City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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(Ed. Note: This article is part of our 2023-24 season coverage, which will run for the six weeks preceding the first official games of the year on Nov. 6. To access all of our high school and college preview content for this season click here.)

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Big 5 Preseason Primers
MBB: Drexel | La Salle | Penn | Saint Joseph’s | Temple | Villanova
WBB: Drexel | La Salle | Penn | Saint Joseph’s | Temple | Villanova

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2023-24 Penn Quakers MBB Primer
Coach: Steve Donahue, 8th season (112-93, .546)
Last Year: 17-13 (9-5 Ivy League), lost in Ivy League semifinals (77-70)

This season was supposed to be Penn’s strongest shot at an Ivy League title since winning it all in 2018, but a couple surprising offseason departures mean that this year might be a little more of a rebuilding project than Donahue and his staff intended. Fortunately, the arrival of a highly-regarded freshman class that could include the program’s next big star helps mitigate some of the losses, and it’s not like the returners are devoid of talent, either. Donahue needs a few former role players to step up and show they can be productive regulars, and a few starters to become stars, but the pieces are there for the Quakers to stay in the top half of the Ancient Eight and make something happen in the postseason.

Key Departures: G Jordan Dingle (23.4 ppg, 3.6 rpg), SF Max Martz (10.8 ppg, 4.2 rpg), G Lucas Monroe (4.9 ppg, 6.0 rpg)

There’s actually six members of last year’s rotation who don’t suit up for the Quakers anymore, including shooting guard Jonah Charles, center Max Lorca-Lloyd and combo forward Michael Moshkovitz, who started a combined 15 games and averaged a combined eight or so points per game, but they’re much more replaceable parts of the overall machine. It’s the other three who won’t put on a Penn uniform any more whose absences are likely going to be felt much more significantly this fall. 

Going into the offseason, it was known that they were going to lose Charles, Lorca-Lloyd, Monroe and Moshkovitz, who all graduated from Penn and were forced to use their extra (COVID) years of eligibility elsewhere if they wanted to play more college hoops. But Dingle, the nation’s second-leading scorer and a guard with a chance to end up at or near the top of many Penn record books, surprised many with a transfer to St. John’s in May, dealing a major blow to Penn’s 2023-24 outlook. To make matters worse, Martz was forced to end his basketball career entirely thanks to chronic knee/leg issues, taking his career 39.9% 3-point efforts off the table after announcing his medical retirement this fall.

New Faces: G Sam Brown (Fr. | Lower Merion, Pa.), F Augustus Gerhart (Fr. | Hill School, Pa.), G Tyler Perkins (Fr. | Landon School, Va.), SF Nik Polonowski (Lyons Twp., Ill), C Johnnie Walter (Soph. | Oaks Christian, Cali.)

The Quakers staff brought in four collegiate rookies and one transfer, the 6-10 Walter coming in from Cal State-Northridge, where he averaged 1.0 ppg and 1.9 rpg in 25 games, playing about 10 mpg in his freshman season. While he’s likely to see some minutes at the backup ‘5’ spot, it’s the freshman who could really have a major impact on this rotation. That starts with Perkins — the 6-4 guard really took off over the second half of his senior year, winning the MVP of the Capital Classic after averaging nearly 25 ppg as a senior. Physical, smooth and talented, Perkins could immediately come in and lead the Quakers in scoring, and expectations are for him to play big minutes from the get-go.

The rest of the freshman class could also factor into the rotation as well. Brown, a 6-3 lefty and the son of former Sixers coach Brett Brown, was a four-year standout at Lower Merion, one of the region’s best shooters and an underrated athlete and distributor. Donahue’s system loves shooters, and he’ll put ‘em up from just about anywhere. Gerhart, who played at the Hill School for the last few years of his high school career, is a 6-9 plugger with a much-improved face-up game, though he won’t shy away from banging in the post, while the 6-6 Polonowski gives them more size and shooting ability on the perimeter. 

Projected Lineup: G Clark Slajchert (13.6 ppg), Tyler Perkins, SG George Smith (5.6 ppg), SF Eddie Holland III (3.5 ppg) PF Nick Spinoso (8.8 ppg, 5.6 rpg)

With Dingle’s departure, it’s Slajchert who will likely have the ball in his hands quite a bit more this season, as the senior guard has proven himself to be an impressive offensive player over his first two years of college basketball (he lost his first to the COVID year). The 6-1 guard from Thousand Oaks (Cali.) has averaged 12.2 ppg in his college career thus far, entering his final year at Penn well in range of getting to 1,000 points (635), having shot 44% overall and 34.5% from 3-point range last year, but he’ll need to build on his playmaking abilities (1.6 career apg). 

Penn’s likely leader in the assists category this year is Spinoso, as the 6-9, 240-pound big man averaged 3.1 apg a year ago in just 22.1 mpg; the Quakers need him to cut down on his fouls (2.5/game) to stay on the floor, because his passing and facilitating abilities out of the high post really help the offense flow like it did when AJ Brodeur was one of the most dominant forces in the Ivy League. Perkins, as mentioned, should jump right into a significant role as an off-ball scorer, and then it just comes down to which two wings Donahue wants to start alongside them: the 6-4 Smith has played about 20 mpg in 48 career games and hit 46.3% of his 3s a year ago, while Holland — a Friends’ Central product — has good length at 6-6 and can knock down shots as well, though he’s only played 169 minutes in his first two collegiate seasons.

Key Reserves: G Cam Thrower (2.8 ppg), SG Andrew Laczkowski (2.3 ppg), Sam Brown, Augustus Gerhart, Johnnie Walter

Donahue’s shown he’s not afraid to rotate through most of his roster at different points in the season, so it’s highly likely that a few more players than those mentioned here get their chance to contribute at one time or another. But this seems like the group most likely to be regulars: Gerhart and Walter to give them some size up front, while Thrower, Laczkowski and Brown shore up the backcourt and wings. The staff was high last year on Thrower, a 6-3 guard out of Harvard-Westlake (Cali), but injuries held him back as a freshman, limiting him to just 95 minutes. Laczkowski, a 6-6 senior from Dallas, has played in 36 career games in the two years post-COVID, averaging 2.2 ppg on 11-of-39 (28.2%) 3-point shooting, though he’s never had enough regular attempts to really get into a flow. 

Biggest Strength: Underclassmen

With Dingle and Martz’s departure, Penn’s roster weight swung heavily towards the younger classes, with the combined seven freshmen and sophomores on the roster making up not just a solid chunk of the minutes but the vast majority of optimism for the next few years, especially if Thrower turns out to be a significant piece. Perkins, Brown, Polonowski and Gerhart should be a great core to build around, while Walter and 6-9 Chris Ubochi give them even more size in the sophomore class. The Quakers certainly aren’t going to punt on this season, but looking ahead, the future seems bright.

Area for Improvement: Forcing turnovers

According to hoops stat wizard Ken Pomeroy and his fantastic site, the Quakers were a slightly below average team defensively (216th nationally in defensively efficiency), but that was really dragged down by one specific area: they were 113th in defensive effective field-goal percentage, 155th in rebounding percentage, 129th in percentage of shots blocked. But they were 342nd in turnover percentage, forcing opponents to give it up just 14.9% of possessions; a percentage of 18% would put them around the midway point in D-I hoops. That’s another couple turnovers per game, a couple fewer shots for opponents and potentially easy ones for the Quakers, which can make all the difference in close games — and Penn lost seven games last year by seven points or less, including three in OT.