It turns out that getting the gang together again wasn’t enough to solve Penn’s problems. Not even 31 points from Kayla Padilla could do it.
In their second game back after the rolling four-game suspensions of all their juniors and seniors over the season’s first eight games, the Penn women dropped their fifth straight, falling to St. Joseph’s at the Palestra, 83-70. Penn (4-6) has lost three Big 5 games, with one to play next month against Temple.
Penn had Padilla’s bravura performance, but St. Joe’s (3-6) had height, sharp passing and accurate shooting in its favor. The Hawks shot 47.5% from the floor, including 43.8% from three, and collected 40 points in the paint; the Quakers hit 39.7% overall, 41.7% from three, and 24 points in the paint. Padilla shot 10-for-20; Quakers not named Padilla shot 34.2%. It’s hard to win when the numbers are against you like that.
Unlike in its Sunday game against undefeated Duke (now ranked No. 19 in the AP poll), the Quakers had a solid chance to win Tuesday night. But the Hawks had a balanced attack, with four players in double figures: grad student Katie Jekot (five threes, 20 points) and junior guard Kaliah Henderson (16 points) from the outside, and freshman forwards Laila Fair (20 points) and Talya Brugler (18) from the inside, where they drew many of Penn’s fouls. St. Joe’s scored 20 points from the foul line.
Penn put together some impressive runs, coming back from double-digit deficits to within one point at the end of the third quarter on a buzzer-beating three from Padilla. But no other Penn player hit double figures: Mia Lakstigala had nine points and eight rebounds in a solid game, forward Kennedy Suttle had eight points, and Nikola Kovacikova and Jordan Obi had six apiece. Obi, a 6-1 forward who has often played with poise beyond her experience in her first college season, struggled this time out on 2-for-9 shooting.
It had been 10 years since the last time the Penn women’s team had lost five games in a row. Barack Obama was in his first term as president. Kayla Padilla was a fifth-grader. And the Quakers, midway on their climb from 2-26 to the Ivy title, finished the season with a 13-15 record.
Mike McLaughlin’s guard-first team improved the next year with improved play by sophomore forwards Kara Bonenberger and Katy Allen, and especially the year after with the arrival of 6-3 center Sydney Stipanovich from St. Louis. Michelle Nwokedi and Eleah Parker followed, but now McLaughlin must make do without frontcourt players of that caliber. The adjustments will continue.
The Quakers stand a good chance suffering their sixth straight loss Friday, when they travel to Long Island to play Stony Brook (7-1).