Coming live from the Scottrade Center in St. Louis, this is the NCAA Wrestling Championships. I’m Zach Klitzman and I’ll be providing updates as through Saturday, as eight Penn wrestlers look to advance in the national tournament. 330 wrestlers are competing from now until the Finals Saturday evening, representing 74 schools.

Interestingly, the Penn squad has switched uniforms. Instead of going with the solid blue singlets they’ve used throughout the season, they’ve switched up to solid red ones. I’ve yet to had a chance to interview any players or coach Zeke Jones about it, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re special NCAA-only singlets.

(Before I get in much farther, let me say that the internet is spotty at best here in the St. Louis Blues’ home stadium, so apologies there).

It’s roughly 1:30 Central time, and three Penn wrestlers have already competed in the opening round. Ninth-seeded sophomore Rollie Peterkin (125 pounds) dominated his first round opponent, unseeded Jonathan Bittinger of Duquesne, winning with a technical fall 17-1.

However, the second Penn match of the day was less favorable for the Quakers. Junior Rick Rappo (141) faced #3-seed, Kellen Russell of Michigan. The bout went scoreless through two periods, although Rappo forced some injury time in the first when Russell went down with a head injury. But the 25-5 freshman bounced back from the injury, and scored a quick takedown 10 seconds into the third. Russell held on, scoring another takedown and escape, advancing with the 5-0 decision. However, despite the close score, and the zero-zero tie throughout the first two periods, Russell pretty much dominated the match, as Rappo was on bottom throughout most of the bout.
The third bout went similar to Rappo’s. Junior captain Cesar Grajales (149) faced a high seed, Jordan Burroughs, the fourth-seed from Nebraska. And just like Rappo’s it was scoreless after the first period. However Burroughs drew first blood, earning an escape point with :45 seconds to go in the second. However, just six seconds into the third, Grajales tied it up with an escape of his own. But there’s a reason why Burroughs is seeded and Grajales is not. With just under 25 seconds, Grajales had the Cornhusker in a hold, but Burroughs escaped, and then got the reversal, earning three points. With so little time left, Grajales couldn’t earn any points, losing the bout 4-1.

I’ll stop for now, as there are no Penn wrestlers at 157 pounds. The next Penn wrestler is 165-pounder Zack Shanaman.

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First, I should add that at one point the jumbotron revealed team scores. At that point Penn was in 22nd with 3.5, but that was before Shanaman’s upset. (last year the Quakers came in 25 with 28 points).

After the break for the 157 weightclass, I’m back. The second half started with two bouts against ranked Oklahoma State wrestlers. First was junior Shanaman going up against the seventh-seed, Jake Dieffenbach. Dieffenbach had a lead of 4-2 right before the second period was to end, but Shanaman tied it up at the buzzer with a takedown. Finally, with an escape point just fifteen seconds in, Shanaman took the lead. He then played steady defense, holding on for the 5-4 upset win.

While the Shanaman win was the highlight for the team so far, the second Penn-OSU matchup was not as favorable to the Quakers. Redshirt Freshman Scott Giffin (174) faced ninth seed, Brendan Mason of OSU, but the match was more similar to Rappo’s then Shanamans. Mason earned a quick takedown n in 1st, and with an escape and another takedown again, he earned a 5-0 win to even the heads up records of Penn and Oklahoma state wrestlers.

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The next bout, though not against a Cowboy wrestler, was against a Big 12, seeded wrestler. Senior captain Lior Zamir (184) (who was incorrectly called a junior over the PA system) faced top-seed Jake Varner of Iowa State. Varner was 25-0 on the season and was runner-up at the 2007 NCAA Championships. during which he defeated Zamir, 5-0, in the first round of the NCAA Championships. And this year it wasn’t any different.

With :47 left in the first, Varner earned a takedown. and while the scoreless second kept the match close heading into the third, Varner got both a escape around 1:20 and a takedown at 1:01. In the end it was yet another 5-0 shutout loss for Penn.

