TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – The University of Pennsylvania men's basketball team got a basket from freshman Jordan Dingle with 7.5 seconds left and the Quakers withstood a pair of missed Alabama foul shots with 2.4 left to knock off the Crimson Tide, 81-80, on Tuesday night at the Coleman Coliseum.
 
The game was the season opener for both teams.
 
Dingle ended the game with 24 points in his college debut, and senior AJ Brodeur collected the 20th double-double of his career with 19 points and 10 rebounds. Ryan Betley scored 12 points, and Eddie Scott finished with 10.
 
Notes
*The win was Penn's 1,791st as a program but the first to take place against a Southeastern Conference opponent on its home floor. Penn won at current SEC member South Carolina in 1951, when the Gamecocks were in the Southern Conference, and won at original SEC member Georgia Tech in 2001, long after the Ramblin' Wreck had joined the ACC.
 
*The last time the Quakers beat an SEC team anywhere was a 71-63 win over Florida on December 28, 1996 at the Fiesta Bowl Classic in Tucson, Ariz.
 
*Penn led the entire second half with one exception, 80-79. That set the stage for Dingle's winner.
 
*Dingle's 24 points were the most points by a Penn freshman in his debut; the previous mark of 23 was held by current senior AJ Brodeur, set November 11, 2016 at Robert Morris.
 
*Dingle also had seven rebounds, two assists and two steals.
 
*Brodeur, meanwhile, had his 20th collegiate double-double with 19 points and 10 rebounds. He now has 26 straight double-figure scoring games, which puts him alone in fifth for longest such streak in program history.
 
*Brodeur also led Penn with four assists and three blocked shots.
 
*In his first game action in 364 days, senior Ryan Betley scored 12 points and added six rebounds. He played a little more than 33 minutes.
 
*Junior Eddie Scott had his second career double-figure scoring game—the other coming early in his freshman year—with 10 points.
 
*In his collegiate debut, freshman Lucas Monroe logged almost 20 minutes of action and finished with seven points, eight rebounds and two assists.
 
How It Happened
Penn opened the scoring on a Scott triple, but Alabama scored 11 of the next 13 points to go up 11-5 early. The Quakers responded with seven points and a 12-11 lead, but a 7-0 Tide run gave them a 21-16 advantage. Penn again answered, this time with baskets by Brodeur, Brodeur and Betley for a one-point lead. Alabama went back up by six, but the score was tied at halftime, 35-35.
 
Penn then opened the second half with Scott and Brodeur treys sandwiched around a Devon Goodman layup. The eight-point run was the Quakers' second in a span of eight minutes, and they kept Alabama at bay for several minutes after that with the lead bulging as big as nine points on three occasions.
 
The lead was 70-61 when Alabama made a final push. Kira Lewis Jr. (30 points) got a bucket in the lane, then Jaden Shackelford (16) hit a hoop-and-harm to make the score 70-66. Betley ended the skid with a pair of free throws, shots that were matched at the other end by Alex Reese, and then Scott came up with a big putback on a Brodeur miss to make the score 74-68 with 4:28 left.
 
Lewis Jr. hit a three-pointer in transition to cut the Penn lead in half, then made it a one-point game with another fast-break layup off a Goodman miss.
 
At that point, Dingle stepped up with his first massive play. The freshman had his jumper blocked, but he collected the ball and fearlessly fired up a three-pointer in front of the Penn bench that swished through for a 77-73 lead.
 
Alabama hung around, though, and Reese tied the game with 2:20 left on a thunderous dunk that brought the Coleman Coliseum crowd alive. The cheers turned to boos when the Tide were called for a foul, and amid that caucophony Scott hit a pair of free throws with 1:40 left.
 
Alabama had a few chances to tie or take the lead, and it looked like they might have tied it on a tip-in with 52.4 seconds left. However, basket interference was called and upheld on a review, giving Penn the ball with the two-point lead. Brodeur was open for a layup but received Dingle's nice pass a little too tight under the basket and couldn't convert from the low angle. The miss was compounded when Alabama brought it down the floor and Lewis Jr. knocked down a second-chance trey for the Crimson Tide's first lead of the second half.
 
After a timeout, the ball went to Dingle and he drove into the paint before pulling up and knocking down the feathery jumper with 7.5 seconds left. The Tide called a timeout, and on the re-start they gave it to Lewis Jr. who drove into several Penn defenders and drew the foul call with 2.4 seconds left. Amazingly, he missed both of his free throws, and the rebound bounced free as time ran out.