Game 9 - Harvard: The Good, Bad and Ugly

It was a long shot coming in, but Penn's Ivy title hopes were ended by Harvard Saturday in a 37-20 Quakers loss.

The Good: 5th year senior wide receiver Ryan Calvert is continuing to make us ask why we never saw him play much with the offense before this year. He had 11 catches for 114 yards (of Penn's 195 total in the air) and two touchdowns. It was the first 10+ catch game for a Penn WR since 2007. He has a knack for coming up with the ball in tight coverage, which he repeatedly showed Saturday. QB Billy Ragone is going to miss Calvert next year — of 128 completions this season, 49 have gone to Calvert (38%).

The bad: Calvert's success was a result of the Penn running game's lack of it. The Penn rush was held to just 24 yards on the ground. Harvard's defense bottled up running back Brandon Colavita and kept the fleet-footed Billy Ragone at bay, forcing Penn to throw for yardage. That "one-dimensional" offense, as coach Al Bagnoli said after the game, would not be enough to beat Harvard.

The Ugly: Penn and Harvard played the first quarter fairly evenly, and when the Quakers took a lead at the end of the period it seemed we were in for a game. Then Harvard scored 37 unanswered points. The momentum swung in the Crimson's favor after a forced fumble on Jeff Jack, and then it was completely Harvard's after Penn botched a punt snap giving the Crimson a cheap field goal before the 2nd quarter ended. In that span of 37 points, Harvard just made it look easy, scoring on drives that rarely lasted more than 3 minutes.