Philadelphia — The hearts of two universities beat with each bounce of the ball last night as the men's basketball team fell to Penn (13-5 overall, 5-0 Ivy League), 65-55, in Philadelphia.
The PA announcer at the Palestra began the game: "The entire University of Pennsylvania Athletic Staff welcome the Princeton U . . ."
"BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO."
Not many words were heard the rest of the way that were not in chant form from the ocean of fans.
Penn forward Ugonna Onyekwe dominated Princeton (10-8, 4-1) in all facets of the game, scoring 22 points and grabbing 12 rebounds. After an unspectacular first half, Penn took a 27-19 lead into the break, but the excitement took place in the middle ten minutes of the second half.
The first Princeton possession after intermission showed the game might turn into a close-fought battle. After several borderline non-calls in the paint, Gloger was able to sink a shot, pulling the Tigers to within six.
Despite this glimpse of promise, Penn's lead continued to increase to a then-high 10 points with 16 minutes, 35 seconds to go in the game. The Tigers were beginning to drown, but then pulled themselves to the surface with a 9-0 run on the home squad, making the score 33-32 Penn with 12:55 to play.
Just over a minute later, the Tigers took their first lead since early in the first half. Princeton went up again, 36-34, on a basket from senior guard Kyle Wente with 11:38 left in the game.
At this point, the teams treaded water, neither jumping in front, until Venable fouled guard Andrew Toole, who made two free throws with 7:42 to go.
Penn then began to pull away, and the Palestra crowd sensed it could keep the Tigers out of the game. With 5:40 to go, Onyekwe made one of two free throws, but followed his own miss on the second free throw with a monster jam, spreading his legs like Shaquille O'Neal's old Reebok logo.
Penn was in the midst of drowning Princeton during a 11-0 run grabbed a new 51-40 game-high lead with 4:34 left. Princeton did not close within seven points again. With 37 seconds to go, and their team up, 62-50 — the biggest lead of the game — the crowd acknowledged the game's outcome after a Gloger desperation foul, chanting, "IT'S ALL OVER!"
However forgetful, the game had a first half.
A quarter of the way through the game, the Tigers and Quakers were playing each other evenly, but Penn was beginning to take advantage of opportunities that Princeton let slip through their fingers.
Penn found an easy opening in the Tiger defense on its first possession, leading to a two-handed jam by Onyekwe. On the ensuing Princeton possession, junior forward Spencer Gloger missed an easy layup in the lane. This turned into a trend for the rest of the half, as well as for a good portion of the second.
The two teams swapped runs as the half went on, but Penn didn't lose the lead that it gained at 14-12 with 13:21 left to play in the period.
Nearly every time Princeton made a mistake, the Quakers scored on their next possession.
With Penn up, 17-12, the Tigers blew an assignment on their defensive left, and the Quakers spun the ball around the arc. By the time it made it all the way to the right sideline, Penn guard Jeff Schiffer was open for a three-pointer that extended the lead to 20-12.
Princeton was able to climb back within three, at 8:53, after a Kareem-Abdul Jabbar-inspired skyhook from sophomore forward Judson Wallace. 20-17 was the closest the Tigers would get the next 16 minutes of game play.
When junior forward Konrad Wysocki airballed with 2:00 left until the break, the crowd gave him the Palestra treatment, shouting "AIRBALL!" three times before letting out a "YOU SUCK!" for good measure.
Even the Penn students shooting three-pointers in the halftime contest got a deluge of "AIRBALL!" from the ocean of fans.
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