Busy night of basketball

Football team's loss to Yale got you down? It seemed quickly forgotten for one night during an exciting night of Penn basketball.

The men's and women's teams each held their annual Red and Blue (read: White and Blue) scrimmages. Then with a few minutes remaining in the men's game, the announcement was made of the formation of "The Line" for students to buy men's season tickets.

Here are some notes and thoughts from an eventful night.

Men's scrimmage:

Women's scrimmage:

The Line:

Why Penn should have gone for it

I happen to think that Penn coach Al Bagnoli usually does a good job deciding when to go for it on fourth down and when not to. For example, on fourth and five from the Yale 25-yard line late in the fourth quarter of a tie game on Saturday, I was totally behind the coach's decision to try a pass (which ultimately was incomplete).

But in OT, faced with a similar position, albeit six yards closer, Bagnoli trotted out Derek Zoch to try a field goal, which hit the right upright and bounded away, leaving Yale only needing to hit a field goal to win the game, which it did.

Here's my issue -- In his career, Zoch is 4-of-11 on kicks of 37 yards or more (which is where he kicked the unsuccessful try from on Saturday). That's a .364 percentage. Penn had a 4th and 4, which I think the Quakers at least have a better chance of making than 36 percent. In that game alone, Penn was 3-for-4 on 3rd and 3 or 3rd and 4, passing all four times.

In addition, the Quakers averaged 4.8 yards per play in the game. They were having a great deal of success with short passes towards the end of the fourth quarter. Would I have passed on 3rd and 5 the previous play? Yes, but I would have been willing to run if I was committed to go for it on 4th down.

And would the four yards have helped Zoch, even if the Quakers had failed to advance the ball any further then the 15-yard line? I would say yes. In his career, Zoch is 10-for-16 on kicks from 33 yards or less, which is where he would have been kicking from.

The last aspect of Bagnoli's decision that I didn't like is that Yale's Alan Kimball has a big leg, and could make a 42-yard field goal, even if the Quakers defense did not allow a yard. On the season, Kimball is 2-for-3 on kicks of at least 40 yards, including a 48-yarder earlier in the year.

Finally, Zoch was visibly upset when Bagnoli didn't attempt the 42-yarder late in the fourth. At least he could have made a statement with a made kick in overtime.

Unfortunately for Penn, Bagnoli's strategy and Zoch's anger didn't pay off.

Afterthoughts from Yale

Nov. 11 was on every Ivy League fan's calendar this year, but for the wrong reason.

With Harvard's loss to now-red-hot Princeton and Penn's devastating defeat at Yale, the game of the year is no longer Penn-Harvard on the eleventh, or even Harvard-Yale a week later. It's the Tigers' matchup against the Elis at the Yale Bowl.

And with Yale playing Columbia and Brown -- still a mediocre team despite a 28-7 rout of Cornell on Saturday -- there's no reason to believe the Elis will have a conference loss when 11/11 rolls around.

As a fellow 5-foot-9 guy, I have to give wideout Matt Carre some love after his latest performance. Carre caught three passes for 85 yards -- all in the first half, not suprisingly -- and jumped from thirteenth to eleventh on Penn's all-time receiving yards list with 1,155. Next up: 1960's star Rick Owens, who leads Carre by a single yard.

I'm still debating whether or not fans rushing the field after Yale pulled out the win was inappropriate. I've always thought that if fans are going to pull a stunt like that, they'd better have a darn good reason. (Exhibit A: Buffalo's overtime win over Temple after a 3-3 regulation does not qualify. It just made both sides look silly.)

On one hand, the win broke a five-game losing streak against Penn, one short of the longest ever for the Elis. Bear in mind that that was back in the 19th century, something only Coach Lake himself might remember.

On the other, Yale was 4-1 and an underdog in name only. In fact, Yale became the favorite as soon as the kicking game became a big factor, so was the win a big enough shock to justify all that mayhem?

Probably not. But I can't help but like seeing devoted fans finally get to lay it all out on the field. Can you imagine Penn fans doing the same thing if the two team's fortunes were reversed?

Me neither.

FINAL - Yale 17, Penn 14 OT

NEW HAVEN, Conn. -- Both Penn's and Yale's spotless Ivy League records are on the line, and it looks like they couldn't have picked a better day. The sky over the Yale Bowl is almost cloudless, and despite some brisk winds, it looks to be a great day for football.

