Noah Savage didn't belong on the bench. At least not the Noah Savage that was one of Princeton's top players in his freshman and sophomore seasons. The one that started 55 games in a row to begin his college career and averaged 6.4 points in his first season and 10 points in his second.

I'm going to admit it: Princeton was almost my first choice when I applied to college. And for my first few months at Penn - when things sometimes got a little overwhelming - I wondered what it would be like had I made my home-away-from-home patrician New Jersey.

When the use of data analysis seeped into the Roger Clemens steroids saga, four Penn professors shifted their focus from the Wharton curve to the Rocket's splitter. On Jan. 28, Hendricks Sports Management, the agency that represents the seven-time Cy Young Award-winner, released an 18,000-word statistical report aimed at disputing that Clemens had taken performance-enhancing drugs.

It certainly isn't the first time that Penn and Princeton will come into a game at the Palestra neck-and-neck in the Ivy League standings. And it certainly won't be the last. But in this new era of Ancient Eight basketball, the historic rivalry game won't be a battle for first place, or even for second.

Two more games, two more losses. The streak now stands at 14 for the women's basketball team. Despite playing at home, Penn lost 70-61 to the Lions (7-13, 4-2 Ivy) on Friday and 80-56 to the Big Red (13-6, 5-1) on Saturday. In both games, the Quakers (3-17, 0-5 Ivy) came out sluggish, down 25-12 at one point against Columbia and 27-14 against Cornell.

Harvard may have dominated the pool this past Saturday, with a 189-104 victory, but it was Penn's seniors who had the crowd on their side as they competed in their final career home meet. Before the meet began, Coach Mike Schnur introduced his four senior swimmers - Alex Keeney, Chris Weitekamp and co-captains Devon Carr and Pat Gallagher - to a crowd filled with family members and friends.

ITHACA, N.Y.- As Penn slogged through its non-conference schedule, Glen Miller and his players expressed similar sentiments after some of the rougher blowouts. Wait 'til the Ivy League, they'd say. That's where the real season begins, that's where the NCAA berth lies, that's where our season can take a positive turn.

ITHACA, N.Y. - Saturday night may have marked a change in the Ivy League guard. In front of a raucous Newman Center crowd, Cornell defeated Penn 87-74 and took a stranglehold on the early championship race. Cornell's victory effectively knocked the Quakers (7-14, 2-2 Ivy League) off their pedestal as the league's dominant team and propelled the Big Red (14-5, 6-0) to that perch.

Brown and Harvard were left quaking in their singlets this weekend, as the Quakers opened inter-Ivy competition by defeating them both. Despite a tiring week of training, Penn was able to make quick work of the Crimson and Bears, beating them 30-7 and 25-9 on Friday and Saturday, respectively.

For the two Penn squash programs, it was a weekend of exhilarating highs and humbling lows. While the men's squad suffered a tough 6-3 loss to Harvard in a match senior Spencer Kurn hoped would be "the pinnacle" of the Red and Blue's season, the women wrapped up the Ivy League crown and an undefeated regular season with victories over Harvard and Dartmouth.

Perfection yesterday was not good enough. In the second round of the Ivy League Round Robin Fencing Tournament at Princeton, both the Penn men's and women's fencing teams went undefeated. Last week they had each lost to Columbia, and that one defeat was enough to push them each down to second place in the Ivies, despite the strong second-round performance.

NEW YORK - Though Penn entered this weekend atop the Ivy League, two close victories at the Palestra against the teams who currently share last place in the standings had proved little. The first tough tests of the conference season came this weekend as the Quakers hit the road to battle New York's two Ancient Eight squads.

After a tough loss last week against Old Dominion, the Penn men's tennis team could've dwelled on the past. But instead the Quakers rebounded back in style on yesterday, finishing with big wins against Temple and Bucknell. The Quakers went undefeated in both singles and doubles against Temple, winning the match 7-0.

As the Ursinus gymnasts exhibited quality performance after quality performance during Saturday's quad meet, the Penn cheers could not be heard over those of the Bears and their supporters. While the Quakers hosted the meet in Hutchinson Gymnasium, the home team advantage seemed negated by an audience divided equally among Penn, Ursinus, West Chester and Wilson fans.

Historically, Columbia has not posed much of a threat for Penn. This is the school that had a symposium on the culture of losing two years ago. The Lions haven't had a winning Ivy season in 15 years. And they've lost 10 of their last 11 games against the Quakers.

Home-court advantage? The law of averages? The mercy of the basketball gods? The Quakers (3-15, 0-3 Ivy) are hopeful that one of these forces can bring them relief from a 12-game skid as they host Columbia (5-13, 2-2) and Cornell (11-6, 3-1) at the Palestra this weekend.

Former Penn tennis star Joe Mirabile will get a chance to revisit his old stomping grounds at Levy Pavillion this Sunday. This time, however, Mirabile will not be rooting for the home team. Mirabile is the assistant coach at Temple. Penn will take on the Owls (2-4) in the first game of its doubleheader, and will then face Bucknell (0-1) in the afternoon.