For the first time since 2007, the Quakers were able to pull off a victory in Ithaca. With the win, the Red and Blue have begun their Ivy season 2-0 for the second consecutive year, but this time the first two wins came on the tough New York road trip.
THE GOOD: Penn’s stifling defense. From the tip, Penn took away Cornell’s best scorers — Drew Ferry and Chris Wroblewski were limited to eight and four points, respectively. The Big Red never got going offensively. The Quakers forced Cornell to take tough shots, resulting in 38 percent shooting from the field for the Big Red, including 18 percent from beyond the arc. The Penn 'D' forced 12 turnovers, resulting in 17 points. After the game, Coach Allen — always a tough critic on defensive play — praised his team’s effort. “A credit to those guys and their commitment to playing with one another," he said.
ALSO GOOD: Penn’s last play of the first half. With 2.6 seconds on the clock, the inbound went to Zack Rosen, who was double-teamed by the Big Red (shocker!), but Rosen was able to get just enough separation from the defenders to find a wide open Steve Rennard at the three-point line. Rennard got off the shot just in time — and nailed it — giving the Quakers all the momentum going into the half.
THE BAD: Miles Cartwright fouling out. The Quakers are at their best when their three top scorers have it going offensively, and that’s not possible if they’re not all out on the court. Cartwright took a couple weak fouls and has to be smarter about his aggressiveness. He also choked up the ball a few too many times, with three turnovers in just 24 minutes.
THE UGLY: Penn at the charity stripe. 8-for-15 from the free throw line isn’t going to help you win too many close ballgames. Luckily for the Quakers, they had this one well in hand. But when it comes time to play the likes of Harvard and Yale, they’ll need every point they can get. The Red and Blue nearly shot better from beyond the arc (50 percent) than they did from the line (53 percent). Cornell struggled as well, hitting only 13-of-24 (54 percent) free throws.
The Quakers roll home to Philadelphia 2-0 after a narrow win at Columbia Friday and a solid 12-point victory over Cornell, the first at Newman Arena for any of Penn's current players. Here are postgame interviews with coach Jerome Allen and senior Tyler Bernardini, who led Penn with 18 points Saturday.
The Quakers are off to their best Ivy League start since, well, last year after defeating Columbia in the conference opener last night in Manhattan. They now take on Cornell in frigid Ithaca, N.Y. Follow the action live from Newman Arena below:
Though the Quakers began to pull away at the end of the second half — leading by six with 45 seconds to go — the Lions capitalized on several Penn miscues and came within a three-point shot at the buzzer of winning the game. But the Red and Blue prevailed, winning their Ivy opener, 66-64, in Uptown Manhattan.
THE GOOD: Zack didn't do it alone. Too many times this year, the Quakers have relied solely on Zack Rosen for their whole offense. Tonight, he had help. Tyler Bernardini and Miles Cartwright led the way for Penn with 16 points apiece, while Rosen had 15 (but only 2 in the first half). Cartwright missed only one shot on the night — he made 5-of-6. And Bernardini earned most of his points by driving to the bucket and drawing fouls, converting 10-of-11 from the charity stripe. The Quakers are a much better team when Rosen has as much help as he did tonight.
THE BAD: Columbia's shooting from beyond the arc. The Lions came into the game averaging over seven treys per game with the highest three-point shooting percentage in the Ivy League at 38 percent. But Columbia converted only 3-of-19 (16 percent) from long range in this one. It would have been moot, though, if Brian Barbour had been able to sink a game-winner at the buzzer.
THE UGLY: The Columbia band's rendition of Party Rock Anthem. It was bad enough that the band was situated directly behind our position on press row. But when they broke out in Party Rock, it was painful — from the off-key notes to the pauses where they would yell, "Everyday I'm shufflin.'" No wonder their own athletic director banned them from the football team's final game.
With 16 games down and 15 to go (and hopefully more), the DP Sports staff has compiled a collective Good, Bad & Ugly for the season thus far. Penn (7-9, 0-3 Big 5) got off to a quick 3-1 start, but since then the Quakers have dropped eight of 12. The Red and Blue are 4-5 at the Palestra and 3-4 on the road. They begin their quest for their first Ivy Title since 2007 tonight against Columbia.
THE GOOD
Zack Rosen becomes program’s all-time assists leader
With his 506th career assist in a 78-73 win over Lafayette, Rosen passed his coach Jerome Allen as Penn’s career leader.
