Two games down for M. Hoops, and two losses to BCS teams. But as my colleagues Neil Fanaroff and Ari Seifter asked, how much can we learn from these two defeats about the 2009-10 men’s basketball team? Neil believes, not much, since this is way to soon to make snap judgments about the team. Ari believes we can make broader statements about the team’s ability to compete with top-flight teams.

Not to cop out, but they’re both right.

Clearly this Penn team, especially this early in the season, isn’t suited to compete with a top 5 team like Villanova. And there’s a good chance the Quakers’ trip to Cameron Indoor Stadium will result in an equally lopsided loss to Duke.  But that doesn’t mean that Penn will be irrelevant against better competition forever.  Ivy teams in general aren’t irrelevant nationally. Cornell beat Alabama this weekend. Harvard beat Holy Cross and Williams and Mary, two better mid-majors. Even Brown — which was last in the Ivies last year — was semi-competitive agains Virginia Tech. Penn has awhile to go before they can be as successful as Cornell is right now, but that doesn’t mean they’ll go winless in the Big 5 from now until they quit out of desperation.

On the other hand, Neil’s right that losing to Penn State and Villanova tells us very little about Penn’s Ivy chances. The fact of the matter is this season will be a success or failure depending on Penn’s Ivy play. If Penn goes 4-10 in non-conference play like it did last year, people will surely be up in arms, calling for Glen Miller’s head. But then if the team were to somehow go 10-4 in League play, perhaps beat Cornell at the Palestra, go at least 1-1 versus Princeton and not lose to Dartmouth — twice. I’m not saying they necessarily would do that. And Tyler Bernardini’s injury could affect them significantly. But frankly it’s too early to tell if they can compete with teams more equal to their caliber.

I realize some of you already posted your thoughts on Ari’s initial column. But feel free to do so again here on The Buzz, especially your thoughts on this year’s team.

Also, read after the jump for two more Hoops items

(more…)

With the NCAA basketball season just weeks away, everyone’s been releasing their preseason polls. The conference polls have been trickling in over the last week, and the national polls came out today.

The Ivy League released its preseason rankings yesterday, with Penn coming in at third behind Cornell and Princeton. Cornell is, as expected, the unanimous favorite, returning all five starters from last year’s Ivy championship. You’d be hard-pressed to argue against the conference being Cornell’s to lose.

Princeton, Penn, and Harvard are essentially in a dead heat for second place, with only 10 points separating the three schools. Yale, Columbia, Brown, and Dartmouth round out the bottom half of the League in that order.

Keep reading after the jump for a rundown of Penn’s opponents in the national polls and to see how the other Big 5 schools are projected to finish in their own conferences.

(more…)

1) Cornell officially released it’s M. Hoops schedule, and the Big Red certainly do have their work cut out for them. They play at least four “BCS” schools: at Alabama  in the season opener, versus Seton Hall in the home opener, then at two of the most well-known stadiums in the country in Syracuse’s Carrier Dome and Kansas’ Allen Field House (the potential fifth team is St. John’s in the Holiday Festival). They also play three City Six teams beside Penn: at Drexel, versus Saint Joseph’s and at La Salle. However, their schedule isn’t all tough games, as they play Division III schools Clarkson University and Penn State Erie, Behrend College (yes that’s one school) as well as Bryant University and University of South Dakota, both of which joined D-I last year.

Over at Cornell Basketball Blog, some Big Red fans are scared the team will start 0-4 (@ Bama, @ UMass, vs Seton Hall @ ‘Cuse) while others believe “we are good enough to win all four of those games.”

This now makes Penn one of just three Ivy schools not to have released their schedule yet ( Harvard, Yale, Brown and Princeton previously released theirs). I guess Glen Miller’s still trying to find the one more team.

2) Over on SB Nation they’ve listed the top five metropolitan areas that care more about their college hoops teams than their NBA franchise. And unsurprisingly Philadelphia is ranked, coming in second to Tobacco Road/Research Triangle/North Carolina Piedmont area. Yet I don’t know how fair it is to rank them since the “local” NBA team, the Charlotte Bobcats, play over two hours away. Actually of the top five (NC, Philly, Cincinnati, Louisville and Washington-Baltimore) only two areas have local NBA teams.

Regardless, the site calls the Big 5 “the most unique tradition in college basketball” (the editor in me cringes at “most unique”). And sorry St. Joe’s fans, but the Holy War “is sort of an inferior vs. superior match-up. St. Joseph’s is a smaller school who would love to shake the mid-major label, while ‘Nova is in the Big East…and frankly a notch higher on the academic hierarchy.” (Via VU Hoops, which I’m sure loves that last part.)

3) Lastly, turns out the Quaker mascot is one of the creepiest in Division I. Though to be fair, he was tortured.

After my football recap, here’s my roundup of Penn Hoops news:

1) Over the last few weeks, it looks like Penn’s schedule is finally firming up. In fact, it appears that all but one game has been set. Unfortunately for the Quakers, getting that last game might be a little troublesome. According to the team’s twitter account, they can’t find anyone to play at the Palestra on December first. So if any ADs from Mid-Atlantic Mid-Majors read this blog, I’m sure Glen Miller would be happy to hear from you about that date. (On an aside, here’s an article about some of the challenges of creating a Division I basketball schedule.)

2) Mid Major Madness is ranking every team in Division I, and Penn came in at 262 out of 344. The description of the team talks about the high hopes of last year, but says the Quakers went 10-18 since they weren’t “able to handle the pressure” and “due to their poor performance at home in conference play” (can’t argue with that). As for this upcoming year, they make the bold prediction that Harrison Gaines’ transfer will affect the team’s chances to rebound.

Previously, Dartmouth at No. 329, Brown at No. 307, and Columbia at No. 291 were ranked. That means Penn is behind Cornell, Princeton, Harvard and Yale (my guess for who they’ll rank as the top four Ivy teams).

3) Sports Illustrated notes that several elite basketball recruits are considering Harvard due to its expanded financial aid package and Tommy Amaker’s recruiting techniques. But that might come back to haunt Amaker. The former Michigan coach, according to the Cornell Basketball Blog, has recruited many players by promising playing time. As you can imagine, this is quite an attractive pitch. Yet it might just be false promises since the Crimson now have a surplus of players (possibly as high as 14–all juniors or younger–in 2010).

So far Amaker’s stay in the Ivy League hasn’t been great, as Harvard came in tied for sixth in the league last year (with Penn) and in a three-way tie for last in 2008. We’ll see going forward whether or not Amaker finally breaches the top half of the league (I guess Mid Major Madness thinks that’ll happen this year).

4) Looking at the Big 5 wire, Villanova senior Reggie Redding will be suspended for the fall semester after police found marijuana in his car. While that might not affect the Wildcats’ chance of returning to the Final Four, it does mean he won’t be able to suit up against Penn in December. Then again, he only scored two points on 1-for-6 shooting in last year’s Big 5 game.

5) In other City news, the three enshrinees in this year’s Big 5 Hall of Fame class are some of the biggest coaching names in the history of the unofficial conference: Chaney, Massimino, and “Speedy.” Or for full disclosure: Temple’s John Chaney, Villanova’s Rollie Massimino, and La Salle’s William “Speedy” Morris. The three have a combined 58 years coaching in the Big 5, as well as over a combined 15 Big 5 titles.

Done with the jokes, back to reality. Here we go:

1) This year the race for Big 5 Most Outstanding Player was pretty close. In my opinion, Dionte Christmas was the best player in the City, leading the Big 5 with 19.5 points per game. Dante Cunningham had the best postseason of anyone in the Big 5.  But in the end Ahmad Nivins won the award. In some ways this is similar to Alex Barnett winning Ivy Player of the Year.  Simply put, without the output of these two players, their respective teams clearly wouldn’t have been half as good as they were.

2) Despite claiming to cover Ivy sports, Ivy Gate rarely has done so over the last couple of years (only 15 posts have the “sports” tag dating back to the start of 2007).  However, in the last few weeks contributor Max Wasserman has created an Ivy Sports Roundup that covers the past weekend’s games.  Each of the eight schools get an entry, including who they have bragging rights over. This week Penn ranked seventh (ouch) yet had bragging rights over Harvard.  If nothing else, check out the hilarious video from Conan O’Brien on old timey baseball.

3) A Big 5 coach is leaving.  So is an Ivy League one.  Ok, so they’re both assistants.  First, Villanova associate head coach Patrick Chambers was introduced yesterday as Boston University’s new head coach.  Cornell head coach Steve Donahue was a leading candidate early on to replace Dennis Wolff, who coached the Terriers for the last 15 years, but he said he wasn’t interested. In addition, there were rumors that Chambers might be a candidate to replace Glen Miller, if and when the Penn coach left the program.

Meanwhile, Harvard’s Fly By Blog is reporting that Harvard assistant coach Will Wade is leaving to become an assistant coach at VCU under newly hired head coach Shaka Smart. Wade was a key recruiter under Harvard’s Tommy Amaker (HT Timothy Walsh).

In honor of America’s favorite ethnic holiday (sorry Cinco de Mayo), here’s Random Ivy notes, in green font.

1) Want to know how the City Six coaches are filling out their brackets?  Well Soft Pretzel Logic has you covered.  I personally was intrigued by the John Calipari/Bruiser Flint versus Jim Calhoun/Glen Miller rivalry.

2) A favorite takeoff of the NCAA bracket of mine is “Salary Madness” which simulates the NCAA tournament results based on median salaries of the 65 institutions. As normal, the Ivy League representative did extremely well, as Cornell finished second to Duke

The Big Red actually got hosed last year, as they faced powerhouse Stanford in the first round. In fact, the Cardinal won last year’s bracket so Cornell, despite the fourth highest median, lost in the first round.

3) The women’s bracket was announced today. As has been the case in recent years, the Ivy League representative has gotten a 16 seed. That won’t change this year, as Dartmouth faces Maryland at the Comcast Center (no not that one) in College Park, Md.

In terms of other Penn-related schools, Big 5 foes Temple and Villanova got bids, as did Drexel. Those teams will face No. 8 Florida, No. 9 Utah and No. 5 Kansas State, respectively.

4) Moving away form March Madness, the University announced “firm plans” for Penn Park, the 24-acre parcel of land that the University will turn into athletic and recreational fields. The article doesn’t give an intended date of completion, but it does quote from the DP.

There is so much to say about last night’s game against St. Joe’s, and it just doesn’t feel right to hold off on everything until Monday’s edition of the DP. So here’s a brief, informal overview of some of my thoughts from the game, and what I will be writing about in my columns this week.

Sorry to all of you that couldn’t make it out to the Palestra last night. You missed what might wind up being Penn’s best and most exciting game of the season, not to mention a fantastic, classic Big 5 showdown. Sure, the Quakers couldn’t pull off the upset, but they did give the most inspired 40 minutes we’ve seen from them all season. Now, heading into conference play with three consecutive halves of quality, high-energy basketball against Big 5 teams — to go along with a few nice wins (albeit against weaker opponents) — Penn seems to be hitting full stride. That’s very encouraging.

In many ways, I strongly believe that last night’s game was a watershed for the Quakers. I hate to read into one game too much, especially a Big 5 game at the Palestra. No matter what the circumstances leading up to game time are, in the Big 5 we all know that anything can happen. Against Villanova this year, however, not even the ghosts of the Palestra could give the Quakers a fighting chance. But, last night we witnessed the most compelling evidence to date that this team is maturing rapidly and moving in the right direction.

Since I cannot cover everything in one column, I’ll be writing two this week in the paper and posting and responding to your comments on The Buzz, which I am always happy to do.

Tomorrow, I will focus on Penn’s intensity from yesterday’s game as a sign of its increased confidence and maturity. And from my unique vantage point on press row yesterday — because it was a St. Joe’s home game we sat directly behind Penn’s bench and were practically in the huddle — I will give you some anecodtal evidence of why I now am more confident than ever in Glen Miller’s ability to lead this team.

On Wednesday, I will discuss last night’s game in terms of its importance not only to the revival of Penn’s role in the Big 5, but also to the potential for a revival of Penn’s regular fan base, as well.

In the meantime, I look forward to your comments and ideas.

With finals week in full force, I’ve been too swamped to post often, so forgive me if some of these links are outdated.

1) As a special to ESPN the Magazine, Jonathan Tannenwald wrote a piece on the Big 5 in preparation for the St. Joe’s Villanova game which took place Thursday.

2) Speaking of the Holy War, in case you didn’t hear, it was quite the game. The Wildcats pulled out a squeaker, winning 59-56. Maybe Villanova won’t dominate the Schuylkill 16 as imagined.

3) And if there’s one team out there that might jump ahead of Villanova in the rankings, it’s Temple, who pulled of a shocker by owning No. 8 Tennessee 88-72 today at the Liacouras Center. (And yes ESPN does have a Christmas headline.)

4) Lastly, I must admit that I’ve been reading Fire Glen Miller for the last week. After declaring itself a “hate blog” it has toned down its vitrolic postings to some degree, even if half the posts are pretty lame. But it just got a huge dose of legitimacy yesterday when Stephen Danley, yes that Steve Danley, wrote a guest piece.

He breaks the post into three sections: one on the Red and Blue Crew, one on “The Fellas” (aka the current players) and of course one on Glen Miller himself. As for the RBC, he says, “I know I don’t have to tell you - but you guys win games.” The opposite definitely could apply to this year: with the low turnout, the team hasn’t felt any energy from its fans that can “will you to a comeback.”

As for the current players, he makes a great point: his sophomore year the team started 4-7. “And it was an ugly 4-7. Lost to Providence by 40. Wisconsin by 30. San Francisco. Illinois-Chicago. Rider.” However, the team got its you know what together and won the Ivy League with a 13-1 record. This year, with only Harvard (4-3) above .500 in the Ivy League, as the Penn team four years ago said, “Why not us?” (To be fair, four out of Cornell’s five losses came at the hands of either Big Ten or Big East schools.)

Finally, he says that Glen Miller is an offensive genius and has installed a great culture and work ethic. If Danley says that Glen Miller is an offensive genius, I’m willing to believe him. Hopefully that means that the team’s current points per game of 66.6 will go up, and their scoring margin average of -7.3 will improve come Ivy season.

Andrew wrote a great column and follow up Buzz post on how he views the Big 5 in light of Villanova’s dominating win over Penn on Tuesday.  (I also strongly urge you to read the comments on Andrew’s column). I tend to agree that with every blowout loss to a Big 5 rival Penn makes itself less and less relevant in the city.  But I don’t think that means the end of the Big 5 is here, even for Penn. A couple of upset wins and the Quakers wouldd be right back in the thick of things.

Others seem to agree.  Jonathan Tannenwald writes on Soft Pretzel Logic that after three Big 5 teams made the NCAA tournament last year, the rivalry is not on the decline. However, he does see Penn basketball interest decreasing.  I too believe that.  All you have to do is look at the fact that the Red and Blue Crew did not make any rollouts for the Villanova game.  Instead the Penn Band did.*

Mike Kern doesn’t really discuss the end of the Big 5, but his recap takes a look at the series through a decidedly more Villanova-centric lens than Andrew or even Jon did. His main point on the Big 5 is also valid.  Namely, the Wildcats are in something of a no-win situation since either they win like they’re expected to or they lose and ‘Nova fans overreact.  Simply put “…it’s unlikely any other program in Villanova’s position would continue playing so many of these games.”

The Villanovan, on the other hand, did not even use the words “Big 5″ in its recap of the game, save for the headline.

*Disclaimer: I am a member of the band.

I just briefly wanted to add some thoughts to my column today. I appreciate all of the comments and emails I have received — it’s good to see that the subject matter hit home for so many people.

A few of you have mentioned that the high cost of renting out the Palestra for a home game deters a school like Villanova from continuing to play its Big 5 home games there. This point is very valid, and one that all of the Big 5 schools should examine. If Penn is unwilling to waive the rent or more heavily subsidize Big 5 games in the Palestra, perhaps the Big 5 as a whole could embark on a fundraising effort (when the economy isn’t in such bad shape) to alleviate the financial strain on indvidiual schools.

Others have brought up the obvious fact that the quality of Penn basketball has deteriorated to the point that the Quakers will never be able to regain a consistent Big 5 presence, and fans will continue to lose interest. As long as Penn doesn’t give out athletic scholarships, the talent disparity between a Penn and a Villanova will remain in place. Still, I think that if the Big 5 could be built back up a little bit, Penn would have a more powerful recruiting hook, especially if it was willing to give two or three basketball recruits per year a little more leeway with admission requirements. Financial aid could take care of the lack of scholarships.

The Big 5 coaches and athletic directors need to sit down at the end of this season, if not before then, and brainstorm some ideas about what they all can do to improve the current situation. One issue for Penn is that of all of the Big 5 coaches, Glen Miller is kind of the odd man out. Jay Wright, Phil Martelli, and Fran Dunphy are all iconic figures in the Philadelphia area, and John Giannini has built up a strong presence as well. It would be great if the longer-standing Big 5 coaches could make a more concerted effort to welcome Miller into the Big 5 community and set up an open and consistent dialogue about how to improve on a wonderful but fading tradition.

You can continue to leave your thoughts and comments here — the more the merrier. I’ll try to look into the issue as much as possible throughout the season, and your feedback would be most helpful.