GAME INFORMATION
GAME #23: Cornell vs. Penn
GAME TIME: Saturday, Feb. 17, at 4:00 p.m.
GAME SITE: Newman Arena (Ithaca, N.Y.)
SERIES RECORD: Penn leads, 56-21
LAST MEETING: Penn, 68-48 (2/12/2018 in Philadelphia, Pa.)
2017 RECORDS: Cornell (6-16, 2-7 Ivy); Penn (17-6, 7-2 Ivy)
LIVE STATS: http://www.sidearmstats.com/cornell/wbball
LIVE VIDEO: www.IvyLeague.tv
 
* GAME NOTES (PDF)
 
THE MATCHUP: The Big Red will face another steep test when it welcomes the second-best team in the Ivy League, Penn, to Newman Arena this evening. The game is part of a double-header with the men's team also facing the Quakers. The women will tip off at 4 p.m., with the men's game slated to start at 6:30 p.m.
 
QUICK HITS:
• Samantha Widmann enters the contest needing just two steals to move into Cornell's top 10 for season steals … She currently ranks 72nd in the nation for steals per game (2.45).
• Penn defeated the Big Red in the first game of the series this season.
• Head Coach Dayna Smith was an assistant coach at Penn from 199-2002, helping the Quakers to an undefeated Ivy title in 2000-01.
• The Cornell/Penn game has been dominated by the defenses in recent years. In the 13 meetings since 2011-12, there have been nine in which one team was held to 50 or fewer points and five contests in which the two teams combined for fewer than 100 points.
 
SERIES VS. PENN: Cornell's rivalry with the Quakers began during the 1974-75 season and the two teams have met every year since, excluding the 1977-78 and 1978-79 seasons.
• Cornell's longest winning streak in the series came when the Big Red won three consecutive from 2010-12.
• Head coach Dayna Smith, who served as an assistant coach for Penn from 1999-2002, holds a 12-19 record in the series.
 
HEAD COACH DAYNA SMITH: In her 16th season, Dayna Smith ranks fourth overall in Ivy League women's basketball history in years served as a head coach in the conference.
• Only one active coach, Harvard's Kathy Delaney-Smith (35th season), ranks ahead of Cornell's Smith.
• She is the winningest coach in Cornell history, ranking fifth in Ivy League women's basketball all-time, with 175 victories.
 
NOTING THE PRINCETON GAME: Ivy League leading Princeton used a smothering defensive effort during the first quarter of action to jump out to a lead it would not relinquish en route to a 72-40 victory last night in Newman Arena.
• Stephanie Umeh knocked down 6-of-7 from the floor for a career-high 12 points.
• Dylan Higgins also finished with a career-high nine points on 4-of-6 shooting.
• Samantha Clement also added nine points.
• Sophomore Reena Olsen grabbed a team- and career-high four rebounds.. 
• Princeton was led by Bella Alarie's 18 points, while Sydney Jordan (12) and Tia Weledji (11) both finished in double-digits.
• The Tigers shot a blistering 48.3 percent overall (29-63), while holding Cornell to just 30.6 percent from the floor (15-49)..
• Princeton connected on a mere 16.7 percent from beyond the arc (2-12), but for the first time all season, Cornell was held without a 3-pointer (0-7).
• Princeton forced Cornell into 17 turnovers with 12 steals, leading to 21 points off turnovers.
 
SEASON NOTES TO KNOW:
• Cornell is 4-3 in games in which Samantha Widman has scored 20 points.
• The Big Red's defense has held four opponents – Stony Brook, UNH, NJIT, and Columbia – to fewer than 50 points.
• Samantha Widmann has led Cornell in scoring in 15 of its 22 contests so far this season.
• Samantha Widmann has registered double-digits in 16 of 22 games for the Big Red, including seven 20+ point performances and a career-high 28 points vs. Oakland.
• Samantha Widmann has registered at least three steals in 11 games this season.
• Christine Ehland has grabbed at least five rebounds in all but seven games this season.   
• In the 17 games since becoming a starter, Samantha Clement has posted double-digits eight times, with one 20-point performance.
• Danielle Jorgenson has handed out at least five assists in eight games.
• Elodie Furey has led the team in rebounding in five games this season.
• 12 of Cornell's 13 active players have already set a career-high in points this season. 
• Two Big Red – Dylan Higgins and Stephanie Umeh – saw more minutes in the season-opener than they did all of last season.
• Danielle Jorgenson surpassed her career minutes in the third game of the season.
• The Big Red played seven-straight road games between Dec. 21 and Jan. 20. It was the longest road trip since the Big Red played seven consecutive games away from Newman Arena from Jan. 12 to Feb. 5 during the 2004-05 season.
• The Big Red was 0-4 to start a season for the first time since the 2006-07 squad went 0-7.
• Cornell played Pitt in front of a Big Red record 10,587 fans on the Panthers' School Day event. The crowd surpassed the Big Red's 2008 NCAA Tournament game vs. UConn by 4,000 fans. 
 
NCAA STATS:
• Cornell ranks inside the top 100 in fewest fouls (32nd – 368), steals per game (84th – 9.1) and turnovers forced per game (91st – 17.63).
• Samantha Widmann ranks 72nd in steals per game (2.45).
• Samantha Widmann ranks 186th in points per game (15.3).
• Samantha Widmann ranks 192nd in field goal percentage (.442).
• Danielle Jorgenson ranks 177th in assists per game (3.8).
• Janée Dennis'.889 (8-of-9) 3-poin­t FG percentage vs. Lafayette is the eighth best in the NCAA this season for a single game.
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PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Samantha Widmann earned the Big Red's first Ivy League Player of the Week award of the season, and the first of her career, when she took home the honor on Jan. 22. 
• Widmann earned the honor after leading Cornell to its first Ivy League win of the season with a 22-point, 12-rebound double-double at Columbia.
• Widmann was named Ivy Rookie of the Week twice during her freshman campaign.
 
