While perilous road trips lie ahead, including a trip to face Ivy League powerhouses Harvard and Dartmouth next weekend, there is one member of the Penn women's basketball program that believes that the upcoming home games against Yale and Brown comprise the Red and Blue's biggest weekend of all.
That would be Penn coach Kelly Greenberg.
"I think these two games are the most important games for us," Greenberg said. "We have to get two wins this weekend. And I want that pressure. I want our team to know that this is a championship weekend.
"We have to be 3-0 going up to Harvard and Dartmouth. Anything less would be putting the championship on the line, and we don't need to do that right now."
Indeed, the Quakers' margin for error is very small if they want to reach their goal of an Ivy League title and a trip to the NCAA Tournament. The past three league champions, Penn in 2001 and Harvard in 2002 and 2003, lost a total of one league game.
So a loss in either of these two games could mean that the Quakers (7-6, 1-0 Ivy) would be forced to run the table for the rest of the season to win the title.
A loss this weekend would be especially damaging because the contests are at the Palestra, and any team vying for first place in the Ancient Eight must hold serve at home.
Guard Mikaelyn Austin, entering her final Ivy League campaign, echoed her coach's sentiments and reinforced the importance of this weekend as an indicator of how far the team can go.
"It definitely is a very big weekend in terms of which direction it'll send us for the rest of the year," Austin said. "I'm not saying that it's gonna determine how we'll end up doing, but it'll definitely determine the direction we're going in."
Penn will have the opportunity to go up against two teams with contrasting styles. First are the Elis (3-12, 0-2), who combine an up-tempo style with impressive center Erica Davis. The 6-foot-3 freshman has already asserted herself as the team's number one weapon.
The Elis will be followed by Brown (9-6, 2-0), which has already beaten Yale twice this season. The Bears boast a scary frontline featuring 6-foot-5 junior Holly Robertson, 6-foot-1 senior Miranda Craigwell and 6-foot senior Nyema Mitchell.
This trio figures to create size mismatches against the Quakers. But Greenberg believes her team can counter with energy and aggressiveness.
"We need to outwork teams," Greenberg said. "We need to have more energy than them, and use a full court press to create havoc. Sometimes when I think about that early '90s team from Arkansas, I want us to do that, create 40 minutes of hell for other teams. And that's gonna happen in the full court rather than in the half court."
Against Brown, Greenberg plans to guard the Bears' two best offensive players, Robertson and Mitchell, with her two best overall players, senior Jewel Clark and sophomore Jennifer Fleischer. The coach seemed unconcerned that Clark would wear herself out on the defensive end of the floor, thus limiting her ability as a scorer.
"Idon't worry about Jewel,"Greenberg said. "When Jewel gets going it's because she's playing well defensively."
Penn also plans to use more of its bench to defend Brown's taller players. After playing sporadically for the past few weeks, the back-to-back games in the Ivy League may cause some fatigue among the players, especially those Quakers still regaining full strength following injuries.
Greenberg noted that she will be making use of her reserve frontcourt players to compete with Brown's size.
"With Katie [Kilker] coming off the bench, we'll have some people in the game who haven't played that much because of their strength, like a Jenna Markoff," Greenberg said. "We have these back-to-back games coming up, we know we have some depth, so let's use it."
One can only imagine the amount of confidence Greenberg must have in her bench to play them on a weekend that she considers so crucial.