FINAL: Yale 17, Penn 14

Alan Kimball sent his attempt from 35 yards out straight through the uprights to give Yale the win. Tough loss for Penn, and a huge win for Yale, which now sits even with Princeton atop the Ivy League. Hundreds of Elis fans rush the field, a fitting end to a game that had everything a fan could ask for. You couldn't have scripted this one.

Check back for complete coverage in the next issue of the DP.

Overtime: Penn 14, Yale 14

After the offense gained five yards, Zoch, with the wind at his back, hit the right upright with his 37-yard field-goal attempt, and the Yale Bowl went crazy. Not good for Penn.

Fourth quarter: Penn 14, Yale 14

Regulation won't be enough to decide this one. Penn has been unable to come up with a play when needed in the second half, and despite some late heroics, the Quakers will face their first overtime match since beating Bucknell in double-overtime two years ago.

Ambrogi added to an already-impressive performance by intercepting Polhemus near the sidelines and giving Penn the ball on Yale's 37 with 10 seconds to play. Backup QB Bryan Walker, who has relieved Irvin of his duties for now, threw a short pass and a Flutie-esque hail mary, but neither were successful.

Walker had led the Quakers downfield almost into the red zone, but after a low snap Braden Lepisto was unable to pull down an endzone jump-ball on fourth-and-four, and Yale took over on downs. McLeod immediately responded with a 20-yard dash to midfield, but it only set up Ambrogi's pick.

Here we go again.

Third quarter: Penn 14, Yale 14

Both teams spent most of the past quarter pinned in their own territory. Irvin threw a pick after Yale was forced to punt for the first time today, but safety Scotty Williams sacked Polhemus for a huge loss on the ensuing sequence. Penn got the ball back, punted, and Williams downed the ball on the Elis' three-yard line.

It's been that kind of quarter. These next 15 minutes should be far from boring, though -- they will decide who moves into a tie for first and who falls back in the Ivy League.

Halftime: Penn 14, Yale 14

Penn took a 14-7 lead on a 6-yard run by Joe Sandberg, who has been solid if inconsistent so far. The Quakers did miss a golden opportunity to make it a two-possession game when Derek Zoch missed a chip-shot field goal.

Yale then got some help to even things up. Deep in the red zone, Polhemus rolled right and was smoked from behind by the Penn defense. But he somehow got rid of the ball, which was tipped right into the hands of what would otherwise have been an ineligible receiver. Tailback Mike McLeod punched in the TD on the next play.

If that wasn't enough, the Quakers found an even wilder way to end the next drive -- but this one didn't result in a score. Facing a huge third-and-four in Elis territory with 0:56 left in the half, Robert Irvin lined up in the shotgun and watched as the snap sailed over his head. Sandberg ran down the loose ball and heaved a pass -- his second completion of the year -- to Mizell. The Quakers punted to end the half.

Carre is in the midst of a big game, with 85 receiving yards on three touches. Irvin is an impressive 13-of-16 for 144 yards, while Sandberg has 71 on the ground. For the Elis, Henley is the leading receiver with 58 yards, while McLeod has 50 on the ground -- good, but on pace to be well below his league-leading average.

It's up the Quakers to make sure that doesn't change in the second half.

First quarter: Penn 7, Yale 7

The storyline coming in may have been Yale's running game, but both teams have relied equally on the passing attack so far.

The Elis scored first on a 7-play, 60-yard drive highlighted by a big kick return by Matthew Murray and a 40-yard toss by quarterback Matt Polhemus to wideout Chandler Henley. Henley, considered a focal point of Yale's offense, finished the drive with a 9-yard TD catch.

Penn answered quickly, with a long pass to wideout Matt Carre and a shorter toss to TE Chris Mizell.

Yale gave back some momentum with a missed 42-yard field goal near the end of the first quarter. It's anyone's game at this point.

The Fucito File

I first found out about Michael Fucito, Harvard's prized left-winger, when the Crimson came to Rhodes Field in September.

Penn won that game, 3-1, and that was the best I've seen the team play all year. But Harvard's short, speedy #17 caught my eye. On more than one occasion, he left sophomore John Elicker - one of Penn's best defenders - in the dust. I remember thinking that if he was as good controlling the ball as he was running to catch up to it, the Quakers would have been in trouble.

