The way senior defensive back Matt Hamscher sees it, Penn football never rebuilds.
“They just reload,” he said after practice Wednesday at Franklin Field.
As Hamscher and the Quakers prepare for Saturday’s opener against Lafayette, 19th-year coach Al Bagnoli’s think-big philosophy is as prominent as ever. The eight-time champion coach doesn’t just view this season as an opportunity to run the Ivy League table for an unprecedented third-straight year, but also as another chance to add to a tradition of excellence.
“Our whole challenge is to play better than we’ve ever played before, continue to build upon what last year’s class was able to do and leave a legacy that separates you from everybody else in this league,” Bagnoli said.
And the coach has shaped his preseason decisions around those lofty long-term goals.
Most college coaches favor experience over youth when filling question-mark positions, especially on championship-caliber teams. Bagnoli did precisely the opposite in replacing four graduated all-Ivy offensive linemen and the greatest kicker in school history, Andrew Samson.
This year’s offensive line features four underclassmen alongside all-Ivy returnee Greg Van Roten, while freshman Connor Loftus will get the nod over senior Dan Lipschutz at kicker.
“There’s huge upside when you have that many young kids playing,” Bagnoli said.
“If things are equal, you always want to defer to the younger kid who’s going to come back and have another year.”
Bagnoli’s focus is not just on winning now; it’s on winning now and the next year and the year after that.
His third shot at a three-peat — the previous two (1995, 2004) ended in failure — will not play out until the Ivy season starts in October. But September games against Lafayette and Villanova, who have become mainstays on the schedule, serve as opening acts before the main event.
The Quakers prevailed in a sloppy 19-14 affair against the Leopards in last year’s first game to end a three-game losing streak in the series.
“It’s always been a very, very tight, competitive game, win or lose,” Bagnoli said.
Bagnoli compared the Leopards to teams in the Ivy League in terms of their size and smash-mouth style of play, something Hamscher has noticed from inside the lines.
“They’re a physical team, they like to run the ball,” Hamscher said. “They’re huge up front, so from a defensive perspective, it’s going to be a big test for our guys up front.”
In essence, that’s what this Lafayette game represents: an early-season test. Bagnoli will use the 60 minutes on Saturday to determine whether the newcomers he’s deemed ready to compete can withstand the pressure of a physical running game and a blitzing defensive attack.
“We’re kind of over the fact that we’ve been scrimmaging ourselves and practicing blue [versus] white all summer long,” Hamscher said.
The true test, however, will come in October and November, when league rivals challenge the champs week after week.
In mid-September, Bagnoli could not predict what’s in store for his talented group this season. After all, the fun comes in adjusting and reloading along the way.
“This is week one,” Bagnoli said. “Who knows what [the team’s] going to look like in week five?”
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