Penn men's basketball falls in overtime to Drexel, 53-52

In the world of Philadelphia basketball, 33rd Street has belonged to Drexel since 2006.

Following Tuesday evening, by the slimmest of margins, the road will remain Dragon territory.

A trio of controversial calls carried Drexel to a late overtime lead, and a potential Antonio Woods game-winning floater with five seconds left fell agonizingly short, as the Dragons (2-8) held off Penn (5-6), 53-52 in the Daskalakis Athletic Center to win their sixth consecutive meeting between the local rivals.

“We needed to get lucky one time,” said Drexel coach Bruiser Flint, whose team has lost six games by single digits this season. “Better to be lucky than good sometimes.”

Penn struck first with a pair of quick layups by Mike Auger and Woods to take a 4-0 lead, before a slew of Quaker turnovers catalyzed an 8-0 Drexel run to put the Dragons up by four.

From there, poor offense was the theme throughout the remainder of the first half, with neither team building any momentum for long. Drexel shot a surprisingly poor 26.9 percent from the floor in the first half. Tenacious man defense from Penn limited Drexel to its lowest first-half scoring output of the year, as no one besides guards Tavon Allen and Rashann London (who combined for 15 points in the half) could get anything going for the Dragons.

Unfortunately, Penn kept its end of the bargain up, missing its first seven three-point attempts before Woods finally connected from deep to tie the score at 15 after 13 minutes had already passed. Neither team led by more than four at any point in the frame, as a Darnell Foreman assist to Darien Nelson-Henry put the score at 21-20 Drexel after 20 minutes.

“I think honestly both teams played really good defense,” Penn coach Steve Donahue said. “Drexel is aggressive and physical and we knew we were going to have to win this game with the set pieces. I was really proud of our guys — we really fought hard, we had chances to win it, just had a couple of bounces not go our way.”

As the second half begun, both teams gave a tease of offensive prowess — Sam Jones scored five points in the first three minutes, while Drexel forward Kazembe Abif, who finished with 13 points and a career-best 14 rebounds, began to dominate inside for the Dragons — as Penn jumped out to a 32-28 lead with 15 minutes to go.

However, the offensive struggles soon returned for the Quakers. Over a stretch of more than eight minutes midway through the second half, the team went scoreless and committed six turnovers, as Abif and Allen catalyzed another 8-0 run to seemingly put Drexel in control.

“It’s all about our defense,” Abif said. “[Penn] is averaging almost 70 points a game, and we held them to 52. We talked about getting stops in practice, and that’s what won us the game; we got stops when we needed to.”

Led by Nelson-Henry’s 12 rebounds and three blocks, Penn held defensively, with Drexel’s lead never exceeding four points for the remainder of the contest. A layup by Nelson-Henry, who finished with 10 points, with 2:10 left brought Penn within one point, before a crucial and-one from Auger gave Penn its first lead in more than 10 minutes before Drexel tied it back up.

With time winding down in regulation, Woods hit a clutch layup to put Penn up 44-42, but Allen (who finished with 16 points) hit a pair of free throws of his own to tie it back up. Woods missed a jumper just before the buzzer to send the game to overtime, with both teams tying or surpassing their lowest regulation scoring outputs of the season.

“Antonio has been great, especially since we’re talking 11 games into his sophomore year,” Donahue said. “He gets 22 against Temple and then on the road here, gets two really great looks — I thought he got fouled on the first one — and then had a great tuck-under at the end, but just didn’t fall. We’re not getting close to how good Antonio Woods can be, and I’m excited for what the future holds for him.”

Similarly to the beginning of regulation, overtime began strongly for Penn, with layups by Foreman and Woods giving the team a four-point lead.

Like regulation, however, the success was short-lived for the Red and Blue. London scored five straight points to give the Dragons the lead back, before a trio of questionable-at-best calls — one traveling violation on Jamal Lewis, and a pair of shooting fouls on Dan Dwyer and Woods — helped Drexel take a 53-50 lead with half a minute remaining.

Penn fought to the bitter end with Woods, who led both teams with 17 points, making a pair of free throws to trim the lead to one before a traveling call on Allen gave Penn the ball back with one possession to win the game again.

But Woods’ second attempt to clinch a Penn victory fell just short, as the seven-foot floater tantalizingly touched nearly every portion of the rim before missing paydirt, as Drexel secured the rebound and cleared the ball to clinch the slim rivalry win.

“I thought we really guarded well; can’t do anything about officials, they make the calls and you gotta live with them,” Donahue said. “We had chances throughout the game, and to go on the road and hold somebody to 29 percent, you hope to come out with the win. We’re a young team and we have a lot of heart, and we have to put it behind us and get ready for Villanova and league play.”

Penn, which still hasn’t topped a Division I opponent since a Nov. 25 win over La Salle, will get a few days off to enjoy the holiday vacation before coming back into action with a major test. The Quakers will next face off against national powerhouse Villanova (9-2), the 17th-ranked team in the USA Today Coaches’ Poll, on the road on Dec. 28. Penn has lost to the Wildcats in 12 straight seasons, with the last win coming in December 2002.

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