Well, it seems like the Westford, Mass. native has found that control. In his last two games, the sophomore has three goals and four assists. Two of the goals came in Harvard's whitewashing of then-No. 14 Brown in Providence last weekend. Then on Tuesday, Fucito traveled to my hometown of Worcester, Mass. and dropped another goal and assist in a win over Holy Cross. Thanks in large part to Fucito, Harvard has put up an impressive 11 goals in its last 180 minutes, is on a five-game winning streak and is now ranked #25.

And one day before the Holy Cross win, Soccer Times named Fucito its national player for the week of October 9-15. (He had, after all, gotten the golden goal against Fairfield on Oct. 9.)

With the emergence of Fucito and the presence of Charles Altchek and young Andre Akpan, Harvard might have the best offense in the Ivy League. So as Penn heads up to New Haven to play slumping Yale this evening, one can't help feeling that the Quakers chose the right time to meet their rivals from the Bay State. The question is, can they take advantage of their good fortune?

Anything but Uniform: Yale

Hey Penn fans! Want to see a team that actually looks like Penn State?

Well you'll get your chance tomorrow as Penn visits Yale, which looks like this at home.

Aside from a few minor differences (Yale's actually more complex, with pants piping, shoulder logos, a slightly different number font, and a helmet with two stripes and a logo instead of a blank helmet with one stripe), the two teams are essentially the same, with the exact same color schemes and basic template. They even both sport the "white collar" look (Yale, Penn State)

You could also make the case that Yale just looks like Penn without the red. Either way, you have to give the Elis credit for having the most simple uniform in the league, and almost in all of college football, and not adding ridiculous piping and/or alternate colors like many other schools do. It's an old-school look that looks good.

Red and Blue Crew talk about the Line

Due to midterms, traveling, and a classic evening of telephone tag, I couldn't get these interviews in time for today's story about the Line.

Last night, I spoke to two higher-ups in the Red and Blue Crew, Penn basketball's student fan club. Engineering junior Jason Ginsberg, who runs the R&BC this year, was excited to hear about the decision to go to the Penn-Princeton football game.

"It's fantastic," he said, citing the Penn-Princeton rivalry that exists in all sports and the opportunity for Penn fans in different school years to all be able to experience this football game.

Ginsberg also said that in his first two years, the Line has grown more organized, and he thinks more fun (although they were always enjoyable). He added that this year's line promises to be a "step even further in that direction."

On the other hand, College junior Charlie Weinberg, who is on the executive board of the R&BC, was not thrilled with the decision, for two main reasons. First, while he likes the idea of going to Princeton, he's not entirely convinced that the passionate basketball fans of the Line are going to transfer that to football.

But possibly more important, Weinberg was on the winning team of last year's dodgeball tournament during the Line, and so is disappointed that he can't defend his title.

I think that Weinberg's more serious claim is somewhat logical, although having gone to a bunch of Penn basketball games in my years here, I'm pretty sure that the fans will get into the football game. I have to give big props to the athletic department for making these arrangements, and I give them a lot of credit for taking the iniative to make this plan.

It should be a lot of fun.

Midseason awards

Halftime. Time for the bands to come out and perform their occasionally-funny shows and time to watch hungover students shank the kick for cheesesteaks.

Also time to hand out the midseason hardware, both for Penn and for the rest of the Ivy League.

Offensive player of the half-year:
Penn: Joe Sandberg. The versatile senior has done it with power running, bursts of speed and from time to time, good hands out of the backfield. Sandberg is third in the league with 107 rushing yards per game and also ranks third with six total touchdowns.

Ivy League: Clifton Dawson. The Harvard running back continues his pursuit of the inevitable as he tears apart Ivy defenses. Dawson ranks first in the Ivy League in all-purpose yards and scoring and now stands 401 yards short of Ed Marinaro's Ivy League career rushing record. Honorable mentions to Yale RB Mike McLeod and Princeton QB Jeff Terrell

Defensive players of the half-year:
Penn: Brian Fairbanks and Joe Anastasio. The duo leads a front seven that has been among the league's best. Fairbanks leads the league with 8.5 tackles for a loss and Anastasio is eight tackles clear of the field for the team lead with 41 tackles.

Ivy League: Zak DeOssie. The Brown linebacker is about the only thing the 1-4 Bears have going for them. DeOssie is second in the league with 53 tackles and is way ahead of the pack with 36 solo. Honorable mentions: Harvard's entire run defense.

