Before shifting into 24-7 March Madness mode, take a moment to consider the Penn women's basketball team, which got a big shake-up last week when the Penn brass announced that it will not renew head coach Pat Knapp's contract.
About time. Don't get me wrong -- I covered this team my freshman year and developed a lot of respect for Knapp. He is very passionate and candid to a fault, and he struck me as committed to the welfare of his players. I owe him a personal debt for always taking the time to help me understand the team's dynamics. But given how poorly Penn has performed in his five years at the helm, this was the right move for the program.
If you ask me, though, the bigger lesson is that Knapp never should have been hired in the first place.
It's not that he was unqualified — he came to Penn with plenty of credentials, as his bio shows, and he had deep roots in the greater-Philadelphia basketball scene. But he arrived after 18 years at Georgetown, a scholarship program in the Big East with a much higher profile than Penn's. The Hoyas won two regular-season conference titles in Knapp's tenure, and he was voted the league's Coach of the Year in 1993, when Georgetown made its first and only NCAA Tournament appearance.
Penn was clearly a step down from that. Knapp came to Penn voluntarily, according to this 2004 report, which suggests to me that he wanted to take things down a notch and finish his career at a program facing lower expectations and less scrutiny.
The Athletic Department should not be hiring coaches with that profile. Instead, it should be going after up-and-comers — coaches who want to move up in the world, who are ambitious, and who don't want to make Penn their last stop. Coaches like that have a stronger incentive to produce winning teams than someone like Knapp.
“We are disappointed that we did not attain the levels of success we anticipated,” athletic director Steve Bilsky said in a press release.
In the end, Knapp's tenure at Penn had three consistent features: 1) Awesome quotes; 2) Attrition problems; and 3) losing records. The first of those can't make up for the other two for very long.
Most basketball fans know Chuck Daly as the coach of the late-1980s Detroit Pistons and the 1992 Dream Team. But anyone who rooted for Penn from 1971-77 remembers him as the steward of some of Penn's last golden years. The news that he has pancreatic cancer, which generally has a five-year survival rate under five percent, is tough to swallow.
Daly, now 78, replaced Dick Harter after the Quakers' phenomenal 1970-71 campaign, still widely considered Penn's best team ever. Daly lived up to his predecessor, guiding Penn to the Elite Eight and a No. 3 national ranking (!) in his first year, the first of what would be four straight Ivy championship seasons.
We at The Buzz wish Daly and his family the best as he confronts his illness.
As I wrote earlier, three teams with direct connections to Penn made the tournament this year. So how did their seeds turn out?
(Click here for the bracket)
Cornell received a 14 seed and will face No. 3 Missouri Friday in Boise, Idaho. It was somewhat of a surprise that the Big Red received that high of a seed considering how bad the Ivy League was this year. But at least Cornell fans should be used to the weather in Boise -- I imagine Boise as a bigger, yet equally bleak, version of Ithaca.
Temple, meanwhile, got a decent draw at No. 11, facing No. 6 Arizona State in Miami also on Friday. I was happy if for no other reason than I called them getting the 11. If they were to upset the Sun Devils, they'd face either No. 3 Syracuse or No. 14 Stephen F. Austin in the second round.
Finally, Villanova gets American. But as a No. 3 seed they get "protected" geographically. So it wasn't really that surprising that they got the Philadelphia game on Thursday. Villanova actually has a decent shot at the elite eight, if not the Final Four. No. 6 UCLA, No. 7 Texas and No. 2 Duke are the top teams in the bottom half of the East bracket with the Wildcats, but I could see Villanova matching up fairly well with all of those. And considering Pitt -- the same team that the Wildcats beat by 10 in January -- is the top seed in the region, who knows, maybe we'll have 1985 all over again. Well ok, they're not winning the national championship. But still.
In sports, there are several "sporting" events that involve actually no physical action. The NFL Draft comes to mind, as does smaller events like the selection of future Olympic host cities or the post position draw for the Kentucky Derby. But without a doubt, the No. 1 of these events is Selection Sunday.
