Daily Pennsylvanian

Quakeaways from Penn men’s basketball’s 61-59 loss to Princeton

by

There have been plenty of excruciating losses in Penn’s 12-game losing streak to arch-rival Princeton, but none have inflicted a pain quite like Friday’s 61-59 loss to the Tigers at the Palestra.

With less than a minute to go, there was Penn (6-14, 2-5 Ivy) in the lead despite being forced to play without star wing Ethan Roberts, who sat out the contest with an undisclosed injury. As has happened in so many of these losses to Princeton (16-6, 5-2), every break possible went the wrong way for the Quakers when it mattered most.

After sophomore guard Sam Brown missed the back-end of a one-and-one which would have extended the Penn lead to 59-56, junior forward Johnnie Walter had the offensive rebound in his hands for a split-second but couldn’t quite corral the ball. The Tigers secured possession and then saw sophomore guard Dalen Davis break free to drain a wide-open three-pointer from the left wing, giving the Tigers a 59-58 advantage with just over 30 seconds remaining.

On the next possession, senior big man Nick Spinoso drew heavy contact as he went up for a layup, hit his first free throw to tie the game, but missed the freebie which would have given Penn the lead. Walter then fouled Princeton’s Jackson Hicke as he put up a midrange jumper with six-tenths of a second to play.

There was zero doubt Hicke would miss. The 6-foot-5 sophomore hit both shots at the line to kick Penn fans back into a familiar pit of misery.

What could Penn fans take away from yet another disheartening loss?

Read more

The Jerome Allen story: A closer read

by
Jerome Allen was inducted into Class X of the Penn Athletics Hall of Fame in 2017. He’s no longer in the Hall of Fame now, and understandably so, But the good he did for Penn shouldn’t be shunted aside either. (Penn Sports Network video)

It was one year ago today that allegations that Jerome Allen took bribes were first reported by Bloomberg and the Miami Herald.

But the passage of time didn’t make Sports Illustrated’s deep dive last week into how Jerome Allen became guilty of bribery, wire fraud, money laundering and tax evasion any easier to digest.

Most Penn basketball supporters will find it an uncomfortable read, but its revelations are simply too many to ignore.

They reconfirm what we already knew – one of Penn basketball’s most admired figures used his head coaching position for personal gain at the expense of the program.

But taken as a whole, the article’s revelations paint a far more holistic portrait than that.

Allen is and will always be more than an implicated figure on a witness stand, and his story as told by SI merits closer examination – as do the institutions and forces that shaped it. As someone who covered Allen and Penn basketball extensively for the Daily Pennsylvanian from 2012 to 2014, I thought I’d do a closer read of SI’s story, portions of which are italicized below.

Read more

Penn basketball and the Palestra get a presenting sponsor

by

On Tuesday afternoon, Penn’s Dr. M. Grace Calhoun, director of athletics and recreation, held a press conference to announce that Penn Athletics secured a sponsorship with Macquarie Investment Management. The multi-faceted agreement is highlighted by the group’s presenting sponsorship of the men’s and women’s basketball teams, as well as naming rights to the Palestra’s famed court.

Calhoun refused to disclose the length and value of the deal but noted the partnership is for several years and is the largest such agreement in the history of Penn Athletics.

Typically, a presenting sponsor attaches its name to a product. With respect to the “Cathedral of Basketball”, the hardwood will now permanently be known as “Macquarie Court at the Palestra.” Calhoun noted, iin response to questions from Jonathan Tannenwald of Philly.com and reporters form the Daily Pennsylvanian, that having a corporate name linked directly with the fabled arena was not an option. However, she did admit that the school’s famed football stadium, Franklin Field, and the Penn Relays could be considered for a deal in the future.

Read more

Penn basketball leaving turbulence behind

by

 

See if you can find Steve Donahue in this picture. Rest assured, he hates two-point jumpers just as much 33,000 feet up in the air as he does on 33rd Street.

“Hey AQ, where have you been?” The question has arisen this season from many emails and tweets.  First, for those of you who have missed my pithy, yet pedantic,and occasionally puerile persiflage (800 Math, 790 Verbal), my apologies, and no, I have not retired. Instead, I have merely taken a step back to observe the rapid reshaping of the Ivy hoops landscape. Overall, this brief offseason has been arguably more tumultuous than the season itself. Yale captures the league outright for the first time in 54 years and then bags a tournament win over Baylor. Princeton does their “I got this. Oops, no I don’t!” routine in the NIT. Kyle Smith, after winning the CIT, triumphantly leaves Columbia (“Thank you and good night!”) as perhaps the torchbearer of a strange, new breed of Lions coach — a winning one. (I am hoping that they lose the secret formula for this perverse brand of eugenics, no doubt developed in some arcane lab on the Morningside Heights campus, before that institution actually gets used to victory.) Paul Cormier, after two straight ROYs, abruptly gets canned in Hanover which only proves that you can never go home again especially if that home is in New Hampshire, on the Dartmouth campus and you’re hired as its basketball coach. And Bill Courtney, well…even the muskrats at the bottom of the gorge could see that one coming.

So what about my beloved Quakers?

Read more

Penn-Princeton Tuesday roundup

by

Penn 62, Princeton 60 (Women)

Where to begin? With another storybook ending for the Quakers on Princeton’s home floor, and some delightful deja vu for coach Mike McLaughlin’s Red and Blue.

Two years after upsetting Princeton in stunning fashion with an outright Ivy League championship on the line at Jadwin Gym, 80-64, the Quakers toppled the Tigers again in the same scenario, clinching their second Ivy title in three seasons as Jadwin guests. Penn’s win followed another two-point victory over Princeton this season, a 50-48 overtime triumph at the Palestra.

Read more

Steve Donahue nails the little things, bigger things may come

by
Steve Donahue rocks the red and blue tie at his introductory presser Tuesday. (timesunion.com)
Steve Donahue rocks the red and blue tie at his introductory presser Tuesday. (timesunion.com)

It had to go off perfectly.

The hiring of Steve Donahue as Penn’s next head coach was the second major decision that M. Grace Calhoun had to make since coming on as Penn’s athletic director, and it will prove to be – for better or worse – the defining decision of her tenure. And thus, everything had to be perfect.

After all, people had their doubts. Former coach Jerome Allen had left the fan base with a bad taste in its mouth, from his questionable hiring by former athletic director Steve Bilsky, to the questionable manner in which he was dismissed by Calhoun just weeks ago.

In the same way that people surrounding the program feared that the administration had done its due diligence, those same people had a wealth of questions about Donahue. To the naysayers, the pros – his years as a Penn assistant, his three-year run of Ivy League dominance that included him leading a Cornell team to the Sweet 16 – are overshadowed by the cons.

Read more