The Guru Report: Penn Makes Smashing Season Debut Giving McLaughlin 200th Quakers Victory While Princeton and Rutgers Complete Sunday Local Sweep and Texas Upsets Stanford

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

HARTFORD, Conn. - What Rust?

Not far from the city of Boston that shares the same number as its area code, and so it was that the 617-day competition drought that the Penn women’s basketball endured as part of the mandated-shutdown by the Ivy presidents due to the Covid-19 pandemic transformed here quickly into a smashing start of the 2021-22 season as the Quakers raced to a 16-0 lead growing to as many 50 before settling to an 85-42 record over Hartford.

The victory also marked the 200th with the Quakers for veteran coach Mike McLaughlin, who began his 12th season, coming aboard in 2009 from having made Holy Family in Northeast Philadelphia into a Division II powerhouse.

The visitors spent Sunday afternoon holding their own block party, gaining 10 of their program-tying 11 rejections in the first half of shot attempts by the host Hawks (0-2), who are in lame-duck Division I status heading down to an intended Division III declared by the university president.

Meanwhile, Princeton, who won the 2019-20 regular season Ivy title with a perfect record in front of runner up Penn before the Ivy tournament was cancelled, continued the nation’s longest win streak, reactivated when the Tigers resumed play, by easily winning their home opener in Jadwin Gym over Patriot League representative Boston U., 69-40.

The Terriers are picked second behind defending Patriot tournament champions Lehigh.

The Tigers, picked over Penn in the regular season Ivy race, have beaten Villanova and defending regular-season Colonial Athletics Association champion Delaware to run their win streak total to 25.

Rutgers, now 3-0, completed the local Sunday sweep, but it was a struggle at home in the newly renamed Jersey Mike’s Arena in Piscataway, N.J., before outlasting Fairfield 48-42.

Nationally, on a busy day, the shocker upset result saw No. 25 Texas on the road upset No. 3 and defending NCAA champion Stanford 61-56 in the Cardinal’s Maples Pavilion, halting Hall of Fame coach Tara VaDerveer’s all-time NCAA Division I women’s total at 1,126.

That enabled second-place Hall of Fame coach Geno Auriemma to get back within six at 1,120, after the second-ranked Huskies opened their season down the road from here in the XL Arena gaining revenge for their lone 2021 regular season loss at Arkansas by beating the Razorbacks 95-80 as Paige Bueckers, the former freshman who won national player honors, kicked off her sophomore status with a career-high 34 points.

Penn Veterans and Newcomers Blend in Rout: In the pick up where left off department, Kayla Padilla, the 2020 Ivy and Big Five freshman of the year, and national honorable mention from the United States Basketball Writers Association, led Penn with 22 points, shooting 8-for-11 from the field, including 4-of-6 three-pointers, part of a team-successful connection from behind the arc of 12.

That individual attempt total in the long-range department was equaled by senior Mia Lakstigala, who scored 18, overall and tied Padilla with three-blocks each.

Padilla has reached 20 points or surpassed the milestone 13 times in her career. Newcomer Jordan Obi, one of six Quakers making their program debuts, scored 10.

“There was a lot of excitement for this game, it’s been a long time coming,” Padilla said. “We’ve been preparing 600 days,” she laughed, “so there was a lot of excitement, especially since we’re a younger group and wanted to come out and start the season off right.

“We have a busy week, which is good because we’ve been preparing” Padilla said, referencing Tuesday’s home opener in The Palestra at 4 p.m. hosting Division III King’s, then heading Thursday to the Northeast Conference’s Saint Francis of Brooklyn near the Barclays Center, and then hosting Villanova next Monday, Penn’s first Big Five game of the season.

“We get to play against other teams and see how we stack up against them, so it will be exciting.”

Padilla noted the early success of Ivy rivals, Princeton’s start and Columbia’s Sunday 82-78 win at Clemson of the Atlantic Coast Conference.

“The early wins show how could this league is and ready to be right up there with them.”

Other then his first season when Penn won just two games before the high-powered recruiting effort could impact the program, McLaughlin had been right up there with a .619 win percentage that has also included a strong defensive effort such as Sunday in which Hartford’s Jada Lucas, the lone Hawk in double figures, scoring 10 points.

“We’ve been working really hard, and they’ve been excited for this for a while,” said McLaughlin soon after Sunday’s game ended. “To see them respond, especially the first half they way they did, I thought was exceptional,” McLaughlin observed. “They earned it. They enjoyed it. We celebrated this one. It’s been a long way and this basketball team has a long way to go, there’s question about it, but the first one is really important.”

The points in the 54-16 halftime lead by Penn was just shy of the record of 57 points in a first half set on Nov. 9, 2019, Penn’s previous season to the new one, set at The Palestra against Siena of the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC).

Penn is playing with new adversity at the start of the season. 

Earlier in the week the school paper Daily Pennsylvanian reported juniors and seniors, no names were reported nor given by the program, would be suspended four games each for violating a school policy.

A rotation will be used to serve the penalty across the first eight games, the Daily Pennsylvanian reported.

The next four games following the ones noted above through the visit from Villanova, include playing UC San Diego and Memphis in Los Angeles in predetermined games in Loyola of Marymount’s tournament on Thanksgiving weekend, hosting La Salle on November 30, and at Bucknell on Dec. 3 prior to the visiting from Duke on Sunday, Dec. 5.