The next match saw Thomas Shovlin (197) face off against Patrick Bond of Illinois, the 9 seed. It was scoreless in first and second, but just 12 seconds into the third Bond got an escape. However, an escape from Shovlin tied it up. And with both wrestlers not willing to give up any points, we got our first Sudden Victory match for Penn. But Bond got a takedown with just eight seconds left, even though he was dangerously close to being out of the circle. So Bond advanced with a 3-1 win.

Finally in heavyweight there was Trey Mclean against Jared Rosholt, the number five seed from Oklahoma State. And Rosholt just dominated. He got a quick takedown in first minute, and followed that up with a near fall three. And with just one second left in first, he earned the fall against the junior from Penn. With the win OSU is now 2-1 against the Quakers.

Also, they announced the attendance for session one as 15, 513 which is higher than the average attendance from last year’s meet.

That’s it for the first sesssion. The second round will commence at 6:30, so look for more updates then. I’m off to enjoy the comp dinner, as well as watch some sweet NCAA tournament basketball games.

To start off, I believe that as a Penn fan you have to root for Cornell.

Not only are the Big Red repping the Ivy League, former Penn assistant Steve Donahue is as likable a guy as it gets. Cornell is clearly better than anyone else in the Ivies and deserves to be there. The Big Red also don’t dive like Brown, cheat like Harvard, or pop their collars like Princeton. Okay, never mind, we like to do that too.

Anyway, No. 14 Cornell, No. 11 Saint Joseph’s, No. 12 Temple and No. 12 Villanova are all underdogs, but some aren’t by much.

In Vegas, No. 6 Oklahoma is a mere 1.5-point favorite over the Hawks - the only line that’s more even is No. 7 Miami vs. No. 10 St. Mary’s. Temple is +6.5 against No.5 Michigan State and Villanova is +6 against No. 5 Clemson. Finally, Cornell is getting 14.5 points against the No. 3 Cardinal.

First, I truly believe St. Joe’s is going to win. Not only are the Sooners slightly overseeded in many people’s minds, the Hawks are a very good team. Ahmad Nivins and Rob Ferguson are forces down low, Darrin Govens and Tasheed Carr are good ball-handlers and scorers, the lanky Garrett Williamson is a solid defender and 6-foot-10 guard Pat Calathes is a matchup problem for anyone. If you’re a traditional guard, he’ll shoot over you. If you’re a forward, he’s drive right past you.

Also, the Hawks play their best basketball when they are desperate.

St. Joe’s made a nice run in the Atlantic 10 Tournament, soundly beating Fordham, Richmond and then 3-seed Xavier, all games it needed to win. Perhaps once rumblings started of them being in the NCAA Tourney even with a loss to Temple, the Hawks lost the desperation Phil Martelli wanted them to be playing with, and dropped a 69-64 decision to their Philly rivals. When I stepped into their locker room, it was dead silent, and Ive never seen someone look as angry and depressed as the captain Carr was after that game. Look for St. Joe’s to come out firing against a team it can definitely beat.

Temple will have to play a very good game for an upset, while Villanova and Cornell will have to play great ones.

The Owls are playing great basketball, and should have been higher than a 12-seed. Michigan State is a great team, but not only guards Mark Tyndale (an absolute beast - had 15 rebounds against Charlotte in the semifinal) and Dionte Christmas (can score with the best of them) are playing well, the supporting cast - from 5-8 Chris Clark to 6-9 Lavoy Allen to 7-foot Sergio Olmos - is better than it ever has been. This should be a game, and it’s hard to pick against the Owls.

Villanova and Cornell may have a shot, but it’s slim. The Wildcats slip into the Tournament, and play Clemson, a team that really has Final 4 potential. The Tigers are 4-5 against Tournament teams, but four of those losses are to North Carolina or Duke, including having fallen twice to the Tar Heels in overtime and again last weekend by a thread. Scotty Reynolds is getting more help these days, but K.C. Rivers and Clemson’s multiple big men inside as well as shooter Terrence Oglesby should be too much for Villanova

True, it didn’t do much in the non-conference schedule, but it’s hard to go against Cornell’s win streak. Still, does it have a shot of stopping the Lopez twins? Probably not. But any team that shoots as well as the Big Red do, both from the field (49.2 percent, 41.4 from three) as well as from the line (76.3 percent) can be prime for a big upset.

