PHILADELPHIA – The University of Pennsylvania men's basketball team was hit by a Cornell run late in the first half of Saturday's game at The Palestra, and it proved too much to overcome as the Big Red emerged with an 86-76 victory.
 
Penn was up, 27-25, with less than four minutes to play in the first half, but Cornell's AK Okereke scored back-to-back buckets (one from distance) that set the visitors on a 10-0 run and gave them a lead they wouldn't relinquish. The Big Red ended the half on a 17-4 run, taking an 11-point lead into the locker room, and extended the margin to 20 early in the second half. Penn never got closer than nine after that.
 
Penn fell to 4-11 overall and 0-2 in Ivy League play, while the Big Red—under first-year head coach Jon Jaques, who played collegiately at Cornell under current Penn coach Steve Donahue—remained unbeaten in Ivy play at 2-0 and moved to 10-5 overall.
 
Quaker Notemeal
*Penn forced Cornell into 14 turnovers on Saturday—the Quakers committed just eight—and finished with a season-high eight steals.
 
*The teams shot nearly identical from the field on Saturday, Penn shooting 28-of-58 overall (48.3 percent) and Cornell going 30-of-62 (48.4); the Big Red went 9-of-24 beyond the arc (37.5 percent), the Quakers 8-of-21 (38.1 percent).
 
*Penn got another outstanding offensive performance from junior Ethan Roberts, who had 26 points and shot 9-of-15 from the field. He added five rebounds.
 
*Sophomore Sam Brown scored 15 points on Saturday, knocking down a pair of three-pointers late. It was his best offensive performance since he had 19 against Maine on November 30.
 
*Freshman AJ Levine started in place of Michael Zanoni, who missed Saturday's game due to illness, and scored 13 points which is his season/career high. He also had three assists and three steals.
 
*Senior Nick Spinoso had another stat-stuffing afternoon with 12 points, a team-high six rebounds, and a game-leading seven assists. He also had two steals.
 
*Cornell—which outrebounded Penn 43-24 and won the second-chance points battle, 13-0—showed the offensive balance that has been a hallmark this season, getting 19 points from Cooper Noard, 15 from AK Okereke, 14 from Nazir Williams and 12 from Jack Flegen. Okereke also had four assists while Ryan Kiachian grabbed a game-high eight rebounds.
 
How It Happened
Both teams were hot to start, especially Roberts who had eight points by the first media timeout. Penn's lead was 12-8 at that point, and the Quakers held that lead for nearly the next ten minutes, Cornell finally taking its first lead of the day at 23-22 when Adam Hinton hit what would be his only bucket of the day. The lead changed hands three times on the next three possessions before things settled down, a Spinoso free throw the only point for either team over a span of 1:16. The freebie put Penn up, 27-25.
 
As the clock went under four minutes, Cornell got hot—Okereke in particular. The junior guard hit a three-pointer, then got a layup in transition which forced a Penn timeout that became the under-4 media. Almost a minute later, Okereke again converted, and then Williams followed with a triple (ending Okereke's personal seven-point run). Overall, it was a 10-0 streak and pushed the Big Red in front, 35-27.
 
Roberts ended the skid in the paint, then matched a Kiachian bucket. However, the Big Red rallied for the next five after that and took a 42-31 lead into the locker room.
 
Roberts opened the second-half scoring, then matched a Flegen three-pointer. However, Noard knocked down three-pointers on Cornell's next two possessions and then Guy Ragland Jr. matched a triple hit by Levine. Another empty Penn possession was followed by Williams getting to the line and hitting two free throws, and then Noard got an old-fashioned three-point play. Overall, it was a 34-12 run bridging 7:22 of game time across the halves and Cornell's lead was 20 (59-39).
 
To its credit, Penn never quit. The Big Red went scoreless for more than five minutes and the Quakers used the drought to get within 12. Penn even got within nine ahead of the under-8 media timeout on a Levine basket. The Quakers, however, scored just three points over the game's next 4:31—all of them on free throws—and Cornell was able to keep the ship from listing any further in seeing out the victory.
 
Up Next
Penn is back on the bus for a second trip to Northern New England in nine days. The Quakers are at Harvard on Monday as part of the Ivy League's annual MLK Day slate of games, tipping off with the Crimson at 2 p.m. at Lavietes Pavilion. The Crimson are 1-1 in Ivy play after beating Brown Saturday in Providence, 80-67.
 
For the latest on Penn men's basketball, follow @PennMBB on X (formerly Twitter) and Instagram, and on the web at PennAthletics.com.