When Tim Begley completed his four-point play to put Penn up three with 1:23 remaining Saturday night, I turned to a fellow writer and asked, "Do you think they're going to win the game?"
He shook his head no.
Just over six minutes of play later, his prediction came true, as Brown sent Penn to the bottom of the Ivy League standings with a 92-88 overtime upset.
While the Quakers were amidst a 10-point run at the time, I told my friend that I agreed with his decision -- after all, I had witnessed the team surrender a similar lead the night before.
Before I even knew about Penn's inability to make free throws or prevent Brown from getting second chances in overtime, there was something that Penn was missing, which was not assuring.
Maybe it was how easily Brown pounded the ball inside to its only starting forward, Jaime Kilburn, who at 6-foot-5 was shorter than every Penn starter aside from Charlie Copp. Despite his lack of size, Kilburn was able to dominate Penn's 6-9 Adam Chubb down low, scoring 11 points in the paint after Begley's four pointer.
I watched Jason Forte confidently pull up and make two threes to start overtime. He followed this performance by making all four free throws in the extra frame.
"The least I can do is hit free throws and a three," Forte said.
There was also Brown guard Mike Martin, who aside from hitting a buzzer-beating shot to send the game to overtime, hit 3-of-4 three-point shots in the game. However, Luke Ruscoe outdid his teammate, making 6-of-7 treys.
For the Bears, there were not enough basketballs for everyone to take and make shots when the game was on the line.
"We were pretty confident and we just kind of used that momentum saying, 'We're not going to lose this game,'" Martin said.
The same held true the night before at Yale, when Edwin Draughan, Paul Vitelli, Alex Gamboa and Matt Minoff all wanted to be the hero who sent the defending Ivy champions packing.
"I just felt like I was at practice," said Vitelli of his clutch free throws at the end of the game to clinch an Elis win.
But, on both nights this weekend, Penn was looking for someone whose name wasn't Begley or Schiffner to be the hero.
With the opposition dedicated to stopping the two Penn guards down the stretch, no other Quakers player answered the call. The remaining players looked afraid to take the big shot. They continuously passed the ball to one another instead of taking the ball to the basket like the Brown players who made the deciding plays down the stretch.
"We've struggled closing out games all year," Begley said. "It showed this weekend more so than anything.... That's just players not making plays down the stretch that we needed to."
It was Penn's confident swagger last season that allowed the Quakers to sweep through the Ancient Eight, winning tough games at Cornell, Brown and Yale. When the team took the ball up the court, it didn't hope to score, it assumed it was going to score. The Red and Blue went into each game knowing they were the superior team and proving it on the court.
However, when games are close this season -- as they often are -- the Quakers seem more surprised to win than expectant.
Sure, you can point out the fact that Penn made all eight free throws in the first half against Yale and then made just 5-of-11 in the second. You can also highlight how Yale grabbed rebounds on 47 percent of its missed shots in the second frame.
Others will criticize Penn's inability to hit foul shots in overtime at Brown-- making just 2-of-6 -- and the Quakers' failure to make shots underneath the basket.
Adam Chubb "missed some easy ones," Martin said.
But it all goes back to Penn's confidence. The more sure the Quakers are that they will win, the easier it will be for them to hit those clutch shots and grab those timely boards.
With second-half leads, the Quakers should be expecting a win, not an opponent's run. But time after time this season, the Quakers have surrendered late leads.
Sometimes Penn is lucky enough to hold on, as was the case against Manhattan and St. John's, where Penn gave up 13- and 10-point first-half leads, respectively.
But against Rider, Yale and Brown, where it had much smaller leads much later in the game, Penn was unable to come away with a win.
"Again a game of runs, which has plagued us all year," Dunphy said after the Brown loss.
But all is not lost.
With an upcoming weekend at home against softer teams in Harvard and Dartmouth, Penn has a chance to start building confidence for the rest of the Ivy League season.
A little bit of confidence can go a long way for this Penn squad. But the team needs to regain some of its swagger soon if it wants to be playing in mid-March.
After the Brown loss, Begley said that all Penn has to do to win the Ivy League is win its next 12 games.
He's right.
The Quakers are good enough to win their next dozen. All they have to do now is convince themselves that they are.