Do your homework before you write. Clearly I need a refresher course. My last post hinged on the ridiculous assumption that Penn schedules its Ivy League games, which it surely does not — a fact that most sports fans take for granted. While I’ve known this all along, it completely slipped my mind when writing the previous post. I certainly feel like an idiot for my unwarranted and sarcastic bashing of the athletic department when I was obviously in the wrong.

Penn’s athletic department is not at all at fault for holding senior day over Spring Break; it’s just an unfortunate consequence of the way that the Ivy League schedule works. When schools have different vacation dates and all games have to be played on weekends, you wind up with the unavoidable situation of having senior night over Spring Break. It wouldn’t make sense to have it any time earlier in the season.

The Ivy League scheduling also alternates home and away dates every season, so you would think that we’d get stuck having a home rivalry game against Princeton over the vacation as well. However, the athletic department realized this situation a few years ago, and the two schools were able to work out a solution in the 2004-05 season where the first game is always played at Penn.

Contrary to what I suggested earlier, the athletic department has worked tirelessly to protect against these attendance issues and should be commended for their efforts. While I’m not sure about the merits of holding “fan appreciation day” over the break, the onus is on me to talk to the marketing arm of the athletic department before bashing the idea. I plan to do so in order to provide a more accurate assessment of the situation.

So to anyone in the athletic department that I offended with my last post, I’m truly sorry. I was the one that made an unconscionable error, and I’ll do my homework next time so that it doesn’t happen again.

I hear that’s a pretty good class for Wharton kids, but I’m in the College, so I wouldn’t know. Maybe the class should be required for the people who work in Penn’s athletic department that are responsible putting together basketball schedules and promotions. Because you’d have to think that in a Wharton marketing class, they’d teach you not to hold “Fan Appreciation Day” or “Senior Night” on days when fans can’t come to the games.

Nonetheless, the athletic department, in its infinite wisdom, has decided that the Red and Blue Crew should be “appreciated” when they’re on SPRING BREAK. Better yet, Brian Grandieri — who has given his heart and soul to Penn basketball and its fans over the past four years — will play his final game at the Palestra in front of an absolutely empty student section. What a great way to honor the seniors!

I understand that attendance hasn’t been good at all this year. But between ordering a ban on the “Hey Song” and scheduling these games during Spring Break, the athletic department is completely failing to ameliorate the situation. In fact, the situation is just getting worse. It is absolutely unconscionable that students have to miss out on the last home games of the season, and even more ridiculous that they’d have to miss out on a promotion designed almost exclusively for them. How could the athletic department be unaware of the fact that the campus clears out after Thursday? Kids that have to travel to get home or go to Spring Break destinations have flights to catch and aren’t going to hang around a few extra days at Penn — it would be unreasonable for anyone to expect as much.

Obviously, when you’re not a league title contender for the first time in a while, it’s not easy to keep attendance and fan support up. The whole process can get a little frustrating. And I’m sure that the athletic department is trying its best to improve the attendance issues — it reflects poorly on an institution that prides itself on school spirit to not have the gym packed. But honestly, this is beyond absurd. Shame on Penn’s athletic department for this tremendous oversight.

After the sruggles of the last few seasons (and the beginning of this one), I never thought I’d say the Penn basketball team would win a game at the free-throw line. Let alone two.

After edging past Harvard thanks to going 17-for-21 from the stripe, the Quakers hit 31-of-36 against Princeton, and again won by a very slim margin. The Red and Blue shot 64 percent in non-conference games, but miraculously have hit 73 percent in the conference slate.

Interstingly enough, while the foul calls helped the Quakers by getting them to the line, they hurt them by getting three players ejected, Andreas Schreiber and Brennan Votel against the Crimson and Brian Grandieri last night. The free-throw shooting once again bailed out a team that was missing a star player (this time Tyler Bernardini, out with a concussion).

