PROVIDENCE, R.I. — The best way to deal with brown bears is to stand your ground and never back down. That’s exactly what Penn football did.
After losing its first three Ivy League games, Penn’s (3-4, 1-3 Ivy) chances of an Ivy League title were already quite slim. But if the Quakers wanted to stay alive in the hunt, Saturday was a must-win situation. With its back against the wall, Penn responded in dominating fashion, defeating Brown (3-4, 2-2) 38-28 for the Quakers' first Ivy League win of 2024.
“I feel really good for the kids,” coach Ray Priore said. “They worked real hard at this point and have come up a little short, but we’re very, very proud and are going to enjoy the bus ride home.”
A week after senior quarterback Aidan Sayin left the game against Yale with an apparent elbow injury, junior quarterback Liam O’Brien got the call-up for his first collegiate start.
After a pair of empty possessions, O'Brien strung together a few chunk completions on the team's third drive, capping things off with a 10-yard touchdown to junior wide receiver Jared Richardson — Penn’s first passing score this Ivy League campaign and O’Brien’s first career touchdown pass. Richardson celebrated accordingly, though it cost the team an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty.
“Throughout the week, our big thing was to just have fun,” Richardson said. “[Sophomore running back] Malachi [Hosley] actually came up with the celebration, and so when we scored, we were just going to hit it, so we did just that."
Against an explosive Brown offense, one of Penn's key points of emphasis coming into the matchup was limiting big plays. That proved difficult early as Brown’s first touchdown of the game came off a 31-yard throw from quarterback Jake Wilcox to wide receiver Mark Mahoney early in the second quarter.
The score seemed to be the wake-up call that the Quaker defense needed. The toss to Mahoney would be the last time the Bears would come close to the endzone for the rest of the half. Penn's special teams also did their part, with senior running back Jacob Cisneros blocking a punt to give the Quakers a short field that was paid off with Hosley's sixth touchdown of the season.
With 26 seconds left in the half, O’Brien used his legs to punch in another score, giving the Red and Blue a two-score lead and 21 points total, the team's most so far in conference play. O’Brien finished the game with 72 rushing yards in addition to 240 yards in the air.
“Very proud of how [O’Brien] played, both throwing the ball and running with his feet,” Priore said. “That was as perfect a game as you can go.”
Penn's offense picked up right where it left off in the second half, moving the ball down the field and adding another touchdown off a direct snap to Hosley. But the Bears would not go away.
In Brown’s win last weekend against Cornell, the game was headlined by the Bears scoring 20 unanswered points to open up the second half. In Brown’s win against Harvard to open league play, the Bears came back after being down two scores going into the break. Brown has proven to be a second-half team. Today was no different.
Brown used a number of unorthodox plays on their first drive of the half, including a Philadelphia special-esque play and a trio of wildcat formations that allowed running back Qwentin Brown to break the plane and get the Bears back in the game. Then, after another touchdown toss from O'Brien and a missed field goal from Bears kicker Christopher Maron, Brown sacked O'Brien in the end zone for a safety. The two points cut Penn's lead to two possessions with eight minutes to play and gave the Bears the ball.
“That one was tough,” O’Brien said. “We had a couple plays back to back where we lost yards and [the defense] did a good job blitzing up the middle and covering all our routes pretty well. I just took it — didn’t want to make a bad play worse. Give them the two points and move on.”
After the Bears scored on the ensuing possession but failed to convert a second straight two-point conversion, Penn looked to secure the win by corralling an onside kick. This time, the ball bounced Penn’s way and the kick dribbled harmlessly out of bounds to seal the deal for the Quakers.
“They hit us on a lot of trick plays last year,” Lista said. “This year, everyone did their job, which has been a recurring theme this year. We all did our job and we all got the dub.”
Penn football returns to the gridiron on Nov. 9 at 1 p.m. when it takes on Cornell in Ithaca. There, the team will be facing off against a familiar face in Cornell head coach Dan Swanstrom, who was Penn's offensive coordinator in 2022 and 2023.
“We’re going to spend 24 hours [celebrating] this one,” Priore said. “[Cornell] has been up and down with scoring a lot of points … We have good friends up there and a couple of guys on staff that [we’re familiar with].”
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