Penn pounds Cornell as freshman scores 22

Friday night marked Penn's first win of the season in the Ivy League. Coach Steve Donahue said his team finally realized how hard it was to win a game in the league and the type of effort the Quakers had to put forth for a full 40 minutes.

On Sunday afternoon, it realistically took Penn only 15 solid minutes to get its second Ivy League win of the year. The Quakers decimated Cornell, 82-63, at the Palestra in a game that was never close.

"I thought the key to the game was just our energy from the start," Donahue said. "We were really locked in defensively. Our engagement, not that it hasn't been like this most of the season, but we took it another step.

"We were really locked in for the first 20 minutes defensively."

Penn (9-12, 2-6 Ivy) established early that it was the better team on Sunday. In the first 10 minutes of the game, the Quakers allowed just three points. During that span, they forced 10 turnovers, had three blocks and built a 15-3 lead. Cornell had decent looks at the basket, but just could not convert.

"I said in the huddle, we had a panicked look on our face, and I was sort of like 'What's the problem? If we make these shots, we're going to make these shots', and it was a bad response," Cornell coach Brian Earl said.

It did not get any better for the Big Red in the next 10 minutes. After establishing its dominance on the defensive end of the floor, Penn turned to the offense to build a huge lead. By the time the teams went to the locker rooms at halftime, the Quakers held a 42-14 advantage.

"The best players and teams respond better than we did," Earl added.

The second half was much of the same, other than a 5-0 Cornell flurry to start the frame and garbage-time baskets to end it. Penn kept the Big Red at bay for the rest of the game, coasting one step closer to where the Quakers need to be to have a shot at the fourth seed of next month's Ivy League tournament.

"I think there is a core group here that really understands a sense of almost angry that we are in this position and let's be competitive and use that in a positive way," Donahue said. "I thought we did that from the start."

The Quakers shot the ball incredibly well from the floor. They shot 55.2 percent in the first half, but cooled down a bit to finish the day at 54.7 percent. Penn held Cornell to 38.9 shooting from the floor.

Even though the scoring was balanced, freshman guard Ryan Betley led the way for the Quakers. He had a team high 22 points and grabbed eight rebounds in the game against his former Downingtown West teammate Josh Warren.

"It was definitely some motivation for some bragging rights, but I don't think it affected how I played today," Betley said.

The freshman for Cornell (6-17, 2-6) fouled out with 11:51 left in the game with just two points. The Big Red were led by Robert Hatter with 22 points.

Penn's next chance to build on its newfound momentum is Friday when they travel to Brown, followed by Yale on Sunday. The Quakers are taking things one weekend at a time.

"I think we are playing our best basketball now after some tough failures that we, I think, learned from," Donahue said. "With that said, the rest of the league, everyone is in this. These are going to be incredible weekends."