Trend of the half-year:
Penn: Fourth quarter issues. The Quakers haven't won a fourth quarter in any of their five games. It's only come back to hurt them once, and that might have been the game -- vs. Villanova -- when they played the best fourth-quarter football.

Ivy League: Academic issues, unspecified violations of team rules, midfield brawls, on-campus assaults, press conference meltdowns, senior skit hijinks, fast-food joint melees and a partridge in a pear tree.

Pleasant surprise of the half-year:
Penn: Robert Irvin. The sophomore stepped ahead of Bryan Walker on the depth chart and left the coaching staff with no regrets. Honorable mentions: Red zone "D," Gregory Ambrogi's punt returns, Soph. starter Tyson Maugle's INTs.

Ivy League: Yale's performance. Coming off a down year, and really a down decade, the Elis went shook off an embarrassing loss in the opener to go 2-0 against Lehigh and Lafayette. Now McLeod and crew are looking for a 3-0 start in the Ivies for the first time since 1989. Honorable mention: Ivy's 14-5 mark against the Patriot League.

Disappointment of the half-year:
Penn: Hard to say when out of the 30 team statistical categories, the only one Penn is last in is opponents' penalty yards. A disappointment in the sad sense is sophomore wideout Dan Coleman, who was a pleasant surprise with his cracking the lineup in the preseason and his breakout performance. But it turned to disappointment with an ankle injury, and he hasn't made a catch since.

Ivy League: Brown. Looks like the Bears didn't really win the Ivy League last year. Nick Hartigan won the Ivy League.

Quaker kidnapping

I must admit, Brown students wouldn't normally strike me as violent -- more the mellow type, if you catch my drift.

But when I came across some evidence to the contrary, I was at least glad to see that Brown students are doing their best to strike up some mutual antagonism between our two schools. Heaven knows they could use a rival.

Confused? I'll explain it to you the way one of my DP colleagues explained it to me: "Brown still has our Quaker, and it doesn't look good..."

Maybe, or the player to be named later in the Glen Miller trade just isn't cutting it out in Providence. See for yourself:

Norries Wilson press conference

Maybe you've heard about it, maybe you've read about it on The Buzz, but here it is, unedited, all 6:15 of it. The rant by Lions head coach Norries Wilson was in response to a question to talk about Columbia's inconsistent offense, and opened the postgame press conference after Penn's 16-0 win over the Lions on Saturday.

I'll have more on this in Monday's DP and possibly again later in the week.

Midnight on Broad Street

I headed to the first Midnight Madness of Fran Dunphy's tenure at Temple last night with no idea what to expect -- which, incidentally, is exactly how Dunphy later told me he approached the evening.

But it was clear from the start that this night, as Midnight Madness is supposed to be, was all about the fans. Slam-dunk and three-point contests included, of course.

Seeing Dunphy out on the court with a talented group of athletes again reminded me just how great of a move the job change has been for him. One Temple student told me offhandedly that, while some diehards were not pleased with Athletic Director Bill Bradshaw's hiring of Dunphy, many have come around to Fran since then.

The fan interest that his program received last night probably rivaled any he had seen while at Penn. And as a coach, that's got to feel awfully good.

My other thoughts from the evening:

Temple may not have a Coach Lake-type figure for its awful football program, but it may have his equal for its basketball team. Dressing in simple Temple bookstore sweats, student marketing coordinator Carlos Bates specializes in a rousing refrain of "Your TEMPLE OWLS" that is enought to grab anyone's attention. You might not see Bates, who has been employed with the Owls for "around five years," at a Temple home game, but you sure will hear him.

Best Dressed? That would be every student who coughed up $10 for an "I Love Temple Athletics" shirt. Plain cherry and white lettering, I thought they looked great.

How about worst? None other than the event's organizers, who chose to dress in black t-shirts that had only the ghastly outline of a gigantic owl on the front. Worse, they replaced the owl's eyes with a pair of gold clocks, ostensibly for Midnight Madness. They were flat-out creepy.

Temple administrators are the kings of the gimmick. With raffles for lunch with the Dunph, a semester stipend or endless bookstore giveaways -- along with free pizza for all, no one could claim that the athletic department didn't give enough incentives for students to show up.

Dunphy isn't the only one who's been making a name in the charitable world. While Dunphy has earned praise for his work with Coaches vs. Cancer, women's basketball coach and former WNBA stalwart Dawn Staley has a self-named foundation that offers programs for at-risk children. Not terribly unusual, but I give Temple Athletics credit for promoting it heavily last night.