And while this was a great game, it was painful to watch. As Rob says, these are finesse teams, and while I wasn’t covering this game, from my angle it looked like they didn’t play any more physically than normal. Players were gettting offensive fouls for posting up and defenders were getting whistled for holding their space. Players were getting called for actions that they would get yelled at by their coaches for not doing. Even the carrying calls were kind of absurd. The game was stopped so often that the contest had no flow, and it’s not fun to see a third of the points scored on free throws. If this was a Big East game, the team managers would have to suit up.

And while I didn’t see it, I’ve heard from multiple people that the Noah Savage technical was for hitting Eggleston in the groin, a la Chris Paul on Julius Hodge, though not as bad.

FINAL: Temple 80, Penn 64

Bernardini hits a three, but it’s a few minutes too late. He then gets called for a charge, and all Temple needs to do is run out the clock.

Gaines gets a steal and a deuce, but the Egee fouls Brooks, and with 22 seconds left Brooks goes to the line.

With a Tyndale free throw, Temple gets 80 points, and the whole crowd receives free tacos.

1:06 2nd Half: Temple 76, Penn 59

With the shot clock winding down, Clark nails another big three to get the lead out to 15. Gaines misses a tough layup, and Temple has just about put it away. The Owls are on a 9-2 run, and have held Penn off very nicely.

2:33 2nd Half: Temple 71, Penn 57 

Bernardini just has no chance. Christmas makes a nasty step-back jumper, that is absolutely huge, opens the lead back to 14. It’s not over yet though, Penn has been scoring a lot.

Bernardini takes a nice pass from Schreiber to get fouled for a 1-and-1.

Eggleston complains about someone standing at the free throw line, and the ref adjust the players quickly.

3:25 2nd Half: Temple 69, Penn 57

Schreiber is unfazed by getting dunked on, pulling down a nice rebound. Bernardini plays tough on the other end, missing a shot, but muscling down the board and scoring.

After two Eggleston free throws cut it to 10, the two teams trade baskets, and Tyndale puts it back to 12.

6:15 2nd Half: Temple 65, Penn 50

SEND IT IN! Tyndale comes through with an absolute monster dunk on Schreiber, even drawing the foul for the and-1 dunk.

Eggleston comes back with a nice move for another and-1, and Olmos picks up his fifth foul, he’s gone. The crowd gives him some support for a nice effort.

6:41 2nd Half: Temple 62, Penn 48 

Gaines takes a screen from Schreiber and steps back for an open three. There’s another timeout on the floor, and Miller is surprisingly positive, clapping and slapping the hand of Schreiber.

7:43 2nd Half: Temple 62, Penn 45 

Kach makes a nice move to the hoop, as Penn is keeping this a game… but then Christmas nails a three to take the lead back to 16. Every time Penn gets close, the Owls hit a huge shot.

Bernardini is heating up as well this half, as he hits another three.

Allen has had a quiet game, but no one boxes him out, and he get the o-board for an easy layup. Gaines knifes through the defense for two right after.

The Owls are shooting an unreal percentage. The defense was pretty bad in the first half, but now it’s just great shooting. They hit 56 percent in the first half, 8-for-12 from three, and they are certainly keeping those numbers up.

11:12 2nd Half: Temple 51, Penn 38 

Finally, Gaines makes an appearance, quickly getting the ball to Bernardini and letting him do the rest.

I’m pretty sure the Miller technical was stemming from the charge that was called on Bernardini, but he might have had a case that Egee’s layup was a goaltend, it might have hit the backboard before being blocked. Head official tonight is Joe DeMayo, so technical fouls aren’t exactly a rarity, he loves to make the controversial call.

12:29 2nd Half: Temple 51, Penn 36

Penn may be down by 16, but is making some signs of coming back in this game. Olmos picks up his second foul of the half that both probably should not have been called, but was also a stupid one for him to commit. Olmos reaches over Eggleston’s back, and he’s got to sit down for a while now.

