In front of an enthusiastic yet sparse Saturday matinee crowd at the Palestra, the Penn men bounced back from last Saturday’s loss to Columbia to defeat Dartmouth, 78-68, and move to 3-1 in Ivy League play.
The Big Green (4-10, 1-2 Ivy), fresh off their win over Brown, used an early 65% shooting performance to open up a 28-18 lead by the 7:30 mark. Cam Krystkowiak and Ryan Cornish came off the bench to combine for 11 of the team’s points. Meanwhile, the Quakers (6-11, 3-1) were struggling with a 35% effort from the field.
Penn stopped the bleeding and went on a 9-3 run to make it a 31-27 game with just over four minutes left in the half. Buckets from George Smith helped the Quakers cut the lead to two twice in the remaining time, but an Aaryn Rai layup and free throws from Brendan Barry kept the Green’s advantage at four as the team’s entered the halftime break.
The home team was consistent from the field, shooting 44% from two (8-for-18) and three (4-for-9), while the visitors shot 62% (8-for-13) from inside the arc and 46% (6-for-13) from outside. Barry led the way for the Green with eight points, while Krystkowiak and Cornish added seven each. Smith and Max Martz had the hot hands for the Quakers with 12 and eight points, respectively.
Michael Moshkovitz, who was held scoreless in the first half, hit his first two shots of the half and the Quakers made four of their first five to tie the game at 42 by the first media timeout. Jonah Charles came off the bench to hit a three from the top of the arc at the 15-minute mark, giving Penn its first lead in almost 20 minutes of action.
The Green came back and took a one-point lead, 48-47, when Garrison Wade hit a left side layup off an inbound pass with 12:12 to go in regulation.
The teams went back and forth with three more times, before Moshkovitz picked up his fourth foul with just under nine minutes left and went to the bench. After Taurus Samuels sank both free throws to give Dartmouth the 54-52 advantage, Jordan Dingle was fouled on a made jumper and converted the free throw to put Penn back on top.
Martz then followed a missed three from Samuels with his own triple from the top of the key to give the Quakers a four-point lead, its biggest of the day. On the next possession, Martz picked up his fourth foul and became the team’s second starter to go to the bench in foul trouble.
Steve Donahue went with a five-guard lineup to hold onto the lead, but an Izaiah Robinson three near the left baseline capped a quick 5-0 run to put Dartmouth back on top 59-58 with seven minutes remaining.
Lucas Monroe would return the favor for Penn, going on his own personal 5-0 run, to get the Penn lead back to four. After Robinson’s 1-for-2 effort from the free throw line, Clark Slajchert hit a floating jumper in the lane and made a layup off the steal of an inbounds pass to make it a 67-60 game at the five-minute mark.
Coming out of the under-four media timeout, Garrison Wade made one or two from the line. Jelani Williams then went strong to the rim with a left-side layup and got Cornish to commit his fifth foul of the afternoon. Williams finished the old-fashioned three to make it 70-61, effectively ending the game for the Quakers.
While the Red & Blue shot 60% from field in the second half, including a 65% (13-for-20) effort from two, it was their three-point defensive pressure that proved to be the difference on the day. Dartmouth, which relies heavily on the long ball and entered the day 87th in the nation in three-point field goal percentage at 35.3%, were held to 11% (1-for-9) shooting over the last 20 minutes.
Williams and Martz each ended the day with 13 points, with Martz adding a team-high six rebounds. Dingle and Slajchert both had 11 points, while Smith finished with 12 points, four rebounds and a game-high five assists. Barry and Rai totaled 16 and 11 points, respectively, in the losing effort.
Both teams are back in action on Monday afternoon with second place Penn traveling to first-place Princeton (13-3, 3-0 Ivy) for a 4 p.m. tip-off, while Dartmouth welcomes Harvard (9-5, 1-1 Ivy) to Leede Arena for a 7 p.m. start. Both games can be viewed on ESPN+.