Which made me realize what a big deal Dawn Staley really is. Apparently she is -- what else could justify this spiffy techno music?

Columbia coach blows a gasket

They were seven of the most unreal minutes of my sports-writing life. Following Penn's 16-0 win over Columbia yesterday, Lions coach Norries Wilson absolutely exploded at his post-game press conference, and it was a sight to be seen.

Wilson was asked by a reporter from the Columbia Daily Spectator to discuss the inconsistency on offense. His answer, while talking a little about the inconsistency on offense, revolved mostly around the following central themes:

• The fact that coach Al Bagnoli is the only person at Penn who treated him with any "modicum of respect"
• Penn assistant coaches negatively recruiting against Columbia
• Penn administrators talking to Columbia players at halftime, telling them they play for a JV program
• The fact that he isn't allowed to bash the officials, so he won't talk about all those times that the Quakers offensive line was holding
• The game was played 18-on-11
• Columbia should hire Penn's offensive line coach to teach his players how to tackle
• Twice using versions of the age-old line that if writers know so much about football, they should coach the team
• The Ivy League does not want a strong Columbia team, because Ivy teams enjoy an easy win on their schedule

Much more on this in the coming issues of The Daily Pennsylvanian

I'm not the world's biggest fan of the Ivy League bands, but I think, in general the halftime shows are in good fun and occasionally make me laugh. But I guarantee you that I was not laughing after Columbia's halftime show yesterday.

It might be funny to enjoy the Mets' success while the Yankees were bounced from the playoffs. But using the line that the Yankees pitching staff went "down in flames" is not the least bit funny.

As somebody who knew Cory Lidle, I can pretty much guarantee you that his widow must have had a good sense of humor, because Cory was a funny guy. So go try that joke out on her; I'm sure she and their 6-year-old son would think it was hilarious.

Wisconsin's band got suspended for its conduct last week, and Columbia's should get the same punishment this week. That was a disgrace.

Anything but Uniform: Columbia

Columbia plays its first road game of the year tomorrow when it comes to Philadelphia to take on Penn, and the Lions have a new look since the last time Penn saw them.

Columbia switched this season from Wilson to Nike, so they no longer look like the Tennessee Titans (no seriously, they're almost the same aside from the Titans wearing their blue pants that day)

Instead, the Lions look like a light-blue version of Dartmouth and a whole bunch of other Nike teams.

Basically, they went from bad to bad, and we'll see whether the Lions go white-on-blue or white-on-white, again, they still haven't played a road game four weeks into the season.

However, the helmets did improve, going from this to this, which is much nicer and matches the school's new athletic script.

So Penn will look a lot better than the Lions in uniform to go along with their likely football advantage, too.

Note: Sorry I screwed up Bucknell last week. Who knew the Bison would whip out a never-before-seen orange third jerseys. It won't happen again. Or maybe it will, but I'll try to make sure it doesn't.

The state of recruiting

In my estimation, there were four types of Fran Dunphy recruits: the local kid, the Jersey kid, the Cali kid and the miscellaneous. In fact 10 of the 15 players on the current roster, all recruited by Dunphy, come from the first three categories.

And if the last week is any indication, there will be four types of Glen Miller recruits too: the San Diego kid, the Bay Area kid, the Valley kid and the kid from the 909.

Miller's first reported conquest as Quakers coach was point guard Harrison Gaines out of Phelan, Calif., located 75 miles outside Los Angeles in the Inland Empire. For the second, he went right back where he started from, getting 6-foot-6 guard Tyler Bernardini out of San Diego.

Those two will join Tommy McMahon from NorCal and Andreas Schreiber from Sweden via SoCal in the Cali contingent. (Schreiber, by the way, was the player to be named later in the deal that sent Eric Osmundson to play professionally in Sweden.) Even if there are only four from the Golden State next year, it's pretty impressive, considering the volleyball team of 19 players only has seven from California, where it's the state sport.

And it's not like the coaching staff is making the cross-country trips just to fill out the roster. McMahon, Schreiber, Gaines and Bernardini all drew interest from bigger and better hoops schools, including several from the Pac-10.

The eastward migration is part of a larger campus pattern of students foregoing the In & Out Burgers for the hoagies. According to this story from a January issue of the DP, California passed New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania in undergraduate applicants.