And that glorious day is finally here. True, Penn fans have nothing to look forward to today. But at the same time, Atlantic 10 champion Temple, as well as fellow Big 5 member Villanova, will be waiting to see their seed (my prediction: Villanova a four, Temple a 11). And of course, Ivy champ Cornell also will be watching closely (though they're almost certainly getting a 15).
Speaking of Cornell, they're already being crowned as Ivy League champs next year. It's not that surprising that the Cornell Basketball Blog is already crowning the Big Red as Ivy League champs, seeing how that blog is a lesson in homerism. But the post does provoke an interesting question.
But keeping in mind Cornell fans' arrogance at this point (read the comments of that link), this leads to another question: Do you Penn fans root for the Ivy League team to do well in the tournament? Before the last two years, if Penn didn't make it, then it likely was Princeton in the tournament. So do you still root for a rival to do well in the interest of league pride? And how about the Big 5 schools? Let me know in the comments below.
So lightning can't strike twice? Tell that to Temple, which I just witnessed upset the top seed in the Atlantic 10 Tournament, No. 19 Xavier, to move one victory away from becoming the conference's first-back-to-back champs since 2001. It was the Owls that did it that year, too, and if they beat the winner of the Duquesne-Dayton game (which started moments ago), Fran Dunphy and Co. will notch their second conference auto-bid to the NCAA Tournament in as many years.
That would be great news for the A-10's postseason representation, too, since Xavier has the profile for an at-large bid.
More on this after the postgame press conferences.
OK so this doesn't have any direct relevance to Penn, the Ivy League or the Big 5, but last night (or should I say early this morning) the best college basketball game of the year happened. No. 20 Syracuse and No. 4 Connecticut met in the quarterfinals of the Big East tournament in Madison Square Garden.
And the game went to six overtimes.
Yes, you read that correctly. SIX (6) OVERTIMES. Eventually Syracuse won, 127-117.
The fact that Syracuse won is both fitting and shocking. At the end of regulation, with 1.1 seconds left, the Orange heaved a long pass a la Laettner in 1992. It was deflected by a Huskies player right to 'Cuse guard Eric Devendorf who heaved up a three-pointer right as the buzzer sounded. Although it swished in, it was soon called off since he released it literally a milisecond after the buzzer went off.
But besides that, it's amazing Syracuse won due to one simple stat: for the first five overtimes Syracuse never led. Yes there were ties, but the Huskies never relinquished a lead. But then in the sixth OT, the Orange came out and scored the first eight points of the period. After that they never trailed, and unfortunately one the most epic games in college basketball history ended somewhat lamely, as UConn never came close to coming back.
(The record for the most OT's in a game was seven, set in 1981 when Cincinnati beat Bradley by a ridiculously low score (for 75 minutes of play) of 75-73.)
So who's happiest with this result? West Virginia, who now faces Syracuse at 9 p.m. tonight. In some ways an Orange win in that game might even be more impressive than this morning's game.
1) It might be spring break, but big Penn sports news keeps on coming. In a move that isn't that surprising, Penn will not re-sign women's basketball coach Pat Knapp. That's what happens when your winning percentage at Penn is .348.
2) Here is the final Schuylkill 16 of the year. I've really enjoyed participating in this poll, and hopefully it'll continue next season. Something I never really noticed until now, but the college basketball regular season (well including this Championship Week) is 17 weeks -- just as long as the NFL.
3) In exactly a week one of the best-attended NCAA tournaments will being -- I'm talking about wrestling of course. Surprisingly, one of the biggest challengers to the perennial Big 12 and Big 10 favorites is Cornell, who is ranked second in the nation. The Wall Street Journal, of all things, has a nice profile on the Big Red and their unprecedented dominance this year.
Since there's a chance that you might need a subscription for that link to work, I'll excerpt the first part of the article after the jump.
