First things first: congratulations to Jon Solomon and Nicole Scheller on their wedding yesterday on the banks of the Delaware River in Stockton, New Jersey. The newlyweds put together an entertaining weekend for those of us visiting from out of town. It was amazing to have the chance to meet so many of you both at the game on Saturday night and at Conte’s afterward.

Here comes Cornell
After losing in the final seconds to Columbia a few weeks earlier, Cornell found itself on the other end of a similar ending on Saturday against Harvard. With three straight wins, the Big Red has done something it hadn’t done all season. The win also lifted Cornell’s record to 4-2 in the league, including a 3-0 record since Khaliq Gant went down. The media normally loves the easy, lazy story of a team rallying around a fallen teammate, but perhaps there’s something to this angle in this case. For a team that has seemed unfocused and inconsistent prior to the injury, the Big Red has played very solid basketball in the three games since. Now Steve Donahue’s team faces its second straight tough game on Friday when Cornell travels to New Haven to face a Yale team that has proven to be close to unbeatable at home in recent years.

…and Princeton, too?
As it turns out, Jadwin Gym isn’t nearly as terrible as it had been built up to be. Granted, we watched the game from courtside and not from the upper balcony, so I can’t really speak to the view from the nosebleeds. The place definitely is not your typical college basketball facility, but it’s no worse than the third- or fourth-best venue in the Ivy League. And Princeton does a great job of making basketball games family-oriented, which was reflected in the large number of small children in the crowd. My biggest problem with Jadwin is one I’ve heard echoed a lot from others: the absence of championship banners. I understand the venue is used by other Tiger sports, including indoor track and wrestling, but it’s really inexcusable for a program with Princeton’s incredible tradition to have no evidence of this in the rafters of its gym. Let’s hope this situation is rectified soon.

As for the game, Princeton played a stellar first half at both ends of the court. Afterward, Joe Scott was clearly disappointed that his team was unable to carry over this dominance to the second half. But it’s tough to fault Princeton too much for the lackluster second stanza, since the game essentially was over shortly after halftime. Predictably, with the Tigers now alone in second place, we’re seeing some articles — even one from the New York Times — painting a picture of Penn and Princeton again fighting it out for league supremacy. While Princeton did look to be vastly improved this weekend, talk of contention is premature at this point. If the Tigers can sweep Harvard and Dartmouth this weekend, then we can start talking about a dramatic turnaround and a big showdown on Tuesday in Philadelphia.

Penn wakes up
The public address announcer’s early score updates from The Palestra were a big hit at Jadwin, as Yale started the game with a 16-1 run and led the entire first half. With four of his starters struggling, Fran Dunphy turned to his bench, and Brian Grandieri and Friedrich Ebede helped the Quakers outscore the Bulldogs 29-17 the rest of the half. In the second half, the Penn starters shook off the rust and ran Yale off the floor, much to the disappointment of the Jadwin faithful. As others have pointed out, if the Quakers were to get off to a similar start on the road — especially in the return engagement in New Haven — the result might turn out to be very different.

Two very different sides to Dartmouth-Columbia
While Dartmouth left Levien Gym relieved and elated after its first Ivy win of the season and the end to a brutal stretch of road games, Columbia fans have to be upset with the direction of the program. Just like last year, the Lions got off to a great start, only to get worse as the season wore on. The only difference is that the collapse came earlier this season. Yes, Columbia is a relatively young team, but the sophomore class has almost two seasons under its belt. The youthful rotation could explain inconsistency, but the Lions have been consistently bad since the nice effort at Notre Dame in December. As for Dartmouth, the Big Green doesn’t have to worry about an 0-14 this season and can look forward to big, supportive home crowds this weekend when Penn and Princeton visit Leede Arena.