Zack Rosen named a finalist for 2012 Bob Cousy AwardThe senior guard is the last Ivy League and Big 5 guard in contention. The current field of 20 players will be narrowed to 10 in February and five in March. The award winner will be announced on April 2nd as part of the Final Four in New Orleans.
Tyler Bernardini’s back-to-back monster games
The fifth-year senior notched a career-high 29 points in his home state of California against UCLA, and in Penn’s next game he topped that with 30 points against Marist. On both nights, Bernardini was 8-for-12 from beyond the arc.
Rob Belcore's new offensive confidence
When he’s going, he goes. Always known for his defense, this season he has turned up the heat offensively as well. When Belcore heats up in a game and gets confident, he’s such a black horse. And he’ll do anything to win, even tossing out water bottles. Ivy squads may struggle to answer.
Giving Temple a run for its money
Even in a 73-67 overtime loss, the Quakers played extremely well. Zack Rosen scored 27 points and made 7-of-10 three-pointers, including six in the second half and overtime. And the Palestra was rocking — it felt like a throwback Big 5 game.
THE BAD
Inconsistency of player performance game-to-game
Each game, someone is great — but never at the same time. As the Quakers begin the grueling Ivy weekend with back-to-back game days, they’re going to need more consistency.
Rebounding
The Quakers rank dead last in the Ivies in defensive rebounds. Box out!
Biggest win came against … Robert Morris?
Thus far, the Red and Blue have defeated most of the teams they should have, but they failed to pull off any upsets. They took Temple, UCLA and Davidson down to the wire, but they failed to finish the job each time.
Foul trouble
This issue was epitomized against Rider, when three big men fouled out. Despite the absence of Fran Dougherty, Mike Howlett and Henry Brooks, the Quakers were still able to come away with the 78-72 win in overtime, even though they finished the game with five guards on the court.
THE UGLY
Back to Big 5 irrelevance
After snapping a 16-game losing streak in the Big 5 against St. Joe’s last year, the Quakers are one loss away from going 0-4 in the city series again.
Late arrivals
We’re not talking about the fans. The Quakers just don’t seem to be there when the game starts — they’ve allowed teams to get out to double-digit leads in the first few minutes of too many games to count.
When Zack Rosen sits on the bench
Rosen came out of the La Salle game for 46 seconds, and the Explorers rattled off six points en route to a 68-57 victory. The Quakers just look lost without their star on the court.
Frontcourt mismatches
Penn hasn’t matched up against anyone very well in this area and has looked especially vulnerable against talented big men. In the Pittsburgh game alone, they were outscored in the paint, 48-16. Talk about ugly.
Philadelphia may be home to the constitution, cheesesteaks and Ben Franklin, but this weekend the City of Brotherly Love will also be the temporary home for Lacrosse.
The 2012 National US Lacrosse Convention begins today and will bring together players, officials and fans from all over the country.
The conference, which is located at the Convention Center, will feature training clinics, physical education workshops and a fan fest.
The keynote speaker for the conference will be former professional football coach and Eagle’s cornerback Herm Edwards. His talk on Friday night will be followed Major League Lacrosse’s Collegiate Draft at 8:30 p.m.
On Saturday, the Philadelphia Wings will take on The Rochester Knighthawks in the season opener of the MLL season.
Among the expected speakers for the conference is Kelly Amonte, the head women’s lacrosse coach at Northwestern, whose team has won six of the last seven national championships.
Other speakers include Ricky Fried, head coach of the U.S. Women’s National team, Jim Berkman, the head coach at Salisbury University and all-time lacrosse coach in NCAA history and Gregory Dale, Director of Sports Psychology and Leadership at Duke University.
The senior wasn't selected in today's MLS SuperDraft, but that doesn't mean he couldn't be playing in a professional stadium in the near future. On Monday the MLS will hold its Supplemental Draft, which offers players another opportunity to sign with MLS developmental rosters and reserve teams.
The Supplemental Draft will feature four rounds with 19 picks in each round. Princeton forward Antoine Hoppenot, who was also invited to the combine, was not drafted either.
The only Ivy player to be drafted was 2011 Ivy Player of the Year Lucky Mkosana. The Dartmouth forward was selected in the second round with the 23d pick overall by the Chicago Fire.
Sometime in the coming week Penn soccer will hopefully add a fourth member to the professional ranks.