Ivy-League Cornell Takes On College Wrestling's
Giants
By DAN ACKMAN
Arising from the east may be the most prodigious group of red wrestlers since the fall of the Soviet Union -- and the least likely. Cornell University, coming off its third straight victory in the Eastern Intercollegiate Wrestling Association tournament held this past weekend in Philadelphia, has the second-ranked wrestling team in the nation. Rarely has an East Coast team been ranked so high; for the Ivy League, it is unprecedented.
Cornell has had good wrestling teams before -- the team placed fourth in the NCAA tournament in 2005 -- but this year its wrestlers and coaches talk openly about challenging the mighty University of Iowa, winner of 20 team titles in the past 30 years, for the national title at the tournament in St. Louis starting on March 19. It could happen -- if everything breaks just right for the Big Red.
Cornell's rise to the top wrestling ranks is part "Field of Dreams," part fund raising, and part the story of two unlikely champions. Head Coach Rob Koll, an NCAA champion and the son of a three-time NCAA champion, is wrestling royalty, but he has charted his own path.
1) Yes I'm linking to my own article, but Harrison Gaines has decided to transfer from Penn.
2) In the de facto Ivy League Championship game, the Dartmouth women's basketball team beat Harvard to clinch the auto-bid to the NCAAs. The win gave the Big Green its 17th championship overall, second consecutive and fourth in the last five seasons.
3) The Ivy League announced its men's All-Ivy teams, and Penn did not do very well. Tyler Bernardini managed an honorable mention (his second-straight such honor). And ... that was it.
Zack Rosen, who many predicted would be Rookie of the Year in the preseason, did not win that award. Instead it went to Cornell guard Chris Wroblewski who played in 30 games (seven starts) and averaged 6.7 points, 2.6 rebounds, 2.6 assists and 25.3 minutes per game. Meanwhile, Rosen started 27 of Penn's 28 games and averaged 8.1 points, 3.4 rebounds, 5.0 assists (which led the league) and 31.1 minutes per game. Then again, Cornell won the league with a 11-3 record, while Penn limped to a 6-8 finish.
But I definitely did agree with the Player of the Year choice, as Dartmouth's Alex Barnett more than deserved that honor. He led the league with 19.4 points per game, and ranked eighth in rebounds with 5.6, as he led the Big Green to a 7-7 Ancient Eight record. That was the team's best finish in four years.\
4) Here's a nice reminiscing of old times at the Palestra and Franklin Field.
Hello from the Palestra. The wireless here is not being friendly tonight, but I was able to use the media room's ethernet to give you some halftime stats. I'll have a final report once the game ends. The score at the break is Princeton 27 Penn 25.
Penn's three seniors started the game, and its leading scorers are Kevin Egee (6) and Justin Reilly (5). Princeton has gotten 7 each from guard Dan Mavraides and center Pawel Buczak.
Field goals: Penn 10-24 (41.7%), Princeton 11-26 (42.3%)
Three-pointers: Penn 4-9 (44.4%), Princeton 2-9 (22.2%)
Turnovers: Penn 8, Princeton 5
Free throws: Penn 3-3, Princeton 1-2
Assists: Penn 8, Princeton 8
Rebounds: Penn 20, Princeton 9
Overall, a very even game apart from the rebounding battle. Penn has done a great job of avoiding the Tigers' box-outs and keeping plays alive, getting three-point attempts after several of its nine(!) offensive rebounds. That was the key to the Quakers' victory at Princeton earlier this year, and their best chance tonight is to convert more of those second chances into points.
1. No recap can do justice to Kevin Egee's long three-pointer that beat the buzzer and Columbia on Saturday. Here, then, is the video evidence for your viewing pleasure.
2. The Quakers were certainly ecstatic after the win. But coach Glen Miller was, as usual, a bit more even-keeled. Here are some of his comments that did not make it into the recap:
- "We're struggling. You win a game - and you win a game in that fashion - and it's very exciting."
