It's hard to believe how far we've come since Sept. 6. Back when Penn had only won six of the last nine Ivy League basketball titles, Joe Scott still coached Princeton, and Steve Irwin was still alive. But it was that day that I made 10 predictions for the year in Penn and Ivy League sports, and now it's time to see how I did.

It's hard to put together 60 minutes of good lacrosse, but at this point Penn will take 20. In their last four Ivy games, the Quakers had managed a 2-2 record despite winning only five of 16 quarters, and it finally caught up to them last night against Princeton.

Beating a city rival is great. Beating a city rival on a walk-off single is better. The Penn softball team accomplished that feat yesterday during the first game of a home doubleheader against Villanova, beating the Wildcats 6-5 after senior right fielder Melissa Haffner drove in the winning run in the bottom of the seventh.

Wilson hires Penn's O-line coach to teach his guys how to tackle Acting on a pledge he made in 2006, Columbia football coach Norries Wilson hired Penn offensive line coach Jon McLaughlin yesterday. "What we should do is hire Penn's O-line coach to teach our guys how to tackle," Wilson had said after his defense was manhandled by Penn.

In the end, it's not about putting your family in a good environment. It's not about a commitment to winning. It's not about the money. Wait - actually, it is about the money. At least it is for Billy Gillispie, who signed on as Princeton's basketball coach just a week after inking with Kentucky, just a week after re-signing with Texas A&M;.

It started at the Dean Dome and moved its way up to the Palestra. Now, the Adam Franklin show is ready to hit the road again. Destination? Madison Square Garden. No, he's not starring for Ringling Brothers or the WWE, though his new employer is often confused with the two.

Former Penn closer Doug Brown may have found the secret to revive his pitching career. And believers in baseball's new mystical pitch may have to look no further than Meiklejohn Stadium. Brown has learned how to throw a "gyroball," a pitch allegedly invented by an Asian physicist and thrown by new Red Sox starter Daisuke Matsuzaka.

Some old-school Philly flavor will be added to the Penn Relays this year. Ex-76er and former NBA star Charles Barkley will compete in a 100-meter dash against 69-year-old Philadelphia native and comedian William H. Cosby, Jr., Ed. D., better known as Bill Cosby.

As the lethal injection coursed through Barbaro's body at Penn's New Bolton Center, just about everyone had given up on the thoroughbred phenomenon. Everyone, that is, except his jockey, Edgar Prado.

With 51 seconds left in the third quarter of Friday's game, Ari Sussman scored a goal for Dartmouth, putting Penn in a 7-3 hole with just one quarter to play. I was covering the game for the DP, and wrote in my notepad ":51, Sussman. Last nail in the coffin?" Shows how much I know.

In a spectacular and emotional comeback, Penn managed to overcome a 7-3 deficit with five unanswered fourth-quarter goals, upending the Big Green 8-7.

It must have taken snow to finally make Tim Kaijala feel at home. The junior middle-distance runner charged ahead of the pack to easily win the men's 800-meter race on Saturday with a NCAA Regional, qualifying time of 1:50.

If Penn is forced to share the Ivy League men's tennis crown again this season, it won't be with Brown. The Quakers swept their New England road trip this weekend, getting by Yale with a 4-3 victory on Friday before upsetting fellow defending co-champion Brown 5-2 the following afternoon.

Yale provided a cold, cruel wakeup call to the women's tennis team on Friday, but the Quakers woke up just as quickly. Heavily-favored Penn beat Yale 5-2 and Brown 7-0, but not before the team was dealt a scare. The Quakers (13-4, 3-0 Ivy) lost 2-1 in doubles against the Bulldogs (7-8, 2-1), putting them behind early on.

Senior pitcher Erin Boyle must have ice water running through her veins. Boyle came in to "stop the bleeding," as she put it, after a rough first inning in the second game of Penn's doubleheader against Brown, when the Quakers opened the game by allowing five runs to score.

The Penn women's lacrosse team has swept its longest road trip of the year. And if its form in these games is any measure, the winning could continue for a while. In the last leg of the four-game swing on Saturday, the No. 11 Quakers (10-1, 3-0 Ivy) continued to dominate the Ivy League, pounding Harvard, 15-3.

Shortened Navy Invite suits M. Golf just fine After day one of the Navy Spring Invitational, Penn men's golf found itself in third place and only three stokes behind leader St. Bonaventure. For better or for worse, the team would never get a chance to improve on that opening showing.