After a strange season in the Ivy League, nothing has really changed. True, Brown and Yale, who were picked to finish seventh and eighth in the league respectively, were in the title hunt until last weekend, and Harvard and Dartmouth, the preseason third and fourth picks, finished sixth and seventh but it still all ended the same way.
The same way meaning the final Princeton " Penn clash decided the league title. In a season that showed an amazing amount of parity in the Ancient Eight, the first since 1989-90 in which every team in the league had at least three losses, Penn and Princeton once again are the only ones who can win the league title.
And so it came down to the match-up at Jadwin Gymnasium at Princeton. The Tigers (10-3 Ivy, 15-10 overall) and the Quakers (9-4, 12-16) would tip off to decide things, and the Quakers were looking to gain vengeance for the 67-53 beating they took at home three weeks earlier.
The Quakers started with a starting lineup minus their second leading scorer Ugonna Onyekwe, who has been lighting teams up from the bench over Penn's last three games. The Tigers kept junior guard Mike Bechtold on the bench as a counter to Onyekwe and as a bolster for Princeton's second unit.
The first half opened painfully slow, as Princeton engaged in its usual pattern of winding down the shot clock on every possession. Princeton opened the game ice cold from the outside, while Penn jumped on top early behind point guard Dave Klatsky who nailed his first three three-pointers in the first 11 minutes.
Princeton slowly crept back in to the game utilizing the time-tested, Pete Carill-designed high-post offense featuring the irritating back door cut. The Tigers pushed the pace and grabbed a five-point halftime edge at 31-26.
Penn closed the gap early in the half, pulling within one at 35-34, when Princeton exploded. Senior captain Nate Walton hit freshman sensation Andre Logan on the Carill cut on successive plays to ignite a 24-6 run that put the game away for Princeton.
Penn's offense went stone cold over the run, giving up six of their 19 turnovers and shooting 1-9 as their hopes of a third straight Ivy title vanished into the thunderous roar of the black-and-orange crowd.
Penn managed little in the ways of a comeback, cutting the final tally to 68-52. Penn shot a meager 39.6 percent from the floor, and scoring leader Lamar Plummer suffered from a 3-9 shooting night which basically doomed the Quakers who got a poor night from center Geoff Owens who managed only five points against Nate Walton and the Princeton match-up zone.
The victory completes a very successful season for rookie coach John Thompson III, the son of Hall of Fame coach John Thompson formerly of Georgetown, and a former player for Carill at Princeton. Thompson took a team from which he lost four players, including two All-Ivy League selections and still took his team to the title.
It marked the 31st time in 33 seasons and the 38th in 42 that either Penn or Princeton has won the Ivy League title.
All of this makes Wednesday's match-up between Brown and Yale essentially meaningless, where only a week ago it held major playoff implications. The teams will be fighting for third place in the league, which would be Brown's best finish since 1989-90 and Yale's since 1997-98.