- "We kind of wasted a good defensive effort - well, we won, so we didn't - but you got to finish defensive[ly] with rebounds. But we gave up 15 offensive rebounds and some of them were critical. ... If we rebound the basketball even to a reasonable level, we're not coming down to the last shot to win the game." Penn was outrebounded, 38-29, including 15-8 on the offensive glass. A full box score is available here. The Quakers are seventh in the Ivy League in rebounding margin; only Dartmouth is worse.
- On the lack of flow: "We’ve been having trouble scoring all year long, so I don’t mind stoppage of play. We got to the foul line. That’s another area where we came up short, really. … If we hit a few more foul shots, pick up a few more rebounds, and maybe it’s just a more comfortable game for us, margin of victory."
Penn shot 17-for-28 (60.7 percent) from the line. Zack Rosen, Jack Eggleston, Rob Belcore and Justin Reilly combined to go a perfectly respectable 16-for-20 (80 percent). But Cam Lewis showed off his great hands with two of the worst free throws I've ever seen. He finished 0-for-3, as did Brennan Votel; Harrison Gaines was 1-for-2.
- "The bottom line is that at this point, it’s a good win. Any win’s a good win. The guys were excited into the lockerroom. It’s different than losing, that’s for sure."
3. Columbia did not hit a field goal in the final six-plus minutes of a game that featured nine lead changes. The biggest margin by either side was a mere eight points, although Penn spent most of the second half playing catch-up.
There was no drama, no doubt, no nothing. Cornell entered last night's game with its ticket to the postseason in jeopardy, but an 83-59 laugher over Penn turned it into a coronation.
The Big Red clinched the Ivy League championship outright, getting the help they needed from Columbia, which beat Princeton, 58-44. They became the first team other than Penn and Princeton to win back-to-back Ivy titles. The season's five remaining games are now just formalities, save for any RPI effects of Cornell's home contest with Princeton.
Without getting bogged down in Xs and Os, I gathered from the radio broadcast that Penn opened with a decent 15 minutes, faltered just before halftime and took a six-point deficit into the locker room, then somehow hit the 'off' switch and watched Cornell sink 19 of 25 second-half shots. I'm at a loss to explain how that happens, and trying to is a depressing excersise.
Coming into the game, three Ivy teams — Princeton, Yale and Dartmouth — all had a legit shot to finish tied for first place with Cornell. The Tigers had the best odds, with several plausible scenarios that would give them a share of the title. They had won three of their last four games and seemed like a real threat. The brass announced that Columbia's Levien Gymnasium would host any playoff. It appeared that the Ivy League might treat us to some last-minute excitement after a season of very poor-quality basketball.
No dice. The situation resolved itself as quickly as it could have and sucked any potential excitement out of the final games tonight and, for Penn and Princeton, Tuesday. The Quakers, for example, played a game with tangible NCAA implications for the first time in a while, even if only as a spoiler. But they won't even get another chance at that. Tuesday night's visit from Princeton will be about pride alone.
The Ivy League championship is often decided much earlier than this. Those who support the idea of a conference tournament (I don't) are right to point out that under the current system, clinching early can make late-season games of the seven non-title-winners seem irrelevant.
1) In case you don't know by now, Cornell won the Ivy League men's hoops title with a 83-58 win over Penn last night. Or not. It turns out that when Cornell fans stormed the court at the end of the game, they broke a scorekeeper's computer. So in fact the score should've been 83-59. Take that Cornell.
2) Looking at the women's basketball scores, Harvard and Dartmouth both won last night. So tonight if Dartmouth beats Brown and Harvard loses to Yale, then the Big Green will win the league. Otherwise, if just one of those scenarios happen, then the Big Green will clinch a share of the title. And if neither of those happen, the two schools will play a de facto Ivy League title game Tuesday in the teams' final regular season game.
3) As the only league to regularly schedule basketball games on Friday night, the Ivy League has gotten some national attention. From bettors.
