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Penn rally falls short against Brown

Penn was its own worst enemy once again. Turnovers, poor rebounding, and missed free throws doomed the Quakers, and their late rally fell short in a 76-67 loss to Brown on Friday night at the Palestra.

Penn was its own worst enemy once again.

Turnovers, poor rebounding, and missed free throws doomed the Quakers, and their late rally fell short in a 76-67 loss to Brown on Friday night at the Palestra.

Tony Hicks had a game-high 25 points to pace Penn (7-17, 4-6 Ivy League), which lost for the fourth time in five games. Penn, which entered ranked 342d of 345 Division I teams in turnovers per game at 16.7, finished with 16 turnovers. The Quakers gave up 18 Brown offensive rebounds and went 12 for 23 from the free-throw line.

"Who you think you're going to beat [with those numbers]?" Penn coach Jerome Allen said. "I think we're all kidding ourselves."

Steven Spieth had 19 points to lead Brown (15-10, 7-4), which completed a season sweep of the Quakers.

Allen lamented his performance this season, saying he's done a "horrible job." The coach said Penn will need to rework its chemistry going forward to get back to its days of Ivy supremacy. Penn has won 25 Ivy titles, but its last championship came in 2007.

"On paper we look like a pretty good team. On paper," Allen said. "But the one thing that's overlooked is you have to have the right chemistry and have guys willing to accept their roles and not do what they want to do but do what the team needs them to do."

Penn turned it over on three straight possessions late in the second half, the last of which resulted in Rafael Maia's layup that gave Brown a 63-50 lead with 6 minutes, 35 seconds to play. And Brown looked really secure with a 16-point advantage, 67-51, on Spieth's layup with 4:26 left.

Penn used a 7-0 spurt to cut the lead to 67-58 with 2:36 left, and Miles Jackson-Cartwright's layup pulled the Quakers within 68-63 with 57 seconds left. But Penn never got any closer.