NCAA Tournament: Not meant to be

LEXINGTON, Ky., March 15 - Penn was shooting itself in the foot offensively, but the 14-seed took a 39-37 lead by scoring 21 points in the first seven minutes of the second half.

From there, the Aggies decided to take things into their own hands.

In the first half the Quakers were bricking open threes, throwing ill-advised passes along the perimeter and missing more than their share of open layups. Their impotent offense quickly disappeared in the second half, though, as they opened eight of 13 from the field.

But the 3-seed finally got a sense of urgency, and played the way a Final Four contender should. Following a timeout, Texas A&M; defenders were all over their opponents on the perimeter like a cheap suit.

"We didn't want to lose," Texas A&M; guard Acie Law said. "We've worked too hard this season to put ourselves in this situation and we didn't want to let that go. . We had to get back in it and that starts with defense. Guys started playing defense and making plays, and [it allowed us] to get back in the ball game and take the lead back."

Interspersed with some full-court pressing, the Aggies' man defense extended long past the three-point line, as they were pressuring Penn guards some 30 feet from the basket. It was clear that the effort had changed, and the deficit had woken up Texas A&M.;

"I was really pleased with the way our team responded when they got behind," Aggies coach Billy Gillispie said.

Following the hot streak and a subsequent timeout, Penn went five-for-21 from the field to end the game. At that point the Aggies defense forced a six-minute scoring drought that allowed them to take back control and create some breathing room. The Quakers were forced to run the shot clock down on most possessions, and it resulted in six attempted three-pointers - two of them were airballs and none went in.

In addition, because they were forced out so far, the Quakers could only retrieve three of their 13 misses in the last 13 minutes, and two of those offensive boards just went off of a Texas A&M; player and out of bounds.

Aside from the increased effort, A&M; made a few tactical adjustments to spark the immediate turnaround.

Gillispie put 6-foot-8 forward Marlon Pompey on Penn point guard Ibrahim Jaaber, and 6-3 guard Dominique Kirk on forward Mark Zoller. The size of Pompey and the speed of Kirk disrupted Penn's best two players, and in turn their offense was thrown out of whack.

"I thought Marlon did a terrific job on [Jaaber] and Dominique has been able to guard everyone from centers to point guards all year," Gillispie said. "We have a lot of flexibility."

Not one of Texas A&M;'s seven-man rotation struggled to keep up in the end - Gillispie also called Joseph Jones' defensive performance "maybe the best job in his career helping against a really hard team to help against." But most of the players gave Pompey the lions' share of credit for holding the Ivy Player of the Year to three points in the final 13 minutes.

"During that run it was a complete team effort, but Marlon stepped up huge for us."

This unorthodox change was something Penn could have still exploited.

"You try to wait for the TV timeouts but sometimes you can't, and we didn't recognize on the floor as quickly as I would have liked," Miller said. "That switch to Ibby created a mismatch opportunity to Mark Zoller in the low post, it just took too long for us to take advantage of it.

Still, the Penn coach thinks there's no shame in getting beaten by one of the best.

"They're one of the best defensive teams in the country, and the statistics" show that, Miller said. "They stepped up and played very good defense, so give them all the credit in the world."

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