4) Lastly, some sad news. Chuck Daly, former Penn and Detroit Pistons coach, unfortunately has been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. We wish him all the best in his fight against this deadly disease.
If you haven't yet read Krista Hutz's piece in today's DP about student attendance at the Palestra, please check it out here. It was very interesting to get Penn Athletics' take on it. I am shocked at the athletic department's commitment to continue the system currently in place, especially given the overwhelmingly negative student response. I understand the desire to preserve the Line and give some kind of incentive for students to participate in it, but when the attendance patterns have been as ridiculous as they have this season, a change is definitely in order.
(Continue after the jump)
The main problem this season with attendance is not necessarily overall numbers, or at least that's not a problem that the athletic department has much control over. When the team is as bad as it is, students are not going to show up -- that's just the harsh reality, and hardly one unique to Penn.
At the same time, the athletic department could be taking more strides to improve the numbers, and that starts with creating a more equitable and sensible seating policy.
The biggest problem this season with attendance has been the overwhelming discrepancy between the number of students with seats in the general admission upper tier and the number of students with seats down low (reserved season tickets that were purchased by attending the Line). I will suspend discussion of the value of the Line and make this suggestion, assuming it's feasible. If Penn wants to keep the current system, with the Line and general admission in the upper tier, in place, then students with season tickets from the Line must be required to be in their reserved seats by tip-off. Whatever open seats down low are left should be filled by students with general admission tickets on a first come, first serve basis.
You might think that such a policy would be unfair to season ticket holders that are just a few minutes tardy, but think of the benefits here. First, this policy encourages students both with GA tickets and season tickets from the Line to show up early, helping to remedy the perennial problem of students showing up late to games. There is incentive to show up early both for season ticket holders from the Line and students with GA tickets.
Second, an empty student section down low cheapens the value of the reserved ticket by severely limiting the enjoyment of sitting closer to the court and leading the student section. Based on student reaction, it is pretty clear that the students that do show up and sit in the lower tier would much prefer GA ticket holders to join them than to have to remain separate. Even if no students were in the upper-tier as a result, you would still get a cohesive, louder, and more recognizable and influential student section. With an improved student section in place, basketball games become more fun for students to attend, possibly leading to an increase in overall student attendance.
Certainly, Penn should reconsider the value of the Line in general and whether or not it makes sense to continue in its current form. It does have potential value if and when the team gets better and more fans are attracted to the Palestra. Personally, I think that general admission for the entire student section is the way to go, with an "optional" Line for fans in which other incentives or benefits could be offered. Or you could scrap the Line altogether and go with a Midnight Madness format.
But if Penn wants to stick it out with this current system, then those students that do the Line must follow up on their commitment and show up to games, and show up on time. After all, is it more important to do the Line, or to be at the actual games and participate in an active student section? I would hope the athletic department thinks the latter.
1) In a year in which four of the Big 5 schools -- sorry Penn -- could legitimately claim to have the Big 5 Player of the Year, Dick Jerardi has made up his mind. So who does he pick out of Dionte Christmas, Daunte Cunningham, Rodney Green, Ahmad Nivins or Scottie Reynolds? Here's a hint: Jerardi's choice averages more points, rebounds, blocks and has a better FG and FT percent than any of other player.
2) Mark DeRosa, who played baseball at Penn from 1994-96, is now a member of Team USA in the World Baseball Classic. The headline might be a little off -- although he's playing against the World now, he obviously never played against Penn -- but it's actually a good article. Well worth the read.
3) Remember that Bank of America promotion I mentioned yesterday? Well it's now officially "The Penn Visa issued by Bank of America Fan of the Game." Though yet again the headline is off, as the word "fan" is omitted. So enter to be the credit card of the game!
Yes, they can.
It's a longshot, but Princeton still has a path to the Ivy League title and the NCAA Tournament. And, believe it or not, so do both Yale and Dartmouth(!), although they face even longer odds.
