Maybe just for a week, Penn men's basketball coach Glen Miller wished he had never left Providence, R.I., for the big, bad streets of West Philadelphia. "Penn's not an easy place to coach if you're losing," Miller said. "I think that's an understatement." Miller, who left Brown to take the job at Penn before the 2006-07 season, led his team into the Bears' Pizzitola Center Friday night with more than one monkey on his back.

Without much firepower on offense, there's a surefire way to tell whether the Penn women's basketball team will win or lose. When the Quakers allow their opponents to score at least 50 points in a game, they have a woeful 2-14 record. Going into this weekend's home games against Brown and Yale, the team had held opponents to less than 50 points in a game only three times.

Jerome Allen's best Big 5 memory goes all the way back to his first game in the unique, historic Philadelphia City Series. In the former Penn basketball guard's first career game against Temple, with the Quakers down by one as the clock wound down at the Palestra, Allen stood wide open in the corner of the court and watched teammate Vince Curran heave a turnaround jumper from 15-feet that rattled in and out.

This was not how the men's squash team hoped to end the regular season. Last week, the No. 7 Quakers had reason to celebrate after a narrow loss to No. 5 Harvard and a thrilling comeback victory over No. 8 Dartmouth. After a crushing 9-0 loss to No. 6 Rochester yesterday, though, that momentum is gone and Penn must regroup heading into the national team championships this weekend.

NEW HAVEN, Conn., Feb. 14 - The magic surrounding Penn basketball hasn't been what it once was. But as a youthful team that has dealt with more than its fair share of struggles and setbacks, the Quakers will settle for a slightly humbler existence - one as world-class escape artists.

Heading into the season ranked No. 2, the women's squash team had its eyes on returning to the finals of the Howe Cup with dreams of winning the national championship. Unfortunately for the Quakers, they failed to reach that goal this weekend. Although Penn won 8-1 over Cornell in the first round, its run was stopped by Harvard in the semifinals Saturday in Cambridge, Mass.

Columbia's wrestling facilities may be much closer to the iconic building, but recently it has been the Cornell grapplers putting the "Empire" in "Empire State." Despite their name, the Lions (2-10, 0-4 EIWA) are much tamer than the Big Red (8-2, 1-0), who rank third nationally.

Forgive Brown coach Jesse Agel for sounding less than concerned about his backcourt. "We'll do our best to free our guys up," Agel said of his guards, waving off the question. Though Brown's dismal 0-6 Ivy record (6-14 overall) has a lot to do with how different the Bears' perimeter looks this year - Agel lost his All-Ivy guard duo of Mark McAndrew and Damon Huffman to graduation last spring - his squad's outside presence isn't what he'll need against Penn (5-13, 1-3 Ivy) tonight in Providence, R.

After beating Brown by 21 Friday, the Quakers went into New Haven, Conn., and hung tough for their third Ivy League win, 68-63, over Yale. Harrison Gaines was everywhere in the first half, racking up 14 points and four boards, two of which came on the offensive end on one possession that resulted in two made free throws.

Lately, the Temple-Saint Joseph's series has done wonders for the Owls' postseason prospects. The two teams met in the Atlantic-10 tournament finals last year, and Temple's dramatic victory earned it the league's automatic NCAA bid. Similarly, last night's matchup was less about Big 5 bragging rights than about the A-10 horse race.

If momentum is what the Quakers were looking for, they surely have it. Coming off a huge win over Cornell last Saturday, the Penn women's basketball team is looking to continue its confidence in this weekend's matchups. The Quakers (4-15, 1-4 Ivy) will host Brown tonight and Yale tomorrow.

There is no conference championship tournament in the Ivy League, but this weekend's ECAC Men's Tennis Championships - in which fourth-seeded Penn will take on fifth-seeded Cornell in the first round - sure seems like one. The 2009 version of the annual tournament, which will take place at Harvard's Murr Center today through Sunday, has an Ivy League flavor, with the entire Ancient Eight among the 10 teams invited.

Men's basketball blew out the woeful Brown Bears in Providence, R.I., tonight by a score of 73-52. Brown kept it close in the first frame, battling to a 21-21 tie with 7:04 left in the half, but a rare Brennan Votel three-pointer set the Quakers on a 9-0 run that also featured a Cam Lewis slam and lay-up.

Vengeance will be on the minds of the women's squash players when they step on the court this weekend. The nation's top college squash teams will convene in Cambridge, Mass., today through Sunday for the 2009 Howe Cup. It's also the Quakers' one last shot at redemption.

By JOE SANFILIPPO Staff Writer sanfilippo@dailypennsylvanian.com The men's squash team is looking for some love this Valentine's Day - nothing tawdry, just a win to close out the regular season. No. 7 Penn (7-5, 2-4 Ivy) heads to Rochester Saturday for a midday match with the up-and-coming Yellowjackets (9-5), currently No.

Behind senior captain Carrie Biemer's 28 points and third double-double of the year, the Penn women's basketball team took home its second straight Ivy League victory with a 66-49 win over Brown. The Quakers used an 18-2 run over eight and a half minutes in the first half to take a commanding lead.

Valentine's Day in New Haven. This Penn team just can't catch a break. But after a historically bad weekend in Philadelphia - in which the Quakers endured their first Ivy League weekend sweep at home since 1968 - Yale's cozy John J. Lee Amphitheater might not be as bad as it seems.