So don't be the least bit surpised if, with the changing demographics comes a changing schedule. Penn went to San Francisco two years ago and will likely be looking for more games out West.

Eagle-like balance

I was watching the Eagles-Cowboys game Sunday when the announcers pointed out that the Birds had a different leading receiver in each of its five games.

Week 1, it was Donte' Stallworth against the Texans. Week 2, it was apparently L.J. Smith against the Giants, but for some reason, I don't remember that game. Following that were Reggie Brown, Greg Lewis and Hank Baskett the last three weeks.

As soon as that flashed across the screen, I thought that sounded familiar. Did Penn do the same thing in its first four?

Not quite, but very close.

Week 1, it was Dan Coleman with 85 yards against Lafayette. Like Stallworth, he got injured right after that, and Coleman hasn't made a catch since.

Week 2, Chris Mizell just missed, making a team high four catches, but had 11 fewer yards than Braden Lepisto, who led the team

Week 3, it was Matt Carre with seven catches for 87 yards, and Week 4 against Bucknell, Lepisto had seven for 140.

And for the Birds and the Quakers, the result of this balance has been success. Penn quarterback Robert Irvin has his choice of Mizell, Lepisto, Carre, Billy May and running back Joe Sandberg, a competent receiver himself.

Since Dan Castles graduated after the 2004 season, there's been no dominant receiver, just a big handful of good ones.

The big-time wide receiver left, leaving several good ones...

Sounds like something else I heard a little about watching that Eagles game Sunday.

Odds and ends from the Bucknell game

Braden Lepisto's 140 receiving yards were the most for a Penn wideout since Oct. 2, 2004, when Dan Castles caught nine for 145 in Penn's 35-0 win over Dartmouth.

Castles also had two other games that season with more than 130 yards receiving...

It was a tough call for the play of the game between Joe Sandberg and Joe Sandberg.

We went with his 41-yard touchdown run, on which he found a hole, sprinted downfield toward the left sideline, juked a defender, got a big block from Josh Koontz and reached the end zone.

But we could have easily gone with Sandberg's play in the closing seconds of the second quarter. On 4th-and-5, Robert Irvin's pass was tipped at the line of scrimmage. Bucknell defensive end Todd Rinaldo went for the pick, but just popped the football into the air, and Sandberg swooped in for the catch and first down...

It didn't end up as a critical moment in the game, but Bucknell may have cost itself a timeout because of a scoreboard error.

Down 34-17, the Bison scored a touchdown to make it 34-23, which prompted the easy decision to go for the extra point and a 10-point deficit. But the scoreboard read 34-24, and coach Tim Landis took a timeout as his team was lining up for the extra point try. After all, had that been the score, late in the fourth quarter, the smart play would have been to go for two and try to make it a one-score game.

Landis sorted it out with one of the officials, the scoreboard was corrected and Bucknell went on with the extra point.

PENN-BUCKNELL LIVE UPDATES

Final: Penn 34, Bucknell 24

Bucknell managed a pair of fourth-quarter scores against Penn's second-string defense, but this one was decided long before then. The Bison attempted an onside kick with just over two and a half minutes remaining and after some deliberation the referees ruled that possession belonged to Penn.

Irvin ended the day 23-for-33 for 304 yards, three touchdowns and a pair of picks, but the game ball goes to wideout Braden Lepisto and his 140 receiving yards.

Penn is now 3-1, and it's all Ivy play from here on out.

End 3rd: Penn 27, Bucknell 10

Derek Zoch turned around his early-season struggles, connecting cleanly on field goals of 36 and 24 yards to make it a three-possession game.

After the first Zoch field goal, freshman special teamer Chris Wynn forced and recovered a fumble on the ensuing kickoff.

Joe Sandberg went over the century mark in rushing on the next play as he rumbled 30 yards to set up the second Zoch kick.

Bucknell's offense still can't get anything going and has just 153 yards through three.

Halftime: Penn 21, Bucknell 7

Penn tacked on another touchdown in the second quarter and heads into the locker room with a 21-7 lead.

The score came courtesy of Sandberg, who broke into the secondary and easily shook off the only defender between him and six points for his fourth touchdown of the year.

The Quakers defense has also held the Bison offense to 104 yards, dishing out tremendous hits on quarterback Marcello Trigg. Bucknell went-three-and-out twice in the second quarter, giving Penn some of the best field position it has seen all year.

