Penn is back in the mix for Ivy Madness after a second consecutive strong shooting performance.
The Quakers rained in 18 threes on 35 attempts in a 93-78 home dismissal of Columbia. Penn (6-11, 2-2 Ivy) is now tied with Dartmouth for fourth place in the league standings, while the Lions (11-6, 0-4) are pretty much toast after a stellar nonconference campaign.
Saturday afternoon’s hero was Sam Brown, who dropped in a career-high 30 points on 12 shots. He became the first Penn player to hit at least eight threes in a game since Jordan Dingle’s 2022 demolition of Harvard in the first Penn game at the Palestra open to fans since COVID hit.
The Quakers won on Saturday thanks to an excellent stretch of complementary basketball early in the second half. They held Columbia without a field goal for 7:38 on the defensive end, while five different Penn players hit threes on the offensive side of the floor. Penn used the dominant stretch to extend a four-point lead into a 19-point advantage inside of 10 minutes to play.
It’s all good vibes again, thanks to how …
Sam Brown is officially back.
After an absolutely brutal shooting performance during nonconference play, Brown was due for some positive regression. He got it on Saturday, draining eight threes on 10 attempts.
Brown was ready to take — and make — the clean looks he got, even when they were from NBA range. It’s what fans were expecting to see this season.
Oddly enough, it feels like Brown is getting better shot opportunities and benefitting from better spacing even though the Quakers were missing capable outside shooter Michael Zanoni for a third consecutive contest.
The advanced metrics surrounding Brown are now gaudy. His KenPom offensive rating of 150.2 points per 100 possessions during Ivy League play is the best of any player in the conference. He’s shooting 59.1% from three, which is second-best in the league.
Brown deserves Ivy League Player of the Week honors. If he can keep this up, Penn fans should be feeling good about the team’s backcourt for the long term.
George Smith was an unsung hero again.
It’s not a coincidence Penn has been winning with Smith inserted into the starting lineup.
After playing in a bench role for much of the season, Smith has defended well and shot well during his recent stretch of extended playing time.
On Saturday, Smith finished with a KenPom offensive rating of 136 points per 100 possessions. He hit three three-pointers on six attempts, including one during the aforementioned game-deciding run early in the second half.
The 14 points Smith put up on Saturday were a season high. The Quakers are a little smaller when Smith is starting, but it hasn’t been an issue yet.
Friday is a litmus test.
It’s a pleasant surprise Penn is in the Ivy Madness conversation, given the team’s terrible nonconference campaign and 0-2 Ivy start.
If the Quakers can pull off a home win on Friday against Brown — a game Vegas will likely set as a near-coin flip — their postseason hopes will be very much alive. Dartmouth will be heavy underdogs against Cornell that night.
Penn has a brutal Yale-Princeton-Yale stretch lined up after Friday, so a loss to the Bears could quickly snowball into a four-game losing streak.
*looks up what to do in Dayton in mid-March*