Women's hoops begins defense of Ivy title in New England

Ten months and seven days ago, the Penn women's basketball team walked out of the Arena at Harbor Yard in Bridgeport, Conn., after losing to Connecticut in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.

Tonight, the Quakers (7-6) return to the Constitution State for the first time since, as they begin the quest for an unprecedented second straight Ivy League title with a game against Yale (3-12, 0-2 Ivy) in New Haven.

The Elis have gotten off to a rough start in conference play, losing twice by considerable margins to Brown. The Bears (10-5, 2-0) currently sit in first place in the Ivy standings and host Penn tomorrow night.

But Penn senior guard Amanda Kammes said yesterday that she is not fooled by Yale's record -- after all, the Elis upset Harvard at home last season, dealing a near-fatal blow to the Crimson's title aspirations.

"Yale always gives us a great game at their place, so their record can't really speak for their ability or what kind of game they are going to give us," she said. "Any team can beat any other team on any given day, no matter what your record," Kammes said.

Quakers coach Patrick Knapp is particularly wary of Yale's frontcourt, led by sophomore Erica Davis. The 6-foot-3 center is the Elis' leading offensive threat, averaging 12.4 points and 6.9 rebounds per game. But Knapp has studied plenty of game tape this season and has learned quite a bit about Yale's strengths and weaknesses.

"Everybody presses them; everybody denies them," he said. "So we have to have a strong defensive effort and maybe we can duplicate some of those other people's success."

Tonight's game will have an extra twist. It will be broadcast on the YES Network -- the station's first ever Ivy women's basketball telecast. Yankees radio play-by-play voice John Sterling will call the game alongside Chris Shearn and former Duke star Bobby Hurley.

Knapp and Kammes were generally nonplussed about playing in front of the bright lights and cameras, with Knapp noting that "our key is to play well anyway -- just more people are going to see it, I guess."

But Penn senior guard Cat Makarewich, a New Fairfield, Conn., native and self-confessed Yankee fanatic, was more than a little excited to be on the same channel as her favorite team.

"It's awesome," she said. "I've told all my friends who aren't coming to the game to watch the channel, and I'll be playing on the same channel as Derek Jeter, which is great."

This could also be the last game Makarewich plays for the Red and Blue in her home state. Although the University of Connecticut's Gampel Pavilion will host first-round games in this year's NCAA Tournament, Penn would probably only play in Storrs if it was against the Huskies for the second year in a row.

Nonetheless, Makarewich is making the most of this trip.

"I'm really excited for it -- it's always nice to go home," she said "I've got a lot of my friends from high school coming to the game, my friends, grandparents."

After that, the Quakers will head further north to take on Brown. The Bears have enjoyed a strong start to the season and are the only Ivy League team with 10 wins.

Three Brown players are averaging double figures in scoring so far. Junior guards Colleen Kelly and Sarah Hayes are scoring 12.7 and 14.1 points per game, respectively, while senior center Holly Robertson is averaging 15.5 points and 9.2 rebounds per game -- both team highs.

"We're going to be challenged in both games defensively," Knapp said.

But while he emphasizes strong defense, Knapp said he would also be fine with a shootout. And for the first time this season, he conceded that his team is doing better than many expected -- especially those who picked Penn to finish third in the preseason media poll.

This was due mostly to the graduation of stars Jewel Clark and Mikaelyn Austin, who contributed much of the offensive firepower to last year's league champions.

"You know what? In some ways, who would think that we would score the same amount of points or more points with 30 some points graduated?" Knapp said.

If the rest of the league wasn't expecting it, they will start to find out.

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