The last time we saw the Penn women’s basketball team, it was within seconds of a stunning upset of Princeton in Ivy Madness. Penn may well have succeeded but for an egregious foul call.
The last time we saw the Quakers, forward Jordan Obi was one of the Ivies’ premier players, a 6-foot-1 senior forward with guard skills and linebacker strength.
Now Obi has brought her number zero to the roster of the No. 22 Kentucky Wildcats, and Penn coach Mike McLaughlin is looking through an intriguing collection of new pieces to put together the puzzle of another Ivy contender. He showed them off Saturday at the Palestra in the annual Red and Blue Scrimmage.
First, the bad news: One of last year’s most exciting Ivy freshmen, lightning-fast Ese Ogbevire, is out for the season with an injury suffered on the team’s summer trip to Italy and Slovenia. We’ll have to wait another year to see The Ese, Tay and Mo Show, in which the three guards (Ese, Mataya Gayle and Simone Sawyer) run circles around and shoot over opponents. On the plus side, next year will bring another speed demon: Ruke Ogbevire, Ese’s younger sister, a 5-foot-7 guard and a Penn commit.
Even without an Ogbevire, this is a young and guard-heavy team: The only returning forwards, 6-foot-1 senior Iyanna Rogers and 6-foot-4 junior Helena Lasic, have seen limited minutes in their years at Penn. (The two combined for less than one-tenth as many points as Obi’s 413 last season.) Lasic played for about half of Saturday’s 20-minute scrimmage, contributing a bucket, a rebound, an assist and a steal, and she’s expected to have a shot at earning more court time this season.
But the biggest hope for help inside may come from Tina Njike, a 6-foot-2 sophomore center who spent last year recovering from back-to-back ACL surgeries. On Saturday, Njike won the opening tip, sank a layup for the first basket, showed off a nice midrange touch, and had a dozen points on 5-for-9 shooting (plus 2-for-2 from the line) plus five rebounds, all in 15 minutes. She looked far more fluid and effective than she did in video highlights from high school and AAU teams back home in Utah, and she told Ivy Hoops Online afterward that the difference, paradoxically, came from “slowing down on offense…. Five weeks ago, I would get the ball and just, like, go! — instead of getting the ball, composure, and looking at my offense.”
The result is hardly a slowdown offense but a competent one. McLaughlin described her as a “power post” and added, “She can shoot it. Her offensive skill set is pretty strong. She rebounds the ball. And every day she’s been on the floor, she’s gotten a little bit better.”
Though Obi and fellow forward Floor Toonders have graduated, most of Penn’s core from last year remains, led by Gayle and senior captains Lizzy Groetsch and Stina Almqvist. Almqvist and Gayle, like Obi, were among the Ivies’ top 10 scorers last year, and that’s not likely to change: Almqvist twisted her way around defenders for a game-high 15 points on 7-for-10 shooting Saturday.
But six of the 13 players on McLaughlin’s roster are freshmen, and they will have to play substantial roles if Penn is going to contend for the Ivy title — especially if it’s going to exceed expectations of another fourth-place finish. (The goal, Almqvist said, is “revenge” — and the Ivy title.)
McLaughlin said that, of the freshmen, 6-foot-1 forward Katie Collins, recruited from the Jersey Shore, has been the most consistent. He also mentioned 5-foot-7 shooting guard Ashna Tambe from Plano, Texas, 5-foot-10 guard Sarah Miller of Phoenix (where her coach was Jennifer Gillom, a member of the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame), and 6-foot guard Brooke Suttle of Atlanta, whose sister Kennedy also played for Penn.
The team is just starting to practice its offensive plays and defensive system; McLaughlin’s teams are known for harassing defense and effective zone play, and he said those will come as the season progresses and the young players learn.
“You’re going to see some trapping,” McLaughlin said. “We’re going to be tough to play against. We’re going to be able to change defenses up. We do have the personnel.”
The season promises some serious learning experiences. In the first two weeks of the season, Penn will play four particularly tough nonconference opponents: Maine and UC Irvine, both of which reached the NCAA Tournament last season, and Big 5 powers Villanova and St. Joseph’s, which McLaughlin said should be a top-30 team this year.
The season starts Nov. 8 at the Palestra against Merrimack. Penn’s Ivy schedule starts Jan. 4, at home against Columbia.