EVANSTON, Ill. – The University of Pennsylvania women's basketball team remains on the road this weekend, taking on Northwestern out of the Big Ten conference on Sunday in Welsh-Ryan Arena.
 
GAME 2: PENN (1-0) at Northwestern (0-1)
Sunday, November 13, 2022 | 1:00 PM EST
Evanston, Ill. | Welsh-Ryan Arena
Watch | Live Stats | Game Notes
 
The Series
The Quakers are meeting Northwestern for the fourth time in program history, falling in the initial three matchups. The first contest was in December 1995 then followed again in December 2001 in a close overtime loss, 77-71. Both games were at neural locations. The third matchup was in Evanston in 2009, as the Wildcats secured the 61-39 decision. Penn has averaged 51.3 points per game in the series.
 
Last Time We Met
The last matchup in 2009 was in Evanston, falling in a 61-39 tilt. The Quakers were led by a 10-point performance from Sarah Bucar who was named to the all-tournament team in the two-game trip to Illinois. Jess Knapp chipped in seven points to go with eight rebounds.
 
About Northwestern
The Wildcats squared off against No. 20 Oregon to tip off their season on Monday on the west coast, dropping a 100-57 decision. Caileigh Walsh led Northwestern with 15 points, six rebounds and two blocks, while Paige Mott also tacked on five points off the bench. Joe McKeown, in his 14th season with the Wildcats, has guided the program to an NCAA tournament berth as well as five trips to the WNIT. In 2020, they post a 16-2 record in the Big Ten for a share of the league title before the pandemic shut down play.
 
Penn's Last Time Out
In the season opener on Thursday night in Poughkeepsie, the Quakers gutted out a 65-61 victory at Marist behind a 31-point effort from senior captain Kayla Padilla. The fourth straight season-opening win under head coach Mike McLaughlin, Penn battled back from a 13-point run in the first quarter by the Red Foxes to take a second quarter lead that it wouldn't lose the rest of the way. Padilla's 31 points is the third time in her career she eclipsed the 30-point mark, while senior captain Mandy McGurk joined her in double figures with 10 including 7-for-8 at the free throw line in the final minutes of the game. Junior transfer Floor Toonders made her mark in her Quaker debut, pulling in a career-high 14 rebounds, and sophomore Stina Almqvist added eight points and a career-high eight rebounds. Under McLaughlin's tutelage, the Quakers are 162-18 when scoring at least 60 points.
 
A Look Ahead
The Quakers are on the road a lot through the month of November, only playing in The Palestra once on November 17 against Villanova. Beyond opening the season at Marist and the trip to Chicago for the Northwestern matchup, they hit the west coast for California the week of Thanksgiving for battles against San Francisco (Nov. 21) and USC (Nov. 23). The rest of the month includes two more Big 5 games in Philadelphia, at Saint Joseph's (Nov. 15) and at La Salle (Nov. 29).
 
Leading The Way
Penn is led by a pair of seniors this season, as the team named Mandy McGurk and Kayla Padilla captains. This is Padilla's second stint at the helm of the team, earning the honor last season as well. Both players are critical pieces to the success of the program, each being with the team since freshmen year.
 
Padilla Cut Loose
The senior guard from Torrance, California has had a decorated two seasons with the Quakers already, with a list of accolades to go along with it. She entered her Penn career with a stellar freshman season where she was named Ivy League Rookie of the Year, first team All-Ivy, USBWA National Freshman of the Week, and countless Player of the Week nods from the conference and Big 5. Without a season in 2020-21 due to the pandemic, she picked up right where she left off last year, earning first team for the Ivy League, Big 5 and City of Basketball Love. She averaged 37.6 minutes per game which led the Ivy League and was 11th in the country. She also led the conference in scoring with 18.6 points per game at a .401 clip. To top it all off, she continued to put her name in the program record book, setting the three-point field goal record for a single game with nine against Memphis, totaling 36 points for the contest, the 10th most points in a program history. She is opening her senior season on the Preseason Becky Hammon Mid-Major Player of the Year watch list for the second-straight time, which she proved the voters right after a 31-point performance in the season opener at Marist.
 
New Faces
The Quakers have seven new players this season, six freshmen and a junior transfer. All seven come from far and wide including the Netherlands, Canada, California, Illinois, and New Jersey. Junior Floor Toonders highlights the group, transferring in after two seasons with Florida. The freshmen class includes Saniah Caldwell, Simone Sawyer, Georgia Heine, Isabel Gomez, Helena Lasic, and Ella Ray.
 
Magic Number: 60
The statistic that may most indicate a Penn win or loss? 60 points. Penn has won 125 of its last 131 regular season games when scoring at least 60 points in regulation. Since head coach Mike McLaughlin took over at Penn, the Quakers are 162-18 (.900) when they reach that number (134-10 over the last seven seasons). In comparison, the Quakers are just 49-119 (.292) when they've scored less than 60 points under Coach McLaughlin. The trend continues defensively. Over the last eight seasons, the Red and Blue are 41-77 (.347) when allowing 60 points or more. But when holding opponents under that number, the Quakers hold a healthy winning record of 167-34 (.830).