Mano-a-Mano: Does Penn football's nonconference slate matter?

Sports Editor John Phillips: I remember starting out as a football beat last year, watching Penn lose to Lafayette and Villanova. The Quakers went 0-for their entire non-conference slate and I couldn't help but think that they didn't have themselves together. What I didn't see is that coach Al Bagnoli and his team think of the nonconference slate essentially as the preseason.

The talent that the Quakers face off against in their nonconference is much better than the teams they face in the Ivy. Win or lose, all that matters is that they are playing against these teams, getting acclimated to the speed of some of the best schools in the FCS. An upset is nice, but it has nothing to do with what will end up happening in the Ivy slate.

Sports Editor Steven Tydings: John, you are usually a champion on these mano-a-manos, but I firmly disagree on this one. While wins and losses in the non-conference slate don't have any weight in deciding the Ivy League champion, the results are still definitively important. Last season, the Quakers began by looking absolutely dreadful in back-to-back weeks, and it showed early on in Ivy play, as the Quakers were barely able to eek out wins over Dartmouth and Columbia. And quite frankly, Penn can't afford to look that bad against to start off against Lafayette and Villanova. The Red and Blue's sluggish start last year carrying over into Ivy play was no coincidence, as they really hadn't work out some major kinks at QB and on defense. With a young defensive line and other question marks on the roster, they definitely need momentum from nonconference play to have confidence carry over against the early Ivy slate.

JP: I give you the fact that, for the young guys, the offseason will be vital — the D-line, the secondary and the running back core all have some deficiencies.

Maybe it's just that I've been drinking the Bagnoli Kool-Aid for too long. He has a process, and while the start of the season is always rough, because we expect perfection, in actuality, Bagnoli's teams win not because they make it look pretty, but because they get snaps, they get game experience. The actual results don't matter.

ST: Maybe the results are secondary to the experience, but there is also another factor we haven't mentioned: pride. No matter how good the nonconference schedule is (and if you look at William & Mary's 2-1 start, it is pretty darn good), the Red and Blue, especially the upperclassmen, are going to be playing for pride and wins and losses are extremely important to that. When I talked with senior defensive back Dan Wilk in the offseason, he was quick to point out that while winning an Ivy title is great, last year's 6-4 record did put a little bit of an asterisk next to the performance. So even if Penn wins another outright title this year, the nonconference schedule will decide whether it was a truly complete Quakers season.