CU Faces Critical Game Against Penn

Penn has not been playing like the team that was picked to finish second behind Yale in the Ivy League. The Quakers started the season with three losses, including an unexpected one to Dartmouth two weeks ago. Penn is currently 1-3 after a blowout win over Georgetown last week. Even in their losses, however, the Quakers have showcased a stifling defense. They held Lafayette—to whom the Lions gave up four touchdowns this past Saturday—to two field goals and a safety. Now that Penn's best returning offensive player is back from an injury, the Quakers could be undergoing a return to form. It will be a tall order for Columbia to take them on in Saturday's homecoming game.

The big news for Penn at the start of the season was the hiring of new offensive coordinator Bill Schmitz, who implemented the no-huddle offense he used at the University of Alabama-Birmingham. It was designed to speed up the pace of the offense and force mental mistakes by opposing defenses. Based on what he's seen on tape, though, Columbia head coach Norries Wilson believes that the scheme itself doesn't pose a major challenge.

"They do some things at the line," he said. "It's not that they're doing anything different, it's that they're doing it at the line of scrimmage, and doing it a little faster than if they did it from the huddle."

When they've been playing from behind—which was the case against Lafayette, Vanderbilt, and Dartmouth—Penn has reverted to a more conventional offense. Whether or not the Quakers use a huddle on Saturday will be a good indicator of the game's momentum.

As for offensive personnel, Penn has had to turn to backup quarterback Bryan Walker since starting quarterback Robert Irvin went down with an injury against Villanova. Walker threw sixty passes and had a 50 percent completion rate against Dartmouth, a game in which he rushed for an additional 67 yards. He's a dual-threat player in the same vein as Princeton's Bill Foran. The Columbia defense did a good job adapting to Foran's athleticism two weeks ago, and they will need to eliminate Walker's running space early on this Saturday.

The Quakers have solid depth at running back, and their offense favors multiple ball carriers. First team all-Ivy tailback Joe Sandberg has the most experience, and he will likely be the primary ball carrier now that he is fully recovered from an injury against Dartmouth. He is what Wilson referred to as an under-the-radar success.

"He gets 100 yards," Wilson said. "You know, it might be a quiet 100 yards, but he gets over 100 yards, he runs the ball hard, he's a good down-hill runner, and he has a good bit of elusiveness, so we're going to have to do a good job of getting him wrapped up and getting him down."

Penn has been getting solid production out of fullback Michael DiMaggio, and he could be particularly effective for grinding out short yardage against Columbia's comparatively undersized defensive line.

On defense, Penn may pose an even greater challenge to Columbia than Lafayette did last week. When the Quakers played the Leopards, they held them to just three third-down conversions out of 17 chances. The strength of the unit is on the line, which is not good news for Columbia; the Lions had a dismal performance in the trenches last week.

It was bad enough that coach Wilson said after the game that he might rework the team's starting personnel, but he said Thursday that the two-deep had not changed this week.

The Lions will try to reignite their rushing game against a Quakers defensive front that held Georgetown to just 97 net rushing yards last week. The Penn defense has had only one rushing touchdown scored against them all season.

The Quaker secondary is not as dominant, however, and Columbia will be in a good situation if Craig Hormann can continue to find the wide receivers for longer passing plays. The one hitch in this game plan could be the potential threat of rain on Saturday.

A win tomorrow would give either team their first Ivy League win. For Columbia, it would mean the first victory over the Quakers in nine years. Kickoff is at 1:30 p.m.