As you can see here, Princeton — the same Princeton I witnessed the Bad News Quakers beat, fair and square, on its home floor in February — is 7-4 in conference play and sits 1.5 games back of Cornell (9-3), which hasn't punched a ticket to a darn thing yet.
The Big Red host Penn on Friday and Princeton on Saturday, while Columbia hosts Princeton first and then Penn. The Tigers then wrap up the regular season with one more game next Tuesday, a contest against the Quakers at the Palestra that could wind up being crucial. If there is a tie for first place when the dust settles, a playoff at a site to be determined will decide who gets the NCAA auto bid.
With some help from Cornell's sports info office, the title scenarios are laid out after the jump.
- If the Big Red beat Penn on Friday, or if Princeton loses to Columbia, Cornell clinches a share of the title. A Cornell win and a Princeton loss would give Cornell the title outright. If Penn and Princeton both win on Friday, nothing's decided.
- Princeton must beat Cornell on Saturday to stay alive. The Big Red clinch an outright title with a win in that game, regardless of what else happens.
- If Cornell beats Penn but Princeton wins out, the Tigers and Big Red will finish in a tie for first place, forcing a playoff. (This despite what would be a Tigers sweep of Cornell.)
- If Cornell gets swept over the weekend, Princeton can lose one of its other two games and still end up with a share of the title. This is where things really get hairy, because in that scenario either Yale or Dartmouth (both 7-5) could also end up in first place by winning both of their weekend games. So we could end up with a three-team playoff.
- Two Cornell losses and three Princeton wins would give the Tigers the title outright.
Whatever happens will be infinitely more exciting than last year, when it seemed like Cornell had things wrapped up around the third week. I hope Cornell ends up in the NCAAs again; their profile is the strongest, and their seeding would be higher than any other Ivy's. But I'd be happy if we were treated to a playoff, too. Both advocates and opponents of a conference tournament would get what they want.
Here's our first Ivy Notes of March 2009:
1) A San Diego-centric website has a surprisingly interesting profile of Tyler Bernardini, and it has nothing to do with the author's first name. Among highlights: Bernardini admits “the Drexel fans are the absolute worst to me" and that "I really didn't want to go to Penn at first."
2) Penn Athletics is offering a chance to one lucky fan to be the designated "Fan of the Game" against Princeton. But Bank of America is sponsoring the event and it's only open to BoA cardholders.
3) I really don't understand how Twitter works, but supposedly if you like college basketball and can use twitter, Soft Pretzel Logic has you covered. Or tweeted. Something like that.
4) Here's this week's Schuylkill 16.
As a senior who will be away on Spring Break next week, I have seen my final Penn game as a student. It was a harrowing walk over to the Palestra for me last night, to know that such a meaningful and enjoyable part of my college experience was coming to an end – and an abrupt one at that. No Ibby Jaaber sitting in the basket after cutting down the nets. Not even a chance to get to ask Glen Miller a question in an NCAA Tournament press conference after a first-round loss. Instead, Penn gritted out one of the ugliest wins I’ve ever seen in that building. After the jump, I offer some concluding thoughts and personal perspective on this team and its beleaguered coach. Pardon the 1900-word essay, but it should be easy reading.
To clear up whatever confusion might exist, I am a die-hard fan of Penn basketball, just like most of you readers, and it pains me to see the team in this state too. I have also had a responsibility as a reporter to cover this team as fairly as possible and not allow my emotions as a fan of the team to get in the way. It’s something that most DP writers grapple with, especially considering how frustrating Penn’s teams can often be.
I am hardly claiming to be the ideal neutral observer here, but I do feel very strongly, as both a reporter and a fan, that the expectations for this team, not just over the past two seasons, but every season that I’ve been here, have bordered on unreasonable. Furthermore, I do not think that Glen Miller ever made a smooth transition to Penn, even in his first season when he took them to within 10 minutes of the second round of the NCAA Tournament. I’ll try to break down these points in more detail and discuss how they relate to the team’s current situation.
