Penn defeats Yale to set up showdown with Brown for final Ivy League tournament spot

Penn knew the math and came out charging, competing like a team that desperately wanted to continue playing meaningful basketball games. Needing two wins this weekend to secure the fourth and final Ivy League playoff berth, the Quakers are halfway there after Friday’s 77-66 win over Yale at the Palestra.

The game wasn’t as close as the final score might indicate. Penn was never threatened in the second half. The final margin was the closest Yale got in the second half.

It all comes down to Saturday’s game when Penn (18-11, 6-7 Ivy ) hosts Brown (19-10, 7-6). The winner will earn the fourth spot.

Harvard, Yale and Princeton entered the weekend having already clinched berths.

Brown (19-10, 7-6) defeated Princeton on Friday, 67-63, in a game that ended before Penn and Yale tipped off.

Yale dropped to 19-7, 9-4 in the Ivy League.

Senior guard Antonio Woods and junior forward AJ Brodeur set the tone.

Woods, especially, played like somebody who desperately wants to return to an Ivy League tournament that the Quakers won last year.

He scored 15 of his 22 points in the first half, when the Quakers held a 46-30 lead.

“It was definitely a lot of urgency,” Woods said.

In addition to spurring the offense, the 6-foot-2 Woods guarded 6-7 junior Miye Oni, a serious candidate for Ivy League player of the year.

Oni scored just two points and was held to 1-for-8 shooting. In Yale’s 78-65 home win over Penn on Feb. 9, Oni had 21 points, eight rebounds, five assists and just one turnover. This was a much different story for Oni and his team.

“He is a great player, you can’t give him space because he can score on all three levels,” Woods said of Oni. “As a smaller guard it is about taking away space.”

With Harvard losing to Cornell on Friday, Yale and the Crimson remain tied for first place. The Harvard loss was the only good news of the night for Yale.

“Our energy and our effort was not there to win a college basketball game,” said Yale coach James Jones, whose team was led by 19 points from senior Alex Copeland.

Brodeur scored 24 points and grabbed eight rebounds. Besides Woods and Brodeur, Penn had several key contributors.

Junior guard Devon Goodman totaled 14 points, six rebounds and four assists and senior guard Jake Silpe with five points and four assists. Jarrod Simmons, a 6-8 sophomore, played a career-high 20 minutes, contributing two points and a career-best seven rebounds. Senior Jackson Donahue came off the bench to hit two three-pointers in the first half.

So things have come into sharper focus for the Quakers: Win and they’re in.

“Senior night, at the Palestra, my last go-around in the Palestra,” Woods said. “You can’t ask for a better ending.”