College ShameDay: Football Routed as Hyped Rematch Turns Into Dud

PHILADELPHIA—As Penn kicker Peter Veldman’s 27-yard field goal sailed through the uprights to open the scoring at Franklin Field this Saturday, the Harvard football team breathed a collective sigh of relief. It had just survived a potentially costly Neil Rose fumble on its own 12-yard line and the three-point Quaker lead could have been a lot worse.

The next Rose-caused bullet proved to be far more difficult to dodge and, in the end, was far more fatal to Harvard’s hopes of a second straight Ivy-clinching win over Penn.

Quaker defensive end Chris Pennington scooped up Rose’s second first-quarter fumble and rumbled 51 yards for the score, opening the floodgates for 41 consecutive points as No. 17 Penn soundly pounded Harvard, 44-9, to clinch at least a share of its second League title in three years.

“Stating the obvious, Penn dominated us today,” said Harvard coach Tim Murphy. “It was a combination of how well they played and how poorly we played. They were as good as advertised.”

The 35-point loss—the most lopsided for the Crimson (6-3, 5-1 Ivy) since a 47-8 drubbing at Brown in 1995—effectively ended Harvard’s quest to repeat as Ancient Eight champions. In order to share the title with the Quakers, the Crimson would need to beat Yale next week and hope that Cornell can pull off an unlikely upset when it hosts Penn (8-1, 6-0).

Conspiculously invisible Saturday was All-American wide receiver Carl Morris, who hauled in only three balls for an uncharacteristically low 16 yards of offense. Morris had been featured earlier on ESPN’s College GameDay, but failed to provide the highlight reel catches in the cold rain against the Quakers’ pass coverage.

“I was suprised about [Harvard’s lack of a deep passing game],” said Penn senior linebacker Steve Lhotak. “I thought they would have gone over the top more, but that’s a testament to our guys covering them.”

Morris’ silence was symptomatic of the sputtering Crimson offense’s inability to move the ball through the air. No Crimson receiver finished with more than 60 receiving yards, a rarity for Murphy’s complex, pro-style passing offense.

“What we didn’t do is make any big plays in the passing game to our other guys,” said Murphy, shifting the focus off Morris. “We just nickle-and-dimed it.”

The short plays were largely ineffective against the quick Quaker defense, which was able to force long-yardage situations by smothering screens and shallow slants.

On the other side of the ball, Penn’s offense relied on the big play arm of senior Mike Mitchell, who shook off early-game jitters to pass for 317 yards and four touchdowns.

Mitchell’s favorite target was senior All-Ivy wideout Rob Milanese, who outplayed the more hyped Morris. He finished with 139 yards on nine catches, including a 22-yard touchdown that pushed Penn over the 40-point plateau in the third quarter.

“Our school newspaper likes to give the opposing team’s receivers the edge in the matchup section,” Milanese said. “I think I proved them wrong a couple times today.”

The closest Harvard came to Penn was halfway through the first quarter when junior defensive end Brian Garcia sacked Mitchell in the end zone for a safety and an unusual 3-2 score.

From there, though, the game went downhill for the Crimson as Penn’s 41 straight points went unanswered until Matt Fratto’s 9-yard TD catch from sophomore quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick with four minutes left in the game.

Fitzpatrick, who had previously led the Crimson to comeback wins in Rose’s stead, was unable to substantially spark the offense when he entered the game in the third quarter. His touchdown pass did, however, prevent the high-powered Crimson offense from being shut out for the first time since 1998.

The dominating Penn performance was particularly sweet for the Quaker players, who lost a similar high-stakes game in Cambridge last season.

“Last year’s game was the type of game you think about all year,” Milanese said. “The way we handled them today is definitely good payback.”

On the flip side, the dismal Crimson performance was particularly bitter for the contingent of Harvard supporters who braved the cold rain to make the six-hour trek to Philadelphia.

Over 100 students, many of them bussed in from Cambridge by the H-Club, arrived early enough at Franklin Field to cheer on the team during ESPN’s live broadcast. They noisily objected when GameDay analysts Lee Corso and Kirk Herbstreit both picked Penn to win, though they couldn’t really argue with the experts at game’s end.

—Staff writer Daniel E. Fernandez can be reached at dfernand@fas.harvard.edu.

Penn 44, Harvard 9

at Franklin Field

Harvard 2 0 0 7 — 9

Penn 13 21 7 3 — 44

First Quarter P—FG Veldman 27, 11:02. H—Safety, Mitchell tackled in end zone, 7:45. P—Pennington 51 fumble return (Veldman kick), 4:47. P—FG Veldman 23, :10. Second Quarter P—Faulk 18 pass from Mitchell (Veldman kick), 9:27. P—Castles 12 pass from Mitchell (Veldman kick), 5:25. P—Bolinder 33 pass from Mitchell (Veldman kick), 3:30. Third Quarter P—Milanese 22 pass from Mitchell (Veldman kick), 1:11. Fourth Quarter P—FG Galas 41, 7:54. H—Fratto 9 pass from Fitzpatrick (Blewett kick), 4:03. Attendance—18,630.

Harvard Penn

First downs 19 18

Rushes-yards 41-134 30-74

Passing 205 317

Comp-Att-Int 26-40-1 21-30-1

Return Yards 39 106

Punts-Avg. 7-34.6 4-43.0

Fumbles-Lost 2-2 0-0

Penalties-Yards 8-50 6-45

Time of Possession 32:44 27:16

Individual Statistics

Rushing—Harvard, Palazzo 14-55, R.Thomas 7-38, Fitzpatrick 11-35, Tyler 1-4, Carrington 1-1, Rose 7-1. Penn, Recchiuti 7-51, Perskie 8-29, Faulk 3-8, Kapusta 2-5, DeSmedt 2-3, Mitchell 8-(minus 22).

Passing—Harvard, Rose 16-27-1 133, Fitzpatrick 10-13-0 72. Penn, Mitchell 21-30-1 317.

Receiving—Harvard, Byrnes 8-60, Cremarosa 5-44, Harvey 5-41, Morris 3-16, Fratto 2-26, R. Thomas 2-10, Palazzo 1-8. Penn, Milanese 9-139, Bolinder 4-72, Castles 2-26, Faulk 2-25, Recchiuti 2-17, Joe Phillips 1-21, Makovsky 1-17.