In fact, I will start from today and work my way backwards.
There have been a lot of disrespectful messages and comments floating on the DP’s website, the Buzz, and other message boards and blogs about Glen Miller. I have had spirited discussions with many of you about it, and it is clear that I continue to hold a minority opinion. If I were a fan only and not a reporter, and didn't have the same perspective I have now, I would probably be calling for Miller’s firing too. All of those arguments have been hashed out in the past few months though, so I’m not here to continue to argue a point. What I will do is make a few final ones about this program.
First, in case this fact slipped some of your minds, Glen Miller is under a multi-year contract, the details of which are not public. But to put it simply, in order to fire Glen Miller, as so many of you want to do, Penn would have to throw hundreds of thousands of dollars out the window to buy out what’s left on his contract. Then, Penn would have to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars more on a new contract for the next coach. Given the current economic climate and the recent sharp decline in Penn’s endowment, if Penn were to go this route, the backlash from it would far exceed whatever backlash has occurred from Miller’s tenure as coach. It goes without saying, no matter what you feel about Miller, that to fire him now given this reality would be more irresponsible and disrespectful to this school than anything he has ever done as a coach.
Second, I don’t know who Penn fans would have rather had coach this team in the past two seasons – anyone I guess. But I would submit to you that even if John Wooden in his prime were coaching this year’s Penn team, he wouldn’t have won the league. In terms of talent and experience, Penn is not there yet. Perhaps they could have been coached to more wins, but certainly not past Cornell to an Ivy League title. You can blame Miller for his recruits if you want to, but the truth of the matter is that he brought in the Ivy League Rookie of the Year last season and some other players with a whole lot of potential. They don't always play great night in and night out, but they're much further along in their careers right now than average underclassmen.
And given fan expectations as long as I’ve been at Penn, not even an Ivy League title with John Wooden at the helm would have been good enough. In fact, I recall distinctly after Penn’s most recent Ivy League Championship, there was a general feeling that the season’s goal had not yet been accomplished. It was the third Ivy League title in a row – it was getting old already. Fans wanted a first-round win, and when they didn’t get it, they understood but were a little upset. The new expectation going forward, many fans were saying on the message boards at the time, was not to win the Ivy League title, but to get deeper into the Tournament. Rather lofty hopes for an Ivy League, non-scholarship institution.
So sure, it’s possible that another coach could have presided over a .500 or better season this year, but Penn was not winning a title, so fans would have been upset regardless.
But to be fair, the anger directed at Miller cannot be solely blamed on fans’ high expectations. The underlying problem is that he was never a great fit for the program when he was hired and did a poor job from the day he got here of integrating himself into the Penn basketball community, and even the university community as a whole. Fran Dunphy was not just the face of Penn basketball, but in many ways, he was the face of the school. A Philadelphia icon, he taught a class here, sought the advice of many faculty members that he befriended, and truly understood what it meant to be at Penn and compete in this city’s environment. Dunphy was a Philadelphia guy; he got it.
Miller was brought in as an outsider, and it still feels like he’s an outsider to this day. A lot of the relationships that members of the Penn community once had with this basketball program have since faded or been severed completely. Instead of seeing Miller around campus and getting to know him personally and talk to him about his team, everyone is forced to form their impressions of him from the way he comports himself on the bench and in press conferences. And if you’re just basing your judgments on Miller from his behavior during and immediately following games, it would be fair for you to think he was a total lunatic, as many of you do.
When I was a freshman starting out at the DP, I obviously did not have the privilege of covering basketball. But when Dunphy left that spring, my final exam studying was interrupted by the seniors at the DP. They had called me in to the office, along with every reporter on staff, to assemble a war room of sorts to coordinate the paper’s coverage of Dunphy’s departure. I remember it like it was yesterday. My assignment, which remains to this day the most personally challenging and interesting one I have ever completed, was to revisit Penn’s prior head coach search process – the one that yielded Fran Dunphy as an end result. In a 24 hour stretch, I talked to Dunphy, Paul Rubincam – the executive director of the Big 5 and Penn’s former athletic director, and several of the other candidates that were in the running for the job at the time. The one common theme throughout the article seemed to be the importance of prospective coaches having ties to Penn or the Big 5.
