Those who know me personally know that I place a premium on not sleeping, as I hate to miss anything.

As it turns out, going to bed around 1:30 am at The Line Saturday made me miss something that would have further driven home the point I made in my column today. Reader/Red & Blue Crew member Alexa Luzecky let me know that later in the night, sophomores Zack Rosen and Mike Howlett returned to the Palestra along with teammate Rob Belcore. They hung out for a while, watching Superbad and talking to some fans. Howlett and Belcore eventually left, but Rosen stayed the night, getting up with the participants at 7:45.

If I failed to drive home the point in my column, then this certainly did. Glen Miller and the hoops team went way above and beyond in their displays of appreciation for the fans, and I applaud them personally for truly forming that personal connection to the fans.

The U.S. Maccabiah basketball team is one win away from reclaiming the gold medal. Coach Bruce Pearl’s boys defeated Canada in the semi-finals today, 123-76, after jumping out to a 64-40 halftime lead. New Hampshire’s Dane Diliegro led the Americans with 20 points and nine rebounds, while Bucknell’s Bryan Cohen (brother of former Penn hoopster Aron) added 17 points and three rebounds. Zack Rosen contributed two points, six assists and four rebounds and committed zero turnovers in 20 minutes.

Now the U.S. must play its fourth game in as many days as it gets set to play Israel in the gold medal game tomorrow at 7:30 p.m. local time (12:30 p.m. EDT). The game will be broadcast on DIRECTV channel 366 (Jewish Life TV) or streamed online at www.jltv.tv.

[Updated July 22, 2:07 p.m.] Team USA won the gold medal today with a 95-86 victory over Israel. The game was a hard-fought, back-and-forth matchup that went to overtime. The U.S. led most of the way, with a three-point halftime lead that ballooned to as many as 13 before going into the fourth quarter at 62-57. With the game on the line, Israel stepped up and took a six-point lead with five minutes remaining. Rosen cut the deficit to two on an acrobatic shot, but committed a turnover on a similar attempt on the next possession. Grunfeld finally tied it for the US on a three-point play with 20.7 seconds left and the game went to overtime. In OT the U.S. took control as Rosen scored three of his six points and added two assists in the extra period, while Grunfeld nailed his free throws down the stretch to ensure the victory. He led the way with 25 points and 12 rebounds for the U.S. and was named tournament MVP.

1) Penn Athletics finally made its official announcement regarding the men’s basketball recruits for the Class of 2013. As I mentioned in a post  last week, the official class only includes three of the five incoming freshmen: Carson Sullivan, Brian Fitzpatrick and Sean Mullan. The other two players, Denzel Washington’s son Malcolm and Jack Eggleston’s brother Tommy, were not listed because they are considered “preferred walk-ons.” None of the five newcomers are listed yet on the 2009-10 roster.

2) If you read my story a few weeks ago, you already know that all the freshmen except Mullan have been playing in the Delaware County Pro-Am summer basketball league. The current Penn players’ team is Trad Jazz, which has gone 2-6 so far. Their next game is tomorrow against UNUM (6-2), which includes a number of notable former Penn hoopsters like Brian Grandieri, Mark Zoller, Michael Jordan, Geoff Owens and Jeff Schiffner. Trad Jazz will play its last game Sunday as the league’s playoffs begin Monday, though the squad is unlikely to make the postseason.

3) Trad Jazz got both of its wins before Zach Rosen left for Israel. Rosen and Team USA got off to a great start at the Maccabiah games with a blowout win over Mexico, 112-13 (that is not a typo; they actually won by 99 points). Rosen put up eight points and four assists. The next game was a revenge match against France, which beat the  US and forced them to settle for Bronze in 2005, and returned most of its players for the 2009 games. The US won 131-77 behind 25 points by Todd Golden and 23 points by Dan Grunfeld (son of Wizards GM Ernie). Rosen’s line — five points, four assists, three rebounds.

The US was finally tested in its third game of group play against Russia. It was a close game that came down to the end, with the score tied at 71 and just seven seconds remaining. Russia missed the last shot, but they managed a tip-in with .5 seconds remaining and held on for the win. With the loss the US had to beat Argentina to advance to the semi-finals, and the rules are such that a 4-or-more point victory would yield them the first seed and a semi-final matchup with Canada while a less-than-4 point victory would have meant the second seed and a semi-final bout with defending champion Israel.