Senior Christian Barreiro, who attended and played at the MLS Combine, will look to be drafted in either Thursday's MLS SuperDraft or Monday's Supplemental Draft. His inclusion would add another chapter to the recent history of men's soccer players to play in the MLS. Here's a look at some of the others.
Alex Grendi, a midfielder, is fourth all-time on Penn’s career assists list with 20. He was drafted No. 45 overall in the 2009 MLS SuperDraft, made three appearances with the Columbus Crew and was cut after later that year. He now plays for the Wilmington Hammerheads in the USL Pro League.
Daniel Cepero finished as Penn’s career leader in shutouts with 23. Drafted by the New York Red Bulls in the fourth round of the 2007 Supplemental Draft, he was thrust into the starting job in late 2008 and made history by becoming the first keeper in MLS history to score a goal from open play. Cepero played another two years (making stints with the Philadelphia Union and a return trip to the Red Bulls) before retiring.
Matt Haefner, goalkeeper, was a third-team NSCAA/adidas Men’s Division I All-American and 2002 Ivy Player of the Year. The 6-foot-4 keeper was named to Penn’s All-Century team and was drafted in the sixth round of the MLS SuperDraft by the Columbus Crew, but never made any senior appearances for the club.
The eight Ivy coaches participated in the midseason Ivy League media conference today, offering their takes on non-conference play and the up coming Ancient Eight schedule. Here are coach Jerome Allen's remarks (italicized) along with some questions from various media:
I think the beauty of it for us is that we have an opportunity to play now for one of the things we set out for at the beginning of the year, and that is to be Ivy champs. And that starts this Friday. I think for us, coming off a loss last night, and eight out of our last 12 games were losses, for us we’ve just been trying to slowly but surely build the principles that it’s going to take to be victorious in league play. We’ve got a combination of some veterans and some young guys, and I like when they all fuse together, when they all buy in. I’m excited for these guys, I think it’s a great time in their lives. It’s a great time for college basketball, It’s a great time for Ivy League basketball in particular. I look forward to seeing how things play out.
You’ve played a very tough non-Ivy schedule leading up to this, how much do you think that will help you as you get into Ivy League play?
I think it depends on who you ask on the periphery if you think the glass is half full or half empty. We could be a record of, say, 14-2 and not play anyone that is challenging or getting us ready for league play. Or we could have a record of where we currently stand and play at UCLA, at Duke, Pitt, Villanova, Temple, La Salle and say that’s the company we see ourselves in. So hopefully we can draw upon the experiences we’ve had thus far. But to be quite honest with you, that’s really all that I know. That’s kind of the standard for Penn basketball. We’ve had a tough schedule but to get back to where we want to be, those are the types of teams that we have to play and not only play and play close, but we have to beat. Hopefully it helps us going forward, but to be honest with you, I’m kind of disappointed in our results thus far playing against those teams.
Where do you see your team at this point, and what is it that you think you need to improve on as you get into the Ivy League?
We talk all the time as a staff about what do we stand for, what’s our identity. And we would like to say that we’re a pretty solid man to man defensive team, and that hasn’t always been the case thus far. We’ve shown in stretches, whether it be in halves, five-, six-, seven-, eight-minute segments that we can pretty much be a good defensive team. So I’m hoping from that standpoint that once we start league play, those thigns kick in and we really lock in and focus for a full 40 minutes on that end of the floor. And whether the ball goes in the basket or not, who knows, but at least if we give consistent effort on the defensive end, we’ll give ourselves an opportunity to win each and every game.
Zack Rosen was held scoreless last night in the second half. You depend so much on him, do you almost worry about that and tyring to get more complementary scoring and to take a little of the load off him.
It’s one of the things I thought about last night as I was elbowing my wife in the bed. I’d like to say that from his standpoint, I worry more about how he services the group than really scoring, although, I didn’t think he had a great floor game yesterday — I questioned some of the decisions that he made. Do Miles Cartwright and Tyler Bernardini really have to step it up and create opportunities for others? I think that’s the case, but all and all, those guys on the perimeter have opportunities to make plays that they don’t sometimes, and I think that affects how they operate down at the other end of the floor, and that shouldn’t be the case, so hopefully we got it out of our systems and we have an opportunity to come Friday night to right the ship, so to speak. I think our goal is not to win 14 games but to win one game 14 times and if we can just focus in on one game Friday night and then worry about things as they come.
You’ve got one of the best point guard’s in the league if not the best, but Columbia’s Brian Barbour is also playing very well, talk about that matchup between Zack and Brian and your thoughts on Brian’s game.