After a Tyndale basket, Eggleston takes a nice feed from Grandieri for rwo, but then again Tyndale makes a beautiful backdoor feed to Christmas for a layup.

Bernardini hits a three, and Penn’s cut the lead back to 13.

Oh, man jsut like that, Temple has turned the game on its end. Grandieri gets a steal off on Tyndale, but Egee’s transition layup is thrown off the glass by Tyndale, and Christmas takes the outlet for a wide open three. Then Bernardini is called for a charge, and Glen Miller is livid, yelling at the refs and drawing a technical. 

16:17 2nd Half: Temple 45, Penn 29 

Schreiber is continuing his great game, muscling his way to an offensive rebound, but he can’t convert on it. He then draws a foul on the next trip, but then misses two free throws. He’s not perfect, but you have to like his aggressive play.

Egee’s stepping it up, now, nailing a three, and then plucking Christmas on the way in. Schreiber draws another foul, but only makes one free throw. Penn shows press, but backs off.

Schreiber comes out of nowhere for a rejection, and then Eggleston throws Tyndale’s shot off the backboard. After a few sloppy possessions, Schreiber hits a jumper.

Stats: 

The leading man of the half for Penn was by a long shot Andreas Schreiber. He’s got nine points on four of five shooting. It seems like one of Penn’s big me comes to play every night, you just never know which one, and it’s usually only one. Penn’s guards are having a tough time penetrating (big surprise) or really doing anything on offense. Still, they’ve probably been worse on the other end of the floor. Temple has hit 8 of 12 threes. It’s hard to lose shooting 67 percent from deep.
Grandieri and Bernardini have only got up five shots, and have missed all of them, and combined for two points. Lewis leads Penn with three turnovers.
Christmas and Brooks are already in double-figures for Temple, with Tyndale knocking at the door.

HALFTIME: Temple 41, Penn 22  

Eggleston decides he can’t miss any more layups, so he decides to dunk this one home. Temple’s defense is blanketing as Penn tries to take the last shot of the half, but turns it over.

1:07 1st Half: Temple 39, Penn 20  

Brooks takes a baseline pass, and nails yet another three from the corner. Penn’s offense is getting better, though, as Egee gets to the line, hitting one.

Brooks is torching Penn, draining another long J. And on the other end, Olmos is owning Lewis, just back in the game. The Spaniard blocks Lewis on his up-and-under move, warranting an “Ole, ole ole, ole!” chant

Egee’s tough defense isn’t enough, as Christmas is money on a three, and gets fouled on yet another. The Quakers are now in big trouble.

Guzman is down on the floor after the play. He is in pain, but walks off the court with some help.

3:15 1st Half: Temple 31, Penn 19

Penn is fronting the post with Schreiber on Olmos, and Grandieri forces a turnover from behind.

Schreiber is really heating up on offense. He gets his defender in the air and hits for an and-1 (to make it 31-17). Schreiber then nails a 15-footer, and Penn is right back in it, down 12.

4:45 1st Half: Temple 31, Penn 17 

Schreiber gets into it with a put-back dunk on an Egee miss. Grandieri gets in too deep, though, and kills any momentum with a bad turnover.

Brooks gets Schreiber in the air with a pump fake from the corner, but lets Chris Clark nail the final three.

The Penn bench has plays written out on cards that are shown on offense 

The Penn band is finally heard from, they were put up in the rafters, just like in the Villanova game, not quite as bad as that though. 

7:26 1st Half: Temple 28, Penn 12 

Semaj Inge gets his entire mitt on Kach’s pull-up jumper, and then I believe it was Inge again rejecting Bernardini. Conor Turler makes a nice pass into Eggleston for two, but Olmos answers with an easy deuce.

Ryan Brooks now nails a three in Bernardini’s eye, can’t really fault the defense that time, though.

Temple fans roll out a double-banner: “What is Big 5 +1?” and then shortly after “Your 1st half score vs. FGCU!” Not bad, but you’d think they could make a funnier joke about that.

