Isabella Mauricio

Princeton women’s basketball holds off Brown for 12th straight win

by

For the second time in 24 hours, the No. 25 Princeton Tigers fought off a fierce challenge from an Ivy foe, defeating the Brown Bears, 76-63, on Saturday night at Jadwin Gymnasium.

Although the Tigers (17-3, 7-0 Ivy) never trailed in this game, they struggled to pull away from a resilient Brown squad that has been one of the surprise teams in the Ivy League so far this season.

Read more

Penn women’s basketball routs Brown, 77-56

by
Friday night basketball at the Palestra belonged to Penn senior forward Jordan Obi, who scored her 1,000th point as the Quakers demolished Brown, 77-56.
Obi, the most versatile player at Penn since the arrival of coach Mike McLaughlin 15 years ago, was pretty much perfect: 20 points on 4-for-4 shooting and 11-for-12 from the foul line, plus 13 rebounds, three blocks and a pair of assists. Her totals would have been higher, but McLaughlin pulled his starters early with a 30-point lead.
Obi is the 25th Quaker to hit the 1,000-point mark, and she did it faster than all but six other players, in just the third season of a COVID-shortened career. And her timing for a big game couldn’t have been better, because Penn needed this win against an ascendant Brown program that’s trying for its first ticket to the Ivy League Tournament since 2017. Penn has qualified for the tournament each year since its inception and isn’t interested in ending its season early.
When coaches and players say they don’t pay attention to the standings, don’t believe them.
“There is some discussion,” Obi conceded to reporters after the game. “Beating Brown, losing is not an option.”
“We were aware of everything, where everyone stands, but we go into every game as if it’s our last,” said Simone Sawyer, a Penn sophomore guard. Sawyer, who had a shaky start to the season, was back in the starting lineup for the first time since November and came through with three threes and three steals.
Brown and Penn came into the game obviously charged up: The frenetic first three minutes of play included an Obi block, three scrambles resulting in held balls, seven missed shots, five turnovers and just seven points scored. But then Penn started hitting its shots — 58% in the first three quarters — and Brown struggled from the field, shooting just 29% for the night. Penn led all the way; Brown was down 17-12 with under four minutes left in the first quarter, but then Penn went on a 17-point tear and never felt pressure after that.
“I thought we came out and defended really hard,” McLaughlin told reporters after the game. “They executed on the offensive end. We made shots that first quarter. I thought overall it was a great team win.”
He even had high praise for the Penn Band, which erupted in cheers when Obi hit her milestone basket and presented her with a 1,000-point banner after the game.
As for Obi, McLaughlin told Ivy Hoops Online: “She can play inside, outside. She can shoot the three. She’s a power player at times. She can handle the ball. She’s the full package. She’s a very good defender. She’s long. She’s active. She’s willing.”
Joining Obi in double figures for Penn were the usual suspects: junior Stina Almqvist (17 points, 6-for-11 shooting including 3-for-5 from three-point range, plus three assists and a pair of blocks) and freshman Mataya Gayle (11 points, 5-for-9 shooting, three steals).
Kyla Jones led Brown with 18 points on 7-of-18 shooting, and Isabella Mauricio had 11 points on 4-of-9 from the field.
Penn (11-8, 3-3 Ivies) is back in the Palestra on Saturday night against Yale (4-15, 1-5). Brown (13-6, 4-2) will try its luck at Princeton (16-3, 6-0).

Brown women’s basketball holds off Yale to move to 2-0 in Ivy League play

by

A furious run in the final quarter wasn’t enough to keep Yale women’s basketball from a 76-71 defeat at home versus Brown Saturday.

Defense travels, and that was the story of the first half. Brown is the second-best Ivy defensive team, giving up just 57 points per game, and the Bears held Yale (3-12, 0-2 Ivy) to a paltry 23 first-half points.

Read more

2023-24 Ivy women’s media day recap and season preview

by

With the season a few weeks away, the Ivy League hosted Women’s Basketball Media Day on Monday, the first of two media availabilities this week. The event was hosted over Zoom for media members and is available on the conference’s YouTube channel.

The preseason media poll was released last Thursday with Princeton earning all 16 first-place votes. Last year’s Ivy Tournament winner and regular season co-champions are the sixth unanimous pick in league history and the first since Penn in 2016-2017.

Read more

Yale women deliver on Senior Day in 63-53 win over Brown

by

Yale won’t be making an Ivy League Tournament appearance in coach Dalila Eshe’s first season at the helm after finishing fifth in the conference, but the Bulldogs came through on Senior Day with a 63-53 victory over Brown before many program alumni Saturday at John J. Lee Amphitheater.