Irvin now has 211 passing yards in the first half, just 16 short of his season high last week against Dartmouth, while Sandberg has 111 (70 rushing and 41 receiving).

End 1st: Penn 14, Bucknell 7

The teams took very different routes to their points.

Bucknell went with an eight-play 53-yard drive following a Robert Irvin interception to take a 7-0 lead and fire up the homecoming crowd.

That didn't last long. On their next play, Irvin found Braden Lepisto, who had beaten double-coverage for a 72-yard touchdown. The Quakers grabbed the lead on their next drive on a 28-yard strike from Irvin to Matt Carre.

Penn looks firmly in control, especially on offense where Irvin has 169 yards passing and Lepisto has four receptions for 110 yards.

Bucknell comes in as advertised, using the pass sparingly in their spread option offense.

Anything but Uniform: Bucknell

Penn has its final non-conference game tomorrow in Lewisburg, Pa, against Syracuse Bucknell, whose home uniforms look (a lot like the Orange's) like this.

This uniform is a more "modern" version of the Bison's previous duds, which Penn saw two years ago. (Notice a field goal actually being made here)

I like the change, especially the disapperance of the orange stripes on the pants which looked pretty obnoxious. It's a good color combo, and while the design is standard, it looks good.

The Bison's helmet looks like this, which is a lot better than the Buffalo Bills helmet that they used to wear.

Overall, not bad but nothing too special.

More on the football schedule

As a companion to the article about the renewal of the Ivy League football schedule, through 2017 from today's DP, here are three additional questions and answers:

1. What does this do to other sports?
Ivy League Associate Director Chuck Yrigoyen made it clear that one of the most important aspects of scheduling in the fall season is keeping the "jamboree weekends." For example, when Brown's football team visits Penn, their men's soccer, women's soccer and field hockey teams will as well. Volleyball's double-round-robin makes its inclusion impossible.

The jamborees will continue under the new system, with the only possible problems coming from conflicts with the soccer NCAA College Cups.

2. Why did they do it so early?
It was a priority to get the league schedule done, because unlike in basketball, the football non-conference scheduling is done years ahead of time. The Penn-Villanova matchup is booked through 2011, and Penn has been in talks with Delaware for 2012. In other words, it was important for the league schedule to be set in order to know which weeks were free for non-conference games.

3. What does it do to travel distances?
For Penn, a lot. Consider the current league schedule travel setup (adding up one-way distances).

Odd years: at Dartmouth, Columbia, Brown, Harvard - 4 games, 1,057 miles
Even years: at Yale, Princeton, Cornell - 3 games, 450 miles

Under the new schedule:
Odd years: at Columbia, Brown, Harvard - 3 games, 694 miles
Even years: at Dartmouth, Yale, Princeton, Cornell - 4 games, 813 miles

Anything but Uniform: Dartmouth

Penn starts the Ivy League season this weekend with Dartmouth -- the team with arguably the most interesting uniforms in the league and the most recent changes.

As recently as 2001, the Big Green wore this. I know it's hard to see, but you can see the following attributes -- sleeve stripes, white pants, black socks, "normal" varsity block numerals.

in 2002, it was the same design, which was made by Wilson.

In 2003, the Big Green switched to Reebok, with this at home, and this on the road in 2004.The big difference is the addition of black, which when it's paired with green together, looks awful.

Then, under new coach Buddy Teevens, Dartmouth switched to Nike in 2005, and all green look. Here's a front view.

The road jerseys, which Penn will see tomorrow, look much better, as you can see here. I'm not a huge fan of green-on-green, and this uniform look, while it's a standard Nike template, does have unique numerals, which I like.

You may have noticed that I've ignored the most obvious feature of Dartmouth's uniforms -- the helmet.

Here's a good look at it. Dartmouth's media guide from a couple years ago has an explanation of their helmet, which was created by one of their coaches (I can't remember which one, because I obviously forgot my copy of the page), in order to be unique. It certainly is, with the logo up front. I can only think of one other team -- the Wisconsin throwback uniforms from a year ago that have something like that. It's a nice touch.

Now, according to the media guide, Teevens got rid of that helmet his first time at Dartmouth, starting in 1987, in order to try to revitalize a struggling program. When he left in 1992, John Lyons brought back the old-school helmet, which Teevens left in place this time.

He may not have turned around the football team yet, but at least Teevens has the uniform going in the right direction.