Over a decade after Penn and Drexel first began playing annually on the basketball court, the 33rd street rivalry has officially shifted the Dragons’ way.
Drexel pulled away in the second half to hand the Quakers their fourth loss to open the 2009-10 season, winning 58-49. It marked the first time in history that Drexel has beaten Penn three times in a row.
As expected, the game was a defensive battle — at times tense and at other times ugly.
Ugly is about the only word that could describe the first half. The Quakers (0-4) and Dragons (1-3) combined for just 46 points, with Drexel up six at the break.
The offensive struggles continued into the second half, but the intensity picked up on the court and in the stands. Penn narrowed the margin to two midway through the half, showing a sudden spark on offense.
“We made a decent offensive adjustment and really started getting the ball inside a lot more,” Penn coach Glen Miller said.
Sophomore Mike Howlett did much of the dirty work inside, pulling down 13 rebounds to go with 10 points for the game.
But after the brief run, the Quakers’ offense disappeared once again, this time for the rest of the game. Drexel went on a 12-3 run out of a timeout with 10:55 left and maintained its lead for the remainder of the game.
“We got a little stagnant,” Howlett said of his team’s late-game offense. “We started doing too much one-on-one, getting away from our sets.”
The teams combined to shoot 0-for-19 from three-point land — the first time since 2002 that a Division I game featured no threes. For Drexel, keeping the Quakers inside the arc was the key to shutting them down.
“That’s something we focused on,” Drexel guard Jamie Harris said, “closing out hard and making sure they put it on the floor.”
The Dragons’ woeful outside shooting ended a streak of games with at least one three that dated back to 1992, but coach Bruiser Flint wasn’t surprised at the brick-laying.
“Honestly, it’s a miracle our streak hadn’t been stopped a long time ago,” he said.
Even so, Flint’s squad took advantage of Penn’s continued inability to stop guard penetration. Harris, a junior, poured in a career-high 22 points, giving the Quakers the same headaches Delaware’s Jawan Carter gave them Saturday.
“[Harris] was the difference,” Miller said. “He got into the lane a little bit too much on us for some big baskets.”
The battle in the stands was more even, though Dragons fans outnumbered the home fans from the start of the game. Jabs were traded in the form of roll-out signs: Drexel’s student section countered the Red and Blue Crew’s “This year we’re thankful for not having to play in the DAC (Drexel’s Daskalakis Athletic Center)” with “Penn Students: Home for Thanksgiving; Penn Basketball: Never showed up this term.”
There will surely be more chapters added to a rivalry that has become a fixture on each participants’ schedule. But on this night, the Dragons once again showed that they’re ready to take over as the best team on 33rd Street.
After all, beating Penn is becoming the norm for a Drexel program with bigger goals than taking down an Ivy opponent.
Said Flint: “I don’t want to say I expect [to beat Penn], but in our conference [the Colonial Athletic Association] we’ve got to be able to come in and win games like this.”
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