The only senior captain for Yale (13-14, 7-7 Ivy), Camilla Emsbo, was honored before the game. Emsbo was injured all season and will compete at Duke next year as a graduate student.

Read more

Rookies spark bounce-back win for Brown women over Penn

by

Ivy back-to-backs can bring out the worst and best in teams, often in the same weekend.

Coming off an 80-37 drubbing against Princeton at the Pizzitola Sports Center in which it got outscored 33-2 in the third quarter, Brown rebounded 22 hours later with a 68-59 win over Penn.

Read more

Ivy women’s week seven roundup: Ancient Eight’s Top Ten

by

Following Saturday afternoon’s action, the upper division pulled away from the bottom half, while the Brown rebuild took a positive step forward.

Columbia bounced back from a disappointing result against Princeton by taking it out on Yale in front of 1,485 fans at Levien Gymnasium.  The Lions jumped out to a 32-17 halftime lead on the strength of a 14-0 second quarter run.  The Light Blue made it a 20-point game after three and widen it to a game-high 28 points with just under four minutes to go in the contest.  Defensively, they limited the Bulldogs to 32% shooting and only 49 points, the first time they held an Ivy opponent under 50 this season.

Read more

Ivy women’s week five roundup: Ancient Eight’s Top 10

by

As the opening half of the conference schedule came to a close on Saturday, Columbia used a dominant performance over last-place Dartmouth to claim sole possession of first place.  Penn, which entered the weekend tied with the Lions, fell from the top slot after giving up a season-high 84 points during a lopsided 24-point defeat at Harvard.  Princeton, which started out tied with Harvard and Yale, used a masterful defensive performance to beat Yale by 49 points and keep pace with the Crimson.  In Saturday’s Ivy opening game, Cornell used a 10-1 run early in the fourth quarter to pull away from Brown and get the league’s only road win. 

Saturday results
Cornell over Brown, 66-61
Princeton over Yale, 79-30
Columbia over Dartmouth, 79-50
Harvard over Penn, 84-60

Standings 
Columbia 6-1 (17-3 overall)
Princeton 5-2 (14-5)
Penn 5-2 (13-7)
Harvard 5-2 (12-7)
Yale 4-3 (10-10)
Cornell 2-5 (9-11)
Brown 1-6 (8-11)
Dartmouth 0-7 (2-19)

As the second half of the Ivy schedule begins this weekend, all eyes will focus on Levien Gymnasium as Columbia welcomes the Ps to NYC.  The league leaders will look for payback on Friday night against the Quakers, who pulled away late in the fourth quarter at home against the Lions on January 7.  On Saturday, Columbia, which beat Princeton by three in an overtime thriller on January 6, will try to make it two in a row against four-time defending champs.  The Tigers haven’t been swept by an Ivy opponent since losing to Penn three times in 2017, but the dreaded Friday night bus trip from Ithaca to Manhattan and a start time 20 hours after finishing the game at Cornell will certainly pose added challenges.

Fri., Feb. 3
Princeton at Cornell, 6:00 p.m.
Harvard at Yale, 6:00 p.m.
Penn at Columbia, 6:00 p.m.
Dartmouth at Brown, 7:00 p.m.

Sat., Feb. 4
Penn at Cornell, 4:00 p.m.
Princeton at Columbia, 4:00 p.m.
Dartmouth at Yale, 4:00 p.m.
Harvard at Brown, 5:00 p.m.

Below are 10 of the top performances from the weekend:

Read more

Egger, Clark shine for Yale women as they best Brown, stay tied atop Ivy standings

by

Few Ivy observers would have been surprised after the 2021-22 season to see Yale women’s basketball perched near the top of the Ivy League standings in 2022-23. After all, unanimous first-team All-Ivy selection Camilla Emsbo, the league’s most dominant center, would be returning for her senior season.

Then came the summer announcement that Emsbo would miss the entire season due to injury.

But Yale has persevered under first-year coach Dalila Eshe and kept its momentum going with a 72-59 victory at Brown Monday afternoon.

Read more

2022-23 IHO Women’s Preseason Poll

by

It’s still Princeton’s conference until another Ivy proves that it isn’t. Our contributors are united in believing that the Tigers will stay on top in 2022-23, with Megan Griffith’s ascendant Columbia program again placing second.

But there wasn’t consensus on how the rest of the top half of the league will fill out.

Penn could break back into the Ivy League Tournament after missing it for the first time last season, but we expect the Red & Blue to draw stiff competition from Harvard and Yale in their first years under new coaches.

Will #2bidivy happen in the league for only the second time in conference history? It very well could, and the bottom half of the conference is likely to be substantially stronger this season as Brown and Dartmouth return more experienced rosters under coaches that now have a year of Ivy play under their belts.

Read more