Sports Briefs

Penn to offer tickets for academic work Penn fans at the Palestra might have to watch their language a little more in their various cheers and signs. After all, there will be young children about. Penn Athletic Director Steve Bilsky announced a new project which will -- in conjunction with the Philadelphia public school system -- give free tickets to selected Penn men's basketball home games at the Palestra. Four tickets will be given to each West Philadelphia student who finishes certain academic activities online. The games that will be available are Penn's home games against La Salle, Dartmouth, Harvard, Yale, Brown, Columbia and Cornell. Except for the Yale game -- the Elis tied the Quakers for the Ivy championship a year ago -- none of these are probable sell-outs. Also underwriting the program are The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Philadelphia Daily News. -- Andrew DeLaney Feast earns bid to All-Star Classic Penn wrestler Matt Feast was honored with a berth in the National Wrestling Coaches Association's 2003 Cape Cod Potato Chips/NWCA All-Star Classic. The University of Delaware's Bob Carpenter Center is the host of the 37th annual All-Star Classic. The classic will be held Feb. 3. Feast is ranked No. 11 in the nation at 285 lbs. and will face No. 8 John Testa of Clarion. The two are the lowest-ranked matchup of the classic. Most of the Ivy League representation was from Cornell. Three Big Red wrestlers -- Travis Lee at 125 lbs., Clint Wattenberg at 174 lbs. and Dustin Manotti at 149 lbs. -- accepted invitations to the event. Penn and Cornell are anticipated to be the top teams in the Ivy League this season and will meet Jan. 31 in Ithaca, N.Y. Lee and Wattenberg are participating in two of the marquee matchups of the day, as each faces the No. 1-ranked wrestler in his weight class -- Chris Fleeger of Purdue and Jessman Smith of Iowa, respectively. Another one-two matchup is at 174 lbs., in which Greg Jones of West Virginia takes on No. 2 Chris Pendleton of Ohio State. Jones is the defending national champion at 174. The headliner heavyweight event is between No. 1 Steve Mocco of Iowa and No. 2 Tommy Rowlands of Ohio State. The final matchup between the two top-ranked wrestlers in the country features Muhammad Lawal of Ohio State against Jon Trenge of Lehigh. -- A.D.