The Quakers have kept the Bears in hibernation for a little bit longer.
After both Penn and Brown suffered defeats in their Ivy League openers, both teams were out for redemption on Saturday at the Palestra. It was the Quakers who ultimately managed to even out their conference record, winning 81-73 after pulling away from the Bears (6-9, 0-2 Ivy) in the second half. Senior guard/forward Ethan Roberts led all scorers with 28 points in his second game back after injury, while senior guard/forward Michael Zanoni added 20 points.
Penn (8-7, 1-1 Ivy) entered the matchup with the pain of a close defeat at Princeton on Monday still fresh, while Brown were seeking their own consolation after suffering a blowout loss to predicted Ivy League No.1 Yale.
Here’s what helped the Quakers bounce back on Saturday, resulting in the first Ivy League victory for coach Fran McCaffery since becoming head coach last spring.
The free-throw line draws the distinction
After an up-and-down first half, Penn managed to pull away in the second, holding off a late-game push by the Bears which cut the lead to two. From that point on, and thanks to a defensive rally by Penn, the game saw no more field goals, only free throws, with Brown only scoring one to Penn’s seven.
It was the Quakers’ skill in getting to the free-throw line that gave them the edge in a game that was — save for the last few minutes — not exactly a defensive masterpiece. In the second half, Penn attempted 18 free throws to Brown’s six and made them at a better rate. Roberts alone made more free throws in the second half than the Bears even attempted, with eight.
“We shot 29 free throws, they shot 12. That was because of [Roberts] moving without [the ball], driving the ball. Michael, moving without it, driving the ball. TJ driving the ball and moving it side to side,” McCaffery said. “That’s what you’ve got to do.”
The ever-reliable Ethan Roberts
If there is one most impactful player on this Penn team, it is Roberts. In only his second game back after five weeks out with an unspecified injury, the senior has continued right where he left off. After putting up 19 points on Monday at Princeton, he scored 28 today, with the timing of these points being even more impressive than the amount.
With Brown at their largest lead of the game on the heels of an 8-0 run in the first half, it was Roberts who was essential to restoring a tie before the half. After a quiet half until that point, he scored eight points in the last three minutes, including a succession of a layup and a jumpshot that gave the Quakers their first lead since the early minutes of the game.
“I mean, I was just trying to let the game come to me and be fluid in the moment,” Roberts said. “When I saw we [made] a bucket, I wasn’t gonna go get one or make a play for somebody else.”
His patience proved essential, and in the second half, Roberts continued to show up aggressively exactly when he was needed. He impressively demonstrated his ability to draw fouls to get to the free-throw line, where he made 12 out of his 14 attempts. The next-highest number of free-throw attempts in the game was six.
Besides Roberts, Zanoni showed off his shooting abilities, knocking down jump shots off-balance with ease. The two seniors combined for 48 points, over half of the Quakers’ total of 81.
A glimpse at the significance of this win
The Quakers’ first Ivy League win of the season was also the first of McCaffery’s tenure. After falling just short at his first chance, he managed to get the win in his second opportunity. As a comparison and a throwback, 10 years ago, former head coach Steve Donahue only managed to get his first Ivy League win in his fourth game.
The last time the Red and Blue beat the Bears was also three seasons ago, before two successive seasons of series sweeps and before many of Penn’s current players arrived in Philadelphia. The confidence from this win will surely carry over into the next game at Dartmouth, the first one this conference season that the Quakers will enter having won the most recent matchup.
The game in Hanover, N.H. next Saturday will be the first of a two-game roadtrip, and the second game will take place at Harvard two days later.
