Final, Penn 68, Dartmouth 66

Kevin Egee first makes a game-saving block on a Giobacchini layup attempt with Penn up 2. Off the inbound, Fitzgerald recovers the ball from a scramble and puts up a layup that sits on the rim for what seems like an eternity but it falls out and Penn squeaks out a win.

2nd Half :06, 68-66 Penn

Kach fouled Mosley — 40 feet from the basket — and he hit two. But Egee goes back to the line for Penn and made one.

2nd Half :18, 67-64 Penn

The Penn defense held, so Dartmouth was forced to foul Egee. He went to the line for a one-and-one and made both. Glen Miller calls his next-to-last timeout, and Dartmouth has one more good chance to tie the game coming up.

2nd Half :42, 65-64 Penn

Penn takes back the lead! Eggleston tipped in a jumper and Terry Dunn burned his final timeout.

2nd Half 1:14, 64-63 Dartmouth

Wow. Dartmouth hit a layup, Bernardini turned it over, and Barnett drew a foul and hit both free throws, and Dartmouth has a lead for the first time since 18:44 in the first half. This hasn’t been a sudden collapse, but Dartmouth has been chipping away for a long time now, and Penn has gone totally cold from the field. Crucial possession coming up.

2nd Half 2:21, 63-60 Penn

Dartmouth turned it over on the inbounds, and Reilly drew a foul in a scrum on the other end. He hit one, and then Giovacchini — he seems to be in on every play — airballed a three. Bernardini did the same on Penn’s next possession, and the Quakers’ lead is at three.

2nd Half 3:40, 62-60 Penn

Penn didn’t score, but Egee made sure Dartmouth didn’t either. He blocked a driving Giovacchini to preserve Penn’s two-point lead for now. Dartmouth has 4 seconds left on the shot clock when we come back from this timeout.

2nd Half 4:40, 62-60 Penn

No, no, no! Eggleston picks up his third foul. Kurt Graeber makes one. Game is dangerously close to slipping away.

2nd Half 5:16, 62-59 Penn

Bernardini may have helped breath life into the Big Green. He practically body-slammed Giovacchini as he was taking a three, and wouldn’t you know it, it ends up as a four-point play. Not a smart play at all.

2nd Half 5:34, 62-55 Penn

Ugly turnovers are preventing either team from doing much scoring now. Penn is doing the smart thing and taking its time on offense, working as much time off the clock as possible. It’s Grandieri, Eggleston, Bernardini, Egee and Reilly on the floor for the Quakers.

2nd Half 8:24, 60-53 Penn

Giovacchini rolled off a screen and hit a three. Schreiber had a chance to undo some of the damage, but missed two free throws. Only two timeouts left for Dartmouth.

2nd Half 9:34, 60-50 Penn

Barnett got open on the baseline for a dunk and Michael Giovacchini hit two free throws, but Eggleston answered with a lay-in, Gaines found Schreiber with a long pass for a dunk in transition and Grandieri hit another patented mid-range shot. Dartmouth is closing the gap, but if they can’t stop Penn from pulling down offensive rebounds, they won’t have enough possessions to come back.

2nd Half 13:52, 54-41 Penn

Grandieri scored inside and Bernardini hit a fadeaway mid-range J to maintain Penn’s lead despite a rare three-pointer from Dartmouth. Incidentally, Grandieri is playing much better than he did last night. Most of his scoring comes inside six feet, and after hitting a few long jumpers early he’s really gone to work down low against Dartmouth. He may have a double-double before this game is over.

2nd Half 15:48, 50-38 Penn

The Quakers have stretched the lead with some great inside play. Cameron Lewis scored twice inside three feet and Jack Eggleston hit a layup too. Egee is running the point and doing a satisfactory job, even though he just gave up the ball on an ill-advised 30-foot pass. He does that way too often, by the way.

Dartmouth is shooting horribly; this is Penn’s game to lose at this point.