I think Brian’s playing extremely well, I’d echo that same sentiment. He does a lot for Columbia. He gets the guys the ball, he pushes the ball. But for us it’s not going to come down to Brian Barbour versus Zack Rosen. For us to be victorious Friday night we need five guys engaged in every action defensively, and five guys rebounding the ball and everybody not worrying about the next man’s job but worrying about their job. And if we get that for a consistent 40 minutes, I think we’ll be fine. Columbia is playing great basketball right now, but trying to make the game as simple as we possibly can and make it about our principles and not really about individual matchups.
For the rest of the audio from the conference, click here.
This story slipped under the radar when it first broke before winter break, but former New York Giants fullback Jim Finn, who starred at Penn in the late 1990s, is part of a group of former NFL players suing the league for failing to disclose the risks associated with the use of the painkiller Toradal.
The lawsuit alleges that players were lined up for injections of the drug before games without proper warning of its risks. Some medical evidence has shown that the drug can increase cerebral bleeding and increase the risks of brain damage.
Finn sits at or near the top of many of the Quakers' rushing records. In 1998, he set the bar for season rushing yards in 1998, running for 1,450, and is sixth in career rushing yards. He was drafted in 1999 and began his career with the Colts before moving to the Giants in 2003.
Adding another fold to the story is this piece from Philly.com's gossip blog. Finn's ex-wife, actress Rosa Blasi, wrote a scathing book "Jock Itch: The Misadventures of a Retired Jersey Chaser," that wasn't all too kind to Finn. From Philly.com:
Blasi said that during their four-year marriage, Finn (who she calls "Jim Fish," perhaps to stay out of court) was into gambling and heavily reliant on prescription painkillers. But it wasn't until after their marriage went kaput that she learned he had a penchant for Craigslist prostitutes and had slept with her best friend on their wedding day.
And then there's this:
"This guy will sue a parakeet for squawking," Blasi told RadarOnline.com. "But I have proof of all the things I claim, and he isn't saying that any of this stuff isn't true."
Regardless of Finn's personal past, it will be interesting to see how this and other concussion related litigation play out for the NFL and NCAA.
The result of the game last night should not have been much of a surprise. Maybe you could be surprised by Rosen being held to single digits or Fran having a career night, but the final score was about what should have been expected. Although the Quakers did not play their best and certainly could beat this LaSalle team on a given night, the Explorers are simply a better team.
Coming in we knew this would be a battle of the backcourts. Neither team has a truly established presence down low. The Explorers clearly decided that they would take their chances with the Penn bigs to make sure they shut down the perimeter trio of Rosen, Bernardini, and Cartwright. As a result, Fran got free for many open looks inside.
Every time a Quaker guard drove baseline, the defensive big man rotated over to stop penetration. Interestingly, almost nobody ever rotated over to the newly unguarded Dougherty in the middle of the paint. One time somebody slid over to draw a charge on Fran and another time Miles made a shovel pass instead of a bounce pass that got stolen. Either LaSalle is a very bad defensive team incapable of making a second rotation or they consciously decided to stay home on the shooters. I think it was the latter.
If you take a quick glance at the results for this Quaker team through their first sixteen games, nothing really jumps out at you. They haven't pulled off any stunning upsets or had any glaring losses. According to Sagarin ratings, their best win is over number 93 Robert Morris and their worst loss is to number 240 James Madison, putting Penn almost squarely in the middle of Division I at 174. A lot of times consistency and ability to play to your true talent level is a good thing, but entering an Ivy season where they'll face one ranked team and a couple other solid ones, the Quakers will have to figure out a way to elevate their play.
Despite an "off night" for Zack Rosen — he scored an uncharacteristically low eight points in Tuesday's loss to La Salle — he's the heart and soul of this Penn team. Here's what sports writer Evan Spiller has to say about Rosen's performance:
If there was one redeeming part of Penn’s 68-57 loss to La Salle, it was the play of senior Zack Rosen. He rushed to the ball when it was loose, consistently found the right man, and made several key shots and steals.
But it wasn’t just that his play was inspired that made it a good performance. It’s that it was inspired at the game’s key moments. About ten minutes into the first half, when La Salle was up by seven or eight points, it seemed like the Explorers might run way with it. But Rosen stepped up and, for the next six to seven minutes, Penn barely made a shot that wasn’t his score or his assist. In one play, Rosen knocked the ball out of the opponent’s hand, sprinted half a court’s length to get it, then found a teammate to his side, who hit a three.