CLOSE NON-CONFERENCE CALLS: In 11 of its 13 non-conference games, Cornell either held the lead, or was tied with its opponent at some point in the fourth quarter, including a pair of overtime decisions.
• Of those 11 games, the Big Red won four (Canisius, Stony Brook, UMass-Lowell, NJIT) with five of the losses (Colgate, Lehigh, Lafayette, Oakland, UNH) being decided by a combined total of just 15 points.
 
STATING STARTERS: The Big Red graduated all five starters from the 2016-17 squad.
• Cornell had five brand new starters to start a season for the first time in a season since the 2004-05 campaign. 
• Of Cornell's 20 opponents this season, 16 return at least three starters, including all seven Ivy League foes.
• Stony Brook (one starter), Drexel (two), UMass-Lowell (two) and Loyola (two) are the Big Red's only four opponents to return fewer than three starters.
• Nationwide, only Savannah State returns zero starters from the 2016-17 season.
• So far this season, Cornell has used four different starting line-ups, with just Danielle Jorgenson, Christine Ehland and Sam Widmann making all 22 starts.
 
WHAT WAS LOST: The Big Red graduated all five starters from the 2016-17 squad, and lost one other letter winner, as well as one non-letter winner. The seven players accounted for 82 percent of Cornell's points, 71 percent of the team's rebounds and 99 percent of the Big Red's assists.
 
WHAT REMAINS: Cornell returns four players that saw action in at least 15 games a year ago, including Samantha Widmann, the first forward off the bench in 17 contests and Christine Ehland, who returned from injury, to play in 17 of the final 20 games of the season.
• Widmann is the only Big Red returner to average more than 10.0 minutes per game during the 2016-17.
 
NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK: The Big Red added five players to the 2017-18 squad, including the first-ever Ivy League transfer (Laura Bagwell-Katalinich, Penn) under Coach Smith.
• The group hails from four different states – California, Colorado, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania.
• The group consists of two forwards (Elodie Furey, Halley Miklos), two guards (Laura Bagwell-Katalinich, Kate Sramac) and one student-athlete that can play either position (Ariana Abdulmassih).
 
IVY PRESEASON RANKINGS: The Big Red was picked sixth overall in the 2017-18 Ivy League media preseason poll.
• Penn was selected to three-peat, as the Quakers garnered 129 points and 12 first-place votes to hold off Princeton, which totaled 120 points and five first-place votes.
• The four teams that earned spots in the inaugural Ivy League Women's Basketball Tournament were picked to return, as Harvard was selected to finish third with 98 points, followed by Brown in fourth with 87 points.
• Yale was picked to place fifth with 64 points, followed by Cornell (48), Columbia (42) and Dartmouth (24).
 
LIVE FROM ITHACA: The Big Red will have 24 of its regular season games broadcast on national or regional television networks and/or available on the Ivy League Network this season.
• A subscription to ILN, which is available through the ILN mobile app on Apple and Android devices as well as Apple TV and Roku, will get you 20 Big Red contests this coming season, including every home and away contest in the Ivy League 14-game round robin.
• Seven games will be broadcast on ESPN3 and one game will air on SNY via tape delay with all eight of those contests also being simulcast on ILN.
 
DON'T I KNOW YOU?: Shelby Lyman '14 has returned to Cornell as an assistant coach for the 2017-18 season.
• One of the most prolific 3-point shooters in Cornell history, Lyman returns to East Hill after a successful three-year stint as an assistant coach at Division III powerhouse St. John Fisher College, helping the Cardinals to an Empire 8 championship in 2015 and a pair of NCAA DIII Tournament appearances.  
• Lyman still ranks among the top 20 in Cornell history in assists (14th – 219), steals (14th – 122), and minutes played (13th – 3096). She finished her career with 718 career points.
• A native of Snohomish, Wash., Lyman earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Government, before obtaining an MBA from St. John Fisher.
 
HI! MY NAME IS: The Big Red has pair of newcomers on the sidelines as David Elliott (assistant coach) and Caroline Nuckolls (basketball operations) have joined Coach Smith's staff. 
• Elliott is a seven-year veteran of the collegiate coaching ranks, with stints at the University of Denver, Knox College, Columbia, and St. John Fisher College.
• A native of Arizona, Elliott received a bachelors' degree in microbiology from the University of Arizona in 2009, before going on to earn a masters' degree in organizational learning and human resource development from St. John Fisher College in 2012.
• Nuckolls brings seven years of Division I athletics experience to the position, having most recently served as the Women's Basketball graduate assistant at the University of Louisiana-Monroe for the past two seasons. 
• A native of Katy, Texas, Nuckolls graduated from LSU with a bachelor's degree in Sport and Fitness Administration/Management in 2014 before going on to obtain an Master's in Public Administration from ULM in 2017.
 
RECAPPING THE 2016-17 SEASON: Cornell finished the 2016-17 season in fourth place in the Ivy League standings with a record of 16-11 overall and 7-7 in the conference, the most wins and conference wins in a season since the 2007-08 team went