“We’re not going to hide from that fact,” McLaughlin said. “We’ll grow and mature,” he added without going into any more elaboration, being pleased on how the team handled the situation Sunday.

“We’ll deal with it. They’re wonderful kids.”

Princeton String Continues: In the Tigers’ latest win, Julia Cunningham had her first double double with 20 points to top the rest of the squad, shooting 6-of-10 while also grabbing a career-high 11 rebounds. Coach Carla Berube’s team is on a 20-0 home tear in Jadwin.

Emily Esposito had 11 points, the lone player scoring in double figures for the Terriers (1-1).

Princeton had just short of a week before the next challenge, a Saturday visit to Rhode Island of the Atlantic 10, which has been revived under former Virginia star Tammi Reiss.

Rutgers Subdues Fairfield at Finish: The fourth quarter has been the best in all three Scarlet Knights victories and it was needed in this one.

“I game was like I thought it would be, a grind against a veteran team,” said associated head coach Tim Eatman, who is filling in for Hall of Famer C. Vivian Stringer this season. “They returned all and added some good players.

“They put a lot of pressure on us, packed the zone in, and made us move the basketball. Even though the game was a grind, it helped us as a program because it forced us to do the things we need to do in order to be successful, and that’s sharing the basketball and moving side to side. We were hungry and played hard.”

Victoria Morris was the lone Rutgers player in double figures, though Osh Brown grabbed 11 rebounds.

For the Stags (1-1), Callie Cavanugh had 15 rebounds and Lou Lopez-Senechal scored 11.

Rutgers next hosts Stony Brook, the America East favorite, at 11 a.m. on Tuesday, ahead of a visit from Harvard on Friday at 7 p.m.

Nationally Noted: Look for No. 25 Texas to move up in Monday’s AP first regular women’s poll of the season following Sunday’s upset win at No. 3 Stanford (1-1), the second time in three seasons the Longhorns have ambushed the Cardinal. 

The long-range goal is to end Baylor’s long-running reign of the Big 12 once the Longhorns (2-0) enter conference play.

Freshman point guard Rori Harmon had 21 points, while Aliyah Matharu had all 17 of her points in the final quarter and shot 5-of-7 from the field, including 4-for-4 on three-ball attempts.

Stanford, which suffered similarly on the way to last season’s bubble-produced NCAA title, had 20 turnovers, while Texas had just half that at 10.

Texas meets No. 15 Tennessee this coming Sunday in another showdown game, nationally.

Besides the turnovers, Stanford struggled from the field.

Vic Dorr, meanwhile, who left a powerful Mississippi State program to join Texas a year ago, said, “I’m in it. I’m in it with ‘em. I’m in the fight. I think my kids know that and I think they like that.”

Lexi Hull had 16 points for the defending champs, who failed to connect on their first three-point attempts.

“We just weren’t gritty enough down the stretch,” VanDerveer said. “I hope that this game gets everyone’s attention.”

Matharu is a transfer following Dorr from Mississippi State.

“I think later on in the season we’ll look at this game as a blessing in disguise as much as we don’t like it right now,” Hull said.

In the second round of the special-format preseason WNIT, Towson moved to 3-0 with a 64-48 win in Raleigh, where host N.C. State, the fifth-ranked Wolfpack beat Florida 85-52.

Kansas State at home in Manhattan was 76-44 over Western Kentucky, while Tennessee-Martin beat North Carolina A&T 58-40.

Stony Brook at home took a 72-60 win over St. John’s, which visits Temple, Wednesday at 7 p.m.

Georgia Tech, 17th ranked, beat Ohio Valley favorite Belmont 58-45.

No. 2 Connecticut in its first game back since last season’s ending upset loss to Arizona in the NCAA semifinals showed the Huskies will be ready to fulfill prospects for a lot of wins.

Bueckers made 10 of 11 shots in the second half, while for the game Christyn Williams scored 18 and Evina Westbrook scored 15.

Arkansas got 20 points from Amber Ramirez and 17 from Sasha Goforth.

Connecticut played all its home games on campus last season, making the second home here in Hartford, the first appearance in 622 days.

The Huskies head into a big challenge this weekend in the Bahamas at the Battle for Atlantis tourney where No. 1 South Carolina, whom they meet late in the season in a regularly scheduled game, is on the other side of the bracket.

In North Carolina State’s triumph, Wes Moore got his 750th win.

Chloe Bibby had 19 points in No. 4 Maryland’s easy 81-45 win at James Madison in Harrisonburg, Va.

A 12-0 run in the third quarter helped Maryland.

JMU’s Kiki Jefferson had 16 points.

Caitlin Clark, who shared the spotlight with UConn’s Bueckers all last season as the top two freshmen, had 25 points in No. 9 Iowa’s win overe Northern Iowa.

Clark also grabbed 11 points, while Monika Czinano scored 16.

In another battle of ranked teams. No. 8 Indiana bested visiting No. 13 Kentucky 88-67 as Mackenzie Holmes had a career high 29 points. Grace Berger added 19 points and nine rebounds.

Rhyne Howard scored 23 for the visiting Wildcats.

It’s the Hoosier’s first win over Kentucky in 15 seasons.

Tulane of the American Athletic Conference had a nice road win, beating Alabama 69-66, while Old Dominion topped visiting Auburn 57-44.

And that’s the report.