Palestra Pete

Penn women open with win at Hartford

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After 20 months away from the game, you have to expect some rust. The reflexes aren’t as sharp; the eyes don’t take in the court as well, or as quickly. The muscle memory — fingers on the keys, jumping to the stat book — is just a bit off when the middle-aged sportswriter returns.

No rust on the Red and Blue, though. The Penn women went to Connecticut and tore through Hartford, 85-42, as if they’d never put the ball down. (The final score is a bit deceptive; Coach Mike McLaughlin pretty much pulled his starters after three quarters to give his bench game time and keep the total below 100. Hartford won the fourth quarter, 13-7.)

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Penn women shut down Columbia, 51-36

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So what really mattered in Saturday’s Penn-Columbia women’s game?
Well, winning meant something, and Penn did that quite comfortably, 51-36, at Columbia.
But both teams were already locked into the Ivy League Tournament next weekend; only the seeding would be affected, and the loss makes Columbia (17-10, 8-6 Ivy) the No. 4 seed with the job nobody really wanted, facing Princeton in the first game Friday. Penn (20-7, 10-4) will be the No. 2 seed and face Yale. Columbia also was looking for a measure of revenge for a tight overtime loss in Philadelphia. Two top contenders for Ivy Rookie of the Year had a chance to show their stuff. And Janiya Clemmons, the Lions’ sole senior, had a sendoff in her last home game for Senior Day.

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Penn women stop Brown to stop skid

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The Penn women ended a bad week with a strong win Saturday night, beating Brown, 74-60, at the Palestra and locking up a berth in the Ivy League Tournament.
The Quakers dominated the inside; that was to be expected. And the Bears had some success with what they do best, outside shooting plus a fast transition game. But Penn kept pace with Brown from the outside: Penn was 10-for-28 from three, and Brown was 11-for-29.
On Senior Night for Penn, that outside matchup was personified by two shooting guards who have played one another very well for four years, Penn’s Phoebe Sterba and Brown’s Justine Gaziano. Each knocked down five threes; Sterba had 15 points, six assists and two steals, Gaziano 21 points and six rebounds.

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Yale women stymie Penn to create second-place scrum in Ivy standings

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With two weeks to go till the Ivy women’s tournament begins, Yale moved into a second-place tie with Penn in the conference standings, 71-54.
Since Columbia kept pace with Yale and Penn at 7-4 in league play by winning at Harvard, the odds seem good that those three will join Princeton in the tournament in Boston.
Roxy Barahman had a stellar night for Yale (17-7 overall), and the defensive-minded Penn team (17-8) had no answer for her. The senior guard scored 29 points on 10-for-21 shooting, including 4-for-7 from beyond the arc, and served up five assists as the Bulldogs won at the Palestra for the first time in seven years.

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Penn takes revenge on Harvard in 70-48 victory as Parker, Padilla and company put it all together

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When the Penn women have their whole game working, they’re hard to beat. On Saturday night at the Palestra, Harvard couldn’t come close.
Three weeks after losing to Harvard by seven in Boston, the Quakers (17-5, 7-2) scored the game’s first 12 points and never looked back in the 70-48 victory. Four Quakers hit double figures.
Harvard (14-9, 5-5) has lost three in a row and is in danger of missing the Ivy League Tournament in its own gym. (Someone should ask coach Kathy Delaney-Smith how she feels about that possibility. Not me: I’m chicken. But someone should.) The Crimson probably need to win at least three of the last four games on their schedule to knock Columbia or Yale out of the way.

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Penn stomps Dartmouth again, 67-31, as Eleah Parker dominates undersized Big Green

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For the Dartmouth’s women, it was a different location but the same disaster when they faced Penn in Philly on Friday night.
When the two teams met three weekends ago in Hanover, the Quakers had just lost their fourth game in a row, but the New Hampshire winter air revived them and they shut down the Big Green, 66-33.
Friday’s game at the Palestra was somehow even more lopsided, 67-31. Penn (16-5, 6-2 Ivy) held Dartmouth (8-14, 2=7) to a woeful 19.7% shooting from the field with 18 turnovers. Penn, by contrast, shot 41.8% from the field and had 11 turnovers.

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Penn takes a squeaker at Yale

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This game didn’t go anything like the coaches drew it up. But Penn came back with some clutch plays in a defensive struggle to beat Yale, 53-51, Saturday afternoon in New Haven.
Credit two starting guards for Penn (15-5, 5-2), senior captains Phoebe Sterba and Kendall Grasela, with pulling this one out after Yale (15-6, 5-3) built a 10-point lead in the second half. The Quakers’ headliners, junior center Eleah Parker and first-year shooting guard Kayla Padilla, had long stretches when they couldn’t buy a basket, but Sterba canned 16 points and grabbed seven rebounds, and Grasela — who directs the offense while averaging just 3.5 shots a game — had 11 points and five assists.

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Eleah Parker leads Penn over Brown, 85-73

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A team that’s talented, deep, disciplined and versatile will usually find a way to beat you. And a team that has Eleah Parker is well on its way to beating you in any case.

The Penn junior center from Charlotte, N.C., is 6-4 and powerful, with a nice shooting touch from almost everywhere but the foul line. She can go around you, over you and through you. Though she seemed tentative and fatigued for much of the first half of the season, she has returned to form the past few games, and she has rarely been better than Friday night in Providence, where Penn (14-5, 4-2) stopped Brown (7-13, 1-6), 85-73. The win was Mike McLaughlin’s 600th as a head coach.

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Penn women rout Cornell to complete weekend sweep

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A night after the Penn women took a memorable game from Columbia in overtime, coach Mike McLaughlin said he was worried that fatigue might keep the Quakers from being sharp when they faced Cornell on Saturday at the Palestra.
The Quakers needed just five seconds to set those worries to rest.

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Penn bangs inside for overtime win over Columbia

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Penn’s women proved Friday night that power inside can beat accuracy outside, but it couldn’t have been closer, as the Quakers took an overtime game at home against Columbia, 86-84.

Junior center Eleah Parker, who seems fully recovered from injuries and tentative play in the first half of the season, dominated the low post for Penn (12-5, 2-2 Ivy) to collect 28 points and 13 rebounds, shooting 12-for-23 and blocking three shots. Forward Tori Crawford continued her breakout junior year with 13 points, and senior guard Phoebe Sterba, who had an uncharacteristic cold stretch from outside, persisted and finished with 12 points and five assists.

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