9:44 1st Half: Temple 23, Penn 10 

Penn has played a lot of players so farm and there are currently no starters in. Aron Cohen, Mike Kach and Dan Monckton are at the guards, with Schreiber and Reilly in down low.

Tyndale takes advantage of the skinnier Monckton, and seals him, taking the lob in and getting fouled.

After getting called for a travel (third player so far) Cohen makes a nice feed to Eggleston inside, who scores. Schreiber then hits him for a wide open two, only to see Eggleston botch the open layup. He had a bad angle, and couldn’t adjust.

Temple scores easily on the other end, and the lead is back to 13.

11:47 1st Half: Temple 16, Penn 8 

Ouch, Votel travels, for yet another turnover.

After some nice defense by Bernadini on Christmas, Egee turns an offensive rebound into a three.

WOW, Tyndale goes up for a monster dunk, but misses, and is actually called for a charge on Eggleston. Some guts from the freshman.

Temple is jacking up threes and is starting to miss. Those early hits may have given the Owls a false sense of security.

Andreas Schreiber steps up and hits a three from the top of the key, but Olmos answers with a tip-in.

I should note that Harrison Gaines is dressed, but hasn’t played yet. He’s recovering from a hamstring injury. I’d say it would be a bad idea to risk him re-injuring it, but Penn doesn’t play next in about 10 days.

15:37 1st Half: Temple 12, Penn 1

This is just ugly. Lewis gets it inside, and walks, while the perimeter defense is still atrocious. Christmas hits another trey, with barely any defense on him.

Tyndale finally airballs a shot, and Temple’s back to reality.

But the D is still ridiculous - Brennan Votel, recently in for Lewis, gets rejected by Olmos, and the crowd goes crazy.

17:38 1st Half: Temple 9, Penn 0

Lewis  get the tap, but begins with a horrible entry pass to Grandieri. Then, with the shot clock winding down, Tyndale drains a three over Grandieri.

Now, Lewis gets called for an illegal screen and Penn is off to a terrible start.

WOW. Christmas nails a three over Grandieri, and some nice perimeter passing later and Guzman makes it 9-0 Owls.

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Welcome to the Pal… Liacouras Center? It is certainly odd to see Fran Dunphy coaching a Big 5 game not at the Palestra.

Starters:

Penn:
G Kevin Egee
G Brian Grandieri
G Tyler Bernardini
F Jack Eggleston
F Cameron Lewis

Temple:
G Mark Tyndale
G Luis Guzman
G Dionte Christmas
F Lavoy Allen
C Sergio Olmos

Freshman point guard Harrison Gaines is unlikely to see action tonight against La Salle. He is still feeling the effects of re-tweaking his hamstring last week.

Junior Kevin Egee has been seeing more time in Gaines’ absence. Egee played 13 minutes against NJIT last Saturday (Gaines played 24), but he led the team with 30 against Miami when Gaines was on the bench.

Senior guard Michael Kach is good to go, according to Penn’s game notes, as is junior forward Brennan Votel, who dressed for NJIT but didn’t get in the game. Kach had been out with a back problem and Votel with a hamstring injury.

Elsewhere in the Big 5, both Villanova and St. Joe’s could be getting personnel boosts in the near future, the Inquirer reports.

Just a week after Penn’s three embarrassing first-half records against Florida Gulf Coast were either matched or beaten by Savannah State, Princeton’s disgraceful effort from two years ago was absolved as well.

The Tigers put up a woeful 21 points in a loss to Monmouth, an NCAA shot clock era record-low, only to have that broken last night by Rick Majerus’ Saint Louis. The Billikens scored all of 20 points in a 49-20 loss to George Washington in their Atlantic 10 opener. Saint Louis scored only seven points in the first half, went 1-for-19 from three for the game and got blocked 11 times, a season-high for GW.

In fact, GW is terrible this season, and Saint Louis (9-6) isn’t that bad. GW (5-6) is a team that lost to Alabama by 36, and even lost to Binghamton, (by 12) which has an RPI of 314.