“With experience at Penn and in the Big 5, there's a limited learning curve,” Dunphy told me. Rubincam added: “It really helps to understand the Big 5 and the unique situation that Penn is in.”
Nonetheless, Steve Bilsky went a different route and brought in an outsider this time around. He brought in Miller because he proved himself to be an excellent basketball coach and recruiter. He was not, however, someone that had ties to this school or this city’s basketball tradition. As a result, the learning curve has been very steep. Miller is still learning as he goes along. He still doesn’t fully embrace or understand the meaning of the Big 5, and he is only now beginning to understand the basketball culture here at Penn.
For these reasons, Penn fans have a very tough time embracing Miller. They know him only as the guy throwing his jacket and screaming at his players. There is obviously much more to him as a coach and person. He needs to continue to do a better job of opening up to these fans and this program; he needs to repair some of the relationships that have been damaged and immerse himself more in this school’s community.
But when he is an outsider to begin with, and fans are calling for him to be fired, it is very difficult for him to do that. He becomes disillusioned with the situation and probably less willing to make an effort to learn more about this community and fit into it. I do believe Miller is trying to make a commitment to this program for the long haul, and fans need to start recognizing that he is at the very least going to be here next season, with a team that should be much better and competitive in the Ivy League. With this fact established, it is up to the fans and Miller to act accordingly, however they see fit.
If Penn continues to sputter with Miller at the helm for the duration of his contract, then his contract will not be renewed, nor should it be. And in the meantime, Miller needs to work on closing the gap between being an outsider and an active, proud member of the Penn community. Hopefully, if he makes those efforts during the offseason, they will not go unappreciated. If he doesn’t and this team continues to stink, then he’s truly defenseless.
Thanks for reading and sharing your thoughts with me throughout this season. I will continue to entertain your comments and ideas, though I won’t be able to keep in touch next week and am very busy this week. In some ways, I am relieved to be winding down my coverage of Penn basketball. The past season has been tumultuous, to say the least. But the experience overall has been amazing, and I cannot express how fortunate I am to have had the opportunity both to cheer and work at the Palestra throughout my college career.
Fan expectations aside, the basketball culture here is more wonderful than I could have ever hoped for or imagined from an Ivy League school. The passion from the fans this season, regardless of the context, speaks to their enthusiasm and concern for this team. Penn’s basketball culture will never revert back to what it was in decades past. But no matter what your opinions are about this team, the fact that we can still have such spirited conversations about the Quakers, in good times and in bad, is pretty cool in my book. I can only hope that continues long after I graduate in May.
Thanks for reading,
Andrew Todres
Temple couldn't mount a big enough comeback to erase a 16-point deficit at Dayton today, losing 70-65. The box score can be found here and recaps are here and here.
The Owls now finds themselves right where they didn't want to be — needing to deliver a stellar performance in the Atlantic 10 tournament to have a fighting shot at an at-large NCAA berth. The good news is that they remain in fourth place in the standings for now, with a conference record of 9-5; holding on to that position will earn them a first-round bye in Atlantic City.
Temple leads fifth-place Duquesne by a half-game and St. Louis by a full game. Duquesne has a 3:30 p.m. home contest with second-place Rhode Island tomorrow, and the Dukes and St. Louis have a date on Wednesday evening in Pittsburgh.
Yes, Villanova's upset loss to Georgetown will get more play on SportsCenter tonight, but the Owls' defeat is far, far more significant to the postseason prospects of the Big 5. After somehow sneaking three teams in to the Tournament last year, Villanova could be Philadelphia's lone representative this time.
Then again, that's exactly what I thought a year ago, and look what happened.
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