Penn tops Big Green in first Ivy win

The Penn women’s basketball team concluded its season with the fewest wins ever in the program’s 40 years.

But — better late than never — the Quakers did rack up their first Ivy League win.

One night after a heartbreaking loss at Harvard, Penn rallied to defeat Dartmouth, 44-31.

“I think we just were so hungry because we felt the previous night what it felt like to put a whole game together and we knew exactly what we had to do,” senior co-captain Sarah Bucar said.

In the first of their three spring break games, the Quakers came within one possession of beating the second-place Crimson, but lost the nail-biter, 55-52.

With 27 seconds left in regulation and Penn trailing 51-52, freshman forward Jess Knapp split a pair of free throws to tie the game. Despite Penn’s tight defense, Harvard’s Christine Matera downed a three with just 1.3 seconds on the clock to end the game 55-52 in the Crimson’s favor.

“Our defense was awesome that last possession. We just played great defense the whole game,” Bucar said, “so I really do give [Matera] all the credit in the world for stepping up and making that.”

The Quakers came out with a vengeance the following night as they defeated the Big Green (17-11, 6-8) by 13 points to earn their first League victory.

“We even said that the Harvard game meant nothing because it was Dartmouth now and we had to step up to the challenge,” Bucar said. “We just played hungry to win.”

Penn’s defensive efforts finally paid off — the 31 points it allowed was the fewest since a 1995 matchup against Temple.

In addition, both Knapp and senior forward Amy Donovan displayed the team’s offensive strengths, netting 12 points apiece for the second night in a row.

Penn’s three seniors did not finish their career with a win as the Quakers dropped their final match at Princeton, 68-51 the following Tuesday.

“We battled back, [down] 11 with about two minutes left to go,” coach Mike McLaughlin said. “They didn’t give up — we were over matched many times — but that wasn’t going to cause us to give in at all to our opponent.”

Finishing with just two wins, the Quakers set a program record for least regular season victories. Their 22 losses were one defeat shy of their 1995-96 record, when they had just three wins.

And although Penn finished at the bottom of the League, Bucar nabbed a personal achievement of her own as she receivedan All-Ivy honorable mention.

“I think that my teammates and my coaches had a lot to do with it, as cliché as that sounds,” she said. “[They] really made me want to come out and produce and compete every night, regardless of the score.”

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