The Red and Blue Crew comes out with its first rollout of the game: “We may have an off year, but you’re still Dartmouth.”

1st Half Statistics:

Leading Scorers: Penn - Eggleston (12), Dartmouth - Barnett (11)

FG%: Penn - 15-31 (48.4%), Dartmouth - 13-29 (44.8%)

Rebounds: Penn - 27 (12 offensive), Dartmouth - 11 (4 offensive)

Assists: Penn - 9, Dartmouth - 4

Turnovers: Penn - 6, Dartmouth - 5

The Philly Phanatic is in the house! Strange halftime entertainment of a pick up game featuring the Penn Quaker, the Villanova Wildcat, the Phanatic and the Philadelphia Soul’s Soul Man. It must be hard to move around in a mascot suit because these guys can’t buy a bucket. The Phanatic looks intoxicated and it seems like the Soul Man can’t see through his big sunglasses.

Halftime, 41-29 Penn

Dartmouth, down by ten and with the shot clock off, failed to take the last shot of the half, leading to a final Penn possession. After the ball was knocked out of bounds with 0.2 on the clock, Eggleston converted an alley-oop jumper to give Penn all the momentum going into the break.

1st Half 1:09, 37-29 Penn

Grandieri is heating up for the Quakers, but Barnett is keeping Dartmouth in the game. Like last night, Penn is allowing too much dribble penetration by opposing guards. Penn is starting to look pretty comfortable on offense though, exemplified by some nice ball movement that led to an Eggleston jumper from the top of the key.

1st Half 2:56, 31-24 Penn

Mosley scores inside after two Penn defenders can’t grab the board, but he then commits a needless reach-in foul, giving Eggleston two free throws, and misses a wide-open three. After a tough Bernardini layup between two Big Green defenders, Barnett winds up for a monster throw down but is fouled by Schrieiber. After the free throws Dartmouth put on the press, but the Quakers broke it easily and Grandieri hit a 3. Terry Dunn is really using his bench, 11 players have entered for the Big Green.

1st Half 7:02, 22-16 Penn

Harrison Gaines has entered the game but Egee remains on the floor with him. The combo seems to be working well so far. Marciano picked up his second foul and was sent to the bench. Ronnie Dixon, despite a nice drive to the hoop and layup conversion is getting the “AIR-BALL” treatment from the Penn students for an earlier three point attempt. Penn is killing Dartmouth on the offensive glass. Lewis just took a missed Gaines’ jumper and put it in for 2. Barnett responded by breaking Egee’s ankles and converting a baseline jumper.

1st Half 11:46, 13-8 Penn

Andreas Schreiber has made an immediate impact off the bench, First he forced a turnover fronting Marciano inside then he hit a short fadeaway jumper and later converted on a layup. Eggleston is exuding confidence and fighting hard inside, but Penn is turning the ball over, which led to a fastbreak layup by Mosley

1st Half 15:52, 5-4 Penn

I guess most of the Greeks had their share of school spirit last night, not much of a crowd here. It’s been somewhat of a sloppy game so far with a lot of deflections and some missed opportunities, including a Cam Lewis missed layup. Marciano looks like he is going to be a tough load to handle for the undersized Quakers inside.

Starting Lineups:

Dartmouth:

F Alex Barnett

F Johnathan Ball

C John Marciano

G DeVon Mosley

G Marlon Sanders

Penn:

F Cam Lewis

F Jack Eggleston

G Brian Grandieri

G Tyler Bernardini

G Kevin Egee

For some reason Penn is wearing their blue away uniforms and Dartmouth is sporting the home white. Justin Reilly had to wear Dan Monckton’s jersey last night after bloodying his own. This may confirm the suspicion that the Quakers don’t have any backup jerseys.

Rob Gross here at the Palestra to bring live updates from tonight’s Penn-Dartmouth contest. Stay tuned for the game’s events throughout the night.

Tags: dartmouth, Game Updates

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