A similar thing seemed to happen in the second half when La Salle was up 60-51 with 4 minutes and thirty seconds left in the game. Rosen hit Dougherty with a tough bounce pass in the key, then, on the next play, made a lay-up to put the game at 60-55.
No avail, though. Rosen’s missed three-pointer and the subsequent questionable loose ball foul that voided the tip-in moved the momentum in the opposite direction. La Salle ended the game with a comfortable lead, negating Rosen’s hustle.
It's game three of four on the Big 5 slate and the Quakers (7-8, 0-2 Big 5) are hosting La Salle (12-4, 0-1). The Explorer are on a five-game winning streak, most recently topping Atlatntic 10 opponents Xavier and Massachusetts. The Quakers, meanwhile, will look to avenge an 89-83 overtime loss last year at Tom Gola Arena. Cal Silcox, Jennifer Scuteri and Lucas O'Connor are live from the Palestra:
It's no secret that athletic programs at big-time sports schools rake in a ton of money and coaches and athletic directors at those schools are often the benefactors. In recent months and years, the debate about whether college athletes should be paid continues to be at the forefront of discussions about college sports.
Some argue that athletes are paid through scholarships and other benefits, like team apparel and the use of facilities. Others, however, believe athletes deserve their fair share of the profits. As this New York Times article from Dec. 30 points out, the combined salary of the top 15 highest-paid college football coaches is $53.4 million, while the players make nothing.
Former Penn basketball player Stephen Danley and Wharton professor Ken Shropshire took to the airwaves yesterday to share their feelings about this topic on Radio Times with Marty Moss-Coane. Danley played from 2003-2007 and is a Marshall Scholar at the University of Oxford. Shropshire is the director of the Wharton Sports Business Initiative.
Danley believes that student athletes already are paid, though he points out that he did turn down scholarship offers at smaller programs to play at Penn. Shropshire says that even if you agree that players should be compensated, the implementation of any sort of program to do so would be extremely difficult to work out.
It's an interesting discussion, but if an hour of radio doesn't interest you, Danley also wrote an article for the New York Times around March Madness last year on the same topic. He was one of seven writers to participate in the discussion, including Basketball Hall of Famer Bill Walton.
Journalists, current and former players, and fans alike have a lot of opinions about this issue. Do you think college athletes deserve to be paid?
They fell short, however, on their road trip to North Carolina. They suffered a 75-70 loss to Davidson on Dec. 29 followed by an 85-55 loss to Duke on New Year's Day.
The team had a slim victory over Lafayette 78-73 on Jan. 4. Senior Zack Rosen became the all-time career assists leader with 506, passing his coach Jerome Allen.
The men will conclude their winter break against La Salle tonight at the Palestra before beginning the Ivy season against Columbia and Cornell this weekend.
The Quakers may have gotten too much sun in San Diego, because they suffered an 83-48 loss to Princeton at home on Jan. 7.
The women head back to action against NJIT at the Palestra on Jan. 11.
Wrestling (4-3)
The Quakers competed in the Midlands Championships in Chicago, Ill. on Dec. 29 and 30. They finished 15th out of 43 teams. Junior Micah Burak finished second in the 197-pound weight class, becoming Penn's first finalist at the Midlands since 2004. Senior Zack Kemmerer also placed for Penn, coming in seventh in the 141-pound weight class.
The wrestling team followed up Midlands with a dominant 22-9 win over Rider on Jan. 8.
The team will face Cornell on Jan. 14 at the Palestra.
Both the men's and women's swim teams had a strong start to 2012. They went down to Boca Raton, Fla. to compete against Florida Atlantic and Brown on Jan. 4.
The men's team beat Florida Atlantic 179-99 and beat Brown 177-104. Senior Brendan McHugh and his freshman brother Dillon were busy in Florida. Dillon won the 100 backstroke (52.22) and came in second in the 200 backstroke (1:54.41), while Brendan won both the 100 and 200 breaststroke races (56.58 and 2:06.38).
The women's team beat Florida Atlantic 154-124 and beat Brown 174-107. Sophomore standout Shelby Fortin had another strong performance, winning the 200 freestyle by over three seconds with a time of 1:54.74 and the 100 free (53.20).
The men's and women's teams will face Yale and Dartmouth in Hanover, N.H. on Jan. 14.
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