Why Penn coach Steve Donahue scheduled two ‘heavyweights’ ahead of Ivy League play

University City can be a little bit sleepy this week. Exams are over, and Penn students have mostly dispersed for the holidays.

Athletes, though, are still around. Ivy League basketball play begins next week, and there is plenty of work to do to prepare for the rigors of conference play.

There are different ways to do that. Take last year for example. The men’s basketball team hosted Division III Wilkes University after an 18-day break, and if it wasn’t a daytime tip on “community day,” the crowd at the Palestra might not have featured the 1,500-plus that were in attendance.

It wasn’t a perfect Ivy League tune-up, but when you’re a mid-major trying to fill out your schedule, it’s tough to find opponents, especially when league play elsewhere starts earlier than it used to.

This time around, the Quakers are hitting the road. They’re off to Houston first to face the No. 3 Cougars on Saturday (7 p.m., ESPN+) before heading to Alabama to take on an Auburn team on Tuesday (9 p.m., SEC Network) that isn’t in the Associated Press top 25 but has top-10 metrics. This, just a few weeks removed from playing No. 8 Kentucky at the Wells Fargo Center.

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What was Penn coach Steve Donahue thinking?

“That’s how we’re going to try to take the next step and build a team that can win a [conference] championship and then hopefully make a run in the NCAA Tournament,” he said earlier this month after his team lost to Kentucky, 81-66.

There was a stretch in the second half that day that showed his team could compete with the big dogs at times. The Quakers cut a 10-point halftime deficit to two in the first six minutes of the second half before Kentucky eventually made its closing run. It was a small window, yes, but a telling one.

“It’s a great opportunity to learn a lot about ourselves, have some adversity with some teams who have length and athleticism that we’re not going to see,” senior guard Clark Slajchert said about playing Kentucky, Houston, and Auburn. “Coach always says it’s a different kind of challenge, but not necessarily harder than it’s going to be in the Ivy.”

The road trip will feature basketball challenges, but it’s also a time for a group that’s still learning how to play together to get to spend some time together with no class and studying to worry about. The Quakers lost four starters from last year’s team and have two freshmen — Tyler Perkins and Sam Brown — playing more than 30 minutes per game.

Donahue said he’s unsure how the team will spend the New Year’s Eve holiday yet, but previous teams of his have held team events at places like Dave and Buster’s while on a road trip. Donahue said he likes the aspect of getting away this week and bonding together on the road.

“Otherwise no one is here and it’s really boring,” he said of sticking around for the holiday break. “You’re just not getting the most out of, to me, this time of year, getting ready for league play.”

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How do Houston and Auburn prepare you for the Ivy League?

Auburn is like Cornell, but better. The Tigers, like the Big Red, will try to speed you up and turn you over. Houston, meanwhile, plays a lot slower, but ...

“I don’t know if there’s anybody like Houston,” Donahue said, “However, their half-court defense is elite and that’s going to help you, if you can figure out ways to fight through that and be successful.”

The Quakers have taken an interesting path to get to 8-5. There have been highs — hello, Villanova — and lows. When La Salle’s Khalil Brantley hit his half-court heave to sink Penn in the Big 5 Classic, Donahue briefly doubled over the scorer’s table. It hurts when it happens once, but that happened to be Penn’s second buzzer-beating defeat. Penn has just two regulation losses, to Kentucky and St. Joseph’s — one is a lock to make the NCAA Tournament, the other is good enough. Flip the coin on those three overtime losses, and Penn is 11-2.

“We’re probably where we should be based on where we’re at in our development,” Donahue said.

Those aforementioned freshmen are a big reason things are looking up. So is the play of upperclassmen like Slajchert and Nick Spinoso.

» READ MORE: Picked to finish last, La Salle has been flying high through its non-conference slate

The Kentucky game, Donahue said, helped his team in a lot of ways. Confidence is one of them.

“That’s how I’m approaching this trip,” he said. “We’re going into some heavyweights, in their backyard, and we’re going to try to compete and do everything we can to win the basketball game. But more than anything we’re trying to compete and show we belong.

“Those things, if you’re successful, I think do help.”

It could go the other way, too. Donahue said he’s seen the other side of it, where teams aren’t ready for back-to-back matchups like this.

“That’s the reverse factor,” he said. “Their confidence can be shot and you’ve got to be careful. I’m pretty sure that this group, what they’ve been through already, win or lose we’re going to come out of it a better team.”