The rims were friendly to both the Brown Bears and the Princeton Tigers on Friday night at Jadwin Gymnasium. Hoping to snap a 14-game losing streak to Princeton, Brown drained 12 three-pointers, a season high.
Isabella Mauricio
Princeton women’s basketball shuts down Brown in the fourth quarter for 60-47 win
After scoring a dominant win over Yale on Friday night, the Princeton women’s basketball team got on a bus and motored up Interstate 95 to Providence in anticipation of a tough matchup a few hours later against the Brown Bears. Brown hasn’t beaten Princeton in eight years.
The Tigers’ 60-47 triumph at the Pizzitola Sports Center on Saturday night kept that streak going.
Despite the double-digit victory, this game was a struggle for the Tigers, who at times showed their fatigue in having to play back-to-back road games in less than 24 hours.
Ivy women’s basketball Media Day highlights
As the 2024-25 season quickly approaches, the Ivy League hosted its annual women’s basketball Media Day on Thursday. The three-hour event, hosted by Lance Medow, can be viewed on the conference’s YouTube channel.
Prior to the event, the league announced the results of its preseason poll.
Princeton, which has claimed the Ancient Eight title for the last six years, was picked first with 122 out of a possible 128 points and 10 first-place votes. Columbia, which has tied for the top spot in each of the last two seasons, came in second with 110 points and five first-place votes.
Harvard, which has finished the last two years in third placed, was tabbed for third in 2025, earning 101 points and one first-place spot.
Penn, the final participant in last year’s Ivy tournament, was picked fourth with 75 votes, while Brown, which finished last year tied with Penn for fourth, was four points back in fifth place.
Sixth place went to Yale, which was as high as third place in 2022, with 48 votes.
While Cornell and Dartmouth ended last season tied for seventh place, the Big Red got the nod for seventh in this year’s poll with 30 points and the Big Green were eighth with 19 points.
Below are highlights from this year’s virtual Media Day:
Princeton women’s basketball holds off Brown for 12th straight win
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.
Penn women’s basketball routs Brown, 77-56
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
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.
2023-24 Ivy women’s media day recap and season preview
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.
Yale women deliver on Senior Day in 63-53 win over Brown
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.
Rookies spark bounce-back win for Brown women over Penn
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.
Ivy women’s week seven roundup: Ancient Eight’s Top Ten
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.