Angel | Deja vu for Quakers, but frustration remains

Villanova 20, Penn 14. There isn't much else to say that hasn't been said, because this is old news, old emotion, painful cliche, all of it.

Penn Football has lost a game in overtime. Another one. Since 2006, the Quakers have played in 21 games, losing five of them in overtime and nine of them in the last few plays.

It is unconscionable for a team to have lost so many so painfully. That this Saturday's blow can be pooh-poohed - "it wasn't as bad as that Yale game" . "at least it wasn't Princeton again" - underscores the lunacy of what has gone on at Franklin Field.

These games are different, but they all go the same. There are always a couple of schoolyard plays, game-changing toss-ups that transcend the coaches' meticulous plans. They do not go Penn's way.

Coach Al Bagnoli went for a fourth-and-two on the Villanova 40 with about three minutes to go. He said the wrong players were on the field, though that hardly explains how Bradford Blackmon ended up in Penn territory, some 12 yards back from where he started.

When the Wildcats botched a play in overtime, backup QB Chris Whitney magically spun away from a Penn lineman's ambush and surged in for an impromptu score. Bagnoli's arms flailed out with incredulity, and then, as if he suddenly remembered that this was Penn Football in Overtime, they sank to his sides in resignation.

And there's always a tease, the one play that makes the loser think this game will be his turn. This time it was a special-teamer diving to block 'Nova's point-after attempt. It meant the game could be won with just seven points, and it prompted frat-boy raucousness on the Penn sideline.

Bagnoli said he thought his players would win it after that, but in all that jubilation some of them must have wondered what might be coming.

It came, and quickly. Penn's first overtime snap went right to Blackmon, and he started right and curled back left, and the longer this run went the more hopeful you got, until suddenly the ball popped out like a champagne cork and flew where only white Villanova jerseys were around. Half the Wildcats' bench had poured onto the field in celebration before the ref confirmed the bad news. Game over.

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It is easy to forget how much effort goes into a football game. All told, about 125 players and staff pitch in every week; coaches can earn a living preparing for just 10 contests a year. And it isn't like basketball, where a new opponent often looms in two or three days' time. The Quakers literally spent weeks preparing for this game, and those long days and nights of tinkering flew out the window for naught when the football flew out of Blackmon's grasp.

Up where the media sit, a few coaches use the aerial view to watch the game and relay information down to the field. Penn's crew sits near the writers, sequestered by a flimsy, less-than-soundproof door. The game had been over for a minute or so, and as Villanova players danced on Franklin Field, a lone, booming voice emerged from the room, piercing the silence with a rich vein of profanities.

Multiply that by 125 and you get what happened here on Saturday, what has happened nine times in 21 games. Even for a mere support staffer, naked frustration overwhelms any other feeling: Penn Football has lost a game in overtime.

Another one.

Sebastien Angel is a senior Political Science major from Worcester, Mass., and is former Sports Editor of The Daily Pennsylvanian. His e-mail address is angelsd@dailypennsylvanian.com.

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