Penn Readies For Big Weekend At The Palestra

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- The University of Pennsylvania men's basketball team is preparing for the final home Ivy League weekend of the regular season. On Friday the Quakers host Dartmouth and that will be followed by a showdown with Harvard on Saturday night.

The Quakers are 19-7 overall and with their next win they will reach the 20-win plateau for the first time since the 2011-12 season. Penn spent last weekend in New York state. On Friday night they rode a late 18-0 run to a 74-62 win over Columbia in New York City. Then on Saturday night in Ithaca, they took care of Cornell, 79-71. The win against Cornell officially clinched a spot in the Ivy League Tournament for the Quakers.

"I thought our defense was good all weekend," Penn head coach Steve Donahue tells KYW Newsradio. "Solid at Cornell with two really good scorers and we made plays when we had to on the offensive end.

"This group just figures out ways to win games," Donahue adds. "Sometimes it's offense, most times it's defense and more than not, it's some competitive juices late in the game that we figure out ways to win games."

Penn sophomore forward A.J. Brodeur scored 35 points in the two wins, making 15 of 20 shots from the field (he was 15-18 on two-point shots). For his efforts, Brodeur was named Ivy League Player of the Week for the second time this season.

"He had a great weekend," Donahue says. "He always give you the motor, the defense, the hustle plays and now he's become very efficient on the offensive end as well."

Penn also got a tremendous Friday night performance from sophomore guard Devon Goodman. After playing just two minutes combined the previous six games, Goodman came off the bench against Columbia to play a season-high 30 minutes, pour in a career-high 23 points, hit a career-high five threes while adding five assists and five rebounds.

The Dartmouth team that Penn will battle on Friday night is 6-17 this season overall and 2-8 in the Ancient 8. These two teams played up in Hanover, New Hampshire on February 9th with Penn grinding out a 64-61 win.

"They beat us three straight going into that game and it took us everything to win that game," Donahue says. "And they beat us last year in a similar game, where we needed to win and they got it. I've got tons of respect for [head coach David McLaughlin], I think they have three really good perimeter players, they have really good young bigs and they play really hard."

The game against Harvard on Saturday will feature the two teams tied for first in the Ivy League (both teams are 9-1 in the Ancient 8). Harvard won the first meeting between the two teams in Cambridge on February 10th, 76-67. There is a lot of anticipation for that match-up, but Donahue says all they are focused on right now is the game against Dartmouth.

"We really have no opportunity to look at Saturday until [the Dartmouth] game's over," he says.

Both games at the Palestra this weekend will tip-off at 7:00pm.