Princeton can celebrate for now, but I’m not sure how safe that mark is, Princeton has put up 38 and 32 points so far this season. Here’s an excuse to re-use a great quote I got from Monmouth guard Chris Kenny, and now assistant coach under Dave Calloway:

“They’re an in-state rival and to hold them to 21 points, it was great. But I was a little frustrated, to tell you the truth. I like to go for the jugular when I play. We had them at 19; I really wanted to keep them under 20. They scored with two seconds left, so I was frustrated with the effort.”

In some other news, Penn athletics has a men’s basketball TV ad I saw during the Flyers game last night on Comcast SportsNet. It seemed a little low-budget, but was nice to see. It featured a voice saying: “Penn basketball is back, and Coach Glen Miller wants you at the Palestra showing your red and blue pride!” Then it highlights the Big 5 and Princeton game coming up, showing a ticket package.

I’m still wondering what “Penn basketball is back” means. It also shows two plays - one by Darren Smith. Clearly this was made a long, long time ago.

And in actual news, (as of yesterday) former guard David Whitehurst is not currently at practice. He indicated earlier this season that he was intending on playing this semester if his grades permitted him to. He has sat behind the bench for most games this season, but due to academics has not been able to practice or play. I will bring you further information early next week.

In last year’s home opener, the Quakers left their starters in until the final minute and scored 19 points in the last 5 minutes to put up 97 points (three away from giving the fans cheesesteaks) on Florida Gulf Coast in a 97-74 win.

This year a stronger, and newly Division I, FGCU team took that to heart.

“I remember distinctly when they were beating us and they got a steal and they were high-stepping and putting one arm out and trying to run a lob,” coach Dave Balza told The News-Press after the game this year.

As I’m sure you know by now, the Eagles held the Quakers to six points in the first half, winning 60-30. This year’s winning team didn’t rub it in (in fact Penn closed the game on a 12-0 run), but kind of wanted to.

“Guys were joking, ‘Let’s press them at the end,’” Balza said. “We remembered that last year and we sold that throughout the week and it paid dividends. I thought we were really dialed in.

“I would’ve liked to run the score up and pressed some, but I guess we gotta be classy.”

Ouch. If that’s not a shot at Glen Miller I don’t know what is.

Sorry, Andrew, one post illustrating what happened last night is not enough.

Penn’s six points, 5.9 percent shooting and one field goal in the first half were all the worst by any Division I basketball team in the shot clock era. Even the 30-point total was Penn’s worst in 40 years. Here are a few stats that I found must supplement the last post:

• Penn had 16 turnovers and 12 missed shots before scoring a single point
• 10 players attempted a three pointer for Penn, seven of which didn’t make one
• Nine players had multiple turnovers, five (Brian Grandieri, Jack Eggleston, Tyler Bernardini, Justin Reilly and Andreas Schreiber) had four or more
• The five starters (Grandieri, Eggleston, Bernardini, Reilly and Cohen) had eight more turnovers (21) then points (13)
• The starters had an assist-to-turnover ratio of 0.095
• Six players had more turnovers than points
• Schreiber (2-for-5) and Bernardini (2-for-9) were the only players to make more than one basket

I could go on, but I don’t want to see grown men crying before New Years. Here are some quotes from Penn head coach Glen Miller after the game:

“That’s probably the worst performance that any of my teams have ever had — and I’ve been a head coach for a long time. I’m very disappointed.”

“We were just very lethargic and unsure of ourselves. We certainly didn’t handle the five days we had off. We’re a much better team than that.”

“I want to give [the Eagles] credit. I think they’re a better basketball team than their record [4-9] and I think that will come through when they get in league play.”

Since it’s a new year coming up soon, Penn fans can look on the bright side:

• Penn’s 36 rebounds equaled FGCU’s total
• Joe Gill, playing in the first half for (I believe) the first time in his career had a wonderful game, hitting his only shot attempt, scoring four points, and dishing out one assist to no turnovers in seven minutes
• None of this matters until the Ivy League