Kyle Bahr: I want to believe in `U'

I want to believe in Ugonna Onyekwe. But deep down, I can't just yet.

Yes, the stat sheet makes it hard not to believe in the Quakers' dominating junior forward.

Onyekwe's average of 24 points in the four games of the Las Vegas Invitational not only earned him all-tournament honors after Penn's 3-1 performance, but also a place in the national spotlight as the No. 11 scorer in the country.

If the numbers don't lie, then the Quakers' opponents are going to be hammered by the truth all season long -- and the Ivy League title will return to the Palestra.

The numbers have lied before with Ugonna, however, and the Quakers carry the scars to prove it.

My mind wanders back to last preseason -- a time when the Penn men's basketball team not only possessed back-to-back Ivy League titles but was the unanimous preseason pick to add another "-to-back" to the list.

Sure, there was no longer a Michael Jordan or a Matt Langel on the roster, but things seemed to be in good hands in Quakerland. Geoff Owens had his health, Lamar Plummer had his sight and, above all, Penn had its Ugonna.

I was one of the many who couldn't wait to see how the sophomore forward would top his previous season's Ivy Rookie of the Year performance.

His amazing game against then-No. 9 Seton Hall gave us the answers.

Onyekwe's assignment that night was the Pirates' diaper dandy, Eddie Griffin, and he straight-up schooled the kid. Ugonna outscored the freshman by nine points and reset his own single-game career record at 26 points that night. The previous game, he had scored a career-high 20 points in a close loss to then-No. 17 Maryland.

Pair those 26 points with the 11 rebounds he pulled down, and Onyekwe was pure magic against Seton Hall.

The Quakers unfortunately fell to 0-7 that night in a two-point loss, but Ugonna had upheld everyone's hopes that once the Ancient Eight season rolled around, no Ivy team would be able to stop him.

Turns out they didn't have to -- Ugonna stopped himself.

Only twice after New Year's did Onyekwe score more than 15 points, and just once was it against an Ivy League foe.

Ugonna's non-conference magic turned into a Ivy League Houdini act -- he disappeared when the games counted most and Penn fell short of the title.

Onyekwe is concocting a more potent magic early this season, and it looks good so far.

He's got at least one new trick up his sleeve -- a deadly three-point shot -- has shown improvement in both the physical and mental aspects of his game, and his coaches and teammates all agree that this is a new, improved "U" out on the floor.

"Now that he is becoming our go-to guy, he's got to step up and continue to be that," Penn guard David Klatsky said. "He's playing so much tougher and smarter that it's such a big difference for the team."

They are confident in their star, and so is Ugonna himself that he will, as he said, "Make amends for last year."

But ask Ugonna about his role as Penn's No. 1 player, and he'll shake it off like the question is a defender in the paint.

"If I am, it's good; if not, whatever," he said yesterday. "Whether you put that label to it or not, it doesn't matter to me."

And it's this that keeps me cautiously optimistic about Penn's star player, the best athlete in the Ivy League, the guy who's shown he's good enough to drop 28 points on the No. 2 team in the nation.

Ugonna hasn't yet embraced his place as the guy the Quakers will look for when things get a little rough. And until that happens, until he accepts that he is Penn's go-to guy, I cannot truly believe in Ugonna Onyekwe.

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