City of Basketball Love

Owen McCue (@Owen_McCue)
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(Ed. Note: This article is part of our 2022-23 preseason coverage, which will run for the six weeks preceding the first official games of the year on Nov. 9. To access all of our high school and college preview content for this season click here)
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In the five seasons the Ivy League has had a postseason tournament, the Penn men’s basketball squad has qualified.

The rest of the Ivy League believes the Quakers will be there again in 2022-23.

Penn was selected as the conference’s preseason favorite the conference announced during Thursday’s Ivy League Men’s Basketball Media Day.

The Quakers tied Princeton with six first-place votes and narrowly edged the Tigers by one point in the preseason poll with 111 points. Yale (3) and Harvard (1) were the others receiving first-place votes, finishing third and fourth, respectively in the preseason poll.

“I think a lot of that is based on what is returning and sometimes rightfully so, but other times you really don’t know the growth of kids at this age and who gets better even within our program,” Penn coach Steve Donahue said. “So I think it’s good that people recognize we had a good group last year that was coming along.

“And with a lot of returning leadership and players back, it bodes well for you, if indeed, every day you’re paying attention to the habits that make you good, and that’s the key thing. So it’s not like we talk about it at all, but I am excited about this group because it is a group that has really worked hard over the last six months.”

Penn junior guard Jordan Dingle, a unanimous first team All-Ivy League selection, is one of team first team all-league players returning along with Princeton junior forward Tosan Evbuomwan, the league’s unanimous Player of the Year in 2021-22.

Dingle averaged 20.9 ppg, 3.6 rpg and 2.4 apg last season. He was the Ivy’s leading scorer and also ranked 10th in assists. 

With a supporting cast that is either healthy or more experience, Dingle has focused on his playmaking heading into this season.

“My coaches and I have had some conversations about some of the things that we felt I need t o work on, and obviously with everybody else on the team coming back and getting so much better I think that the main thing I’m gonna focus on is trying to maximize my teammates’ abilities,” Dingle said. “Last year, the team was formatted so I had to do a lot of the scoring myself and at times it did make us a little bit easier to guard. Now, with multiple weapons coming from across the points of the floor, I think that our game plan is gonna be to kind of have me be more of a facilitator this year and try to put my guys in the best spots and make scoring as easy as possible for them.”

The Quakers only have two significant departures in guard Jelani Williams (6.0 ppg, 3.7 rpg, 2.0 apg) and forward Michael Wang (6.4 ppg, 2.4 rpg, 1.3 apg) and Wang missed most of last season with injury.

The long list of returners includes guard Jonah Charles (6.7 ppg), forward/guard Max Martz (10.0 ppg, 5.0 rpg), forward Michael Moshkovitz (5.1 ppg, 4.7 rpg), center Max Lorca-Lloyd (4.3 ppg), guard Clark Sajchert (10.7 ppg), guard Lucas Monroe (4.8 ppg, 4.5 rpg), guard George Smith (5.3 ppg), forward/center Nick Spinoso (3.5 ppg) and forward/center Gus Larson (0.4 ppg).

“Last year we were really young and guys were kinda trying to figure out how it worked to win Ivy League games,” Dingle said. “But they’ve made tremendous jumps in the offseason and in practicing with them I’ve been able to notice that and it's’ been a lot easier. The ball is moving a lot better and our scoring is coming from multiple places at once so I think it’s gonna make us a lot harder to guard.”

The Quakers went through a gauntlet of a non-conference slate last season, going 3-10 before Ivy League play and ending the non-conference with a six-game losing streak that left them reeling a little bit both mentally and physically.

They figured things out in league play, finishing with a 9-5 record that placed them third in the league and booked another trip to ‘Ivy Madness’.

“We didn’t really have a chance to practice much,” Monroe said. “Most of our practices were walk-through, scout-based, not very physical, so it’s kind of hard to work on some of our weaknesses. And I think that shifted when we got to Ivy play because you have a whole week of practice, less traveling and there’s obviously more home games built in and I think that’s the reason it became more consistent.”

The Quakers once again have a challenging non-conference slate that includes road trips to Iona, Missouri and West Virginia along with the annual Big 5 slate. Donahue said the Quakers need to show ‘growth and competitiveness’ in those challenges this season unlike 2021-22.

“I just feel like we’re a team that’s now with healthy bodies in size and depth,” Donahue said. “We should be able to compete for a Big 5 championship because that’s really our first goal each and every year, and then move on to our next segment, which would be, you know the 14-game Ivy League season.”

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Ivy League Men’s Basketball Preseason Poll
1. Penn (6 first-place votes, 111)
2. Princeton (6, 110)
3. Yale (3, 106)
4. Harvard (1, 86)
5. Cornell (54)
6. Brown (53)
7. Dartmouth (31)
8. Columbia (25)