Team USA  beat Argentina 97-89 today behind Grunfeld’s 25 points and eight rebounds. Rosen added eight points and four assists. Now the US is set to play Canada tomorrow at 4 p.m. Israeli time (which is 9 a.m. EDT) with a chance to play the winner of Argentina-Israel in the championship.

The Herb Good Basketball Club has given out some Philadelphia hoops awards, and Zack Rosen has won the Dave Zinkoff Award for Big 5 Rookie of the Year.  He did not win the Ivy League equivalent. This is the second-straight year a Quakers hoopster has won the award. Last year Tyler Bernardini won it with 12.9 points, 26.7 minutes, 2.5 rebounds and 1.5 assists per game. Rosen’s stats were arguably better (8.1 points, 31.1 minutes, 3.4 rebounds, and 5.0 assists (which led the Ivy league) per game).  Previously no Penn player ever won it.

Senior Kevin Egee also won the Harry Merrill Sportsmanship Award.

In addition, Villanova coach Jay Wright won Coach of the Year, which shouldn’t come as a surprise. The Big 5 Player of the Year announcement should come soon (Dionte Christmas has my vote).

1) Yes I’m linking to my own article, but Harrison Gaines has decided to transfer from Penn.

2) In the de facto Ivy League Championship game, the Dartmouth women’s basketball team beat Harvard to clinch the auto-bid to the NCAAs.  The win gave the Big Green its 17th championship overall, second consecutive and fourth in the last five seasons.

3) The Ivy League announced its men’s All-Ivy teams, and Penn did not do very well.  Tyler Bernardini managed an honorable mention (his second-straight such honor).  And … that was it.

Zack Rosen, who many predicted would be Rookie of the Year in the preseason, did not win that award. Instead it went to Cornell guard Chris Wroblewski who played in 30 games (seven starts) and averaged 6.7 points, 2.6 rebounds, 2.6 assists and 25.3 minutes per game. Meanwhile, Rosen started 27 of Penn’s 28 games and averaged 8.1 points, 3.4 rebounds, 5.0 assists (which led the league) and 31.1 minutes per game.  Then again, Cornell won the league with a 11-3 record, while Penn limped to a 6-8 finish.

But I definitely did agree with the Player of the Year choice, as Dartmouth’s Alex Barnett more than deserved that honor. He led the league with 19.4 points per game, and ranked eighth in rebounds with 5.6, as he led the Big Green to a 7-7 Ancient Eight record. That was the team’s best finish in four years.\

4) Here’s a nice reminiscing of old times at the Palestra and Franklin Field.

I hope you were all able to catch last night’s monumental Penn-Princeton thriller, either in person or on ESPNU. After the jump, I have some more thoughts and interesting notes on a game that will be talked about for quite some time.

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Now that basketball season is in full swing these notes have taken a decidedly more Big 5 flavor than an Ivy League feel.  But that probably will change once we head into Ivy season.

1) Sports Illustrated profiles “slick coach” Jay Wright of Villanova, which reminds me of the rollout my freshman year during the Penn-Villanova game:  “Your suit might be worth $1,000 bucks, but you’re still coaching a bunch of schmucks.”  Perhaps a little classless, but the profile certainly is not.

2) One commenter at Fan Nation claims Philadelphia is the best basketball town in the nation.

3) Philly Hoops Insider finally has a Penn-centered post, this one on Zack Rosen. However, we’ve still yet to hear from Glen Miller.

4) The Mid Majority blogger Kyle Whelliston was asked who he favors in the Ivy League, and he was quite pro-Cornell.  (via The Cornell Basketball Blog.)

1) Earlier I posted a Washington Post article on the three-point line change in college basketball.  Here is a New York Times article on it, but from the perspective of… Cornell, of all teams.

2) Speaking of the three-point changes, Ken Pomeroy is tracking the difference in long-distance percentage from last year to this year.

3) The New York Times isn’t writing just about Cornell’s team, though. It also ran a profile on Penn’s Zack Rosen.

4) On Friday, the Ivy League released its Ivy Hoops guide for both men’s and women’s basketball.

5) Lastly, congratulations to the men’s soccer team, which beat, Harvard 1-0 on a breakaway goal off a turnover in overtime to clinch the Ivy League’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. Senior goalkeeper Drew Healy earned his 11th shutout this year, which set a new Penn record. The Quakers, in all likelihood, are going to be the only fall team to take home an Ivy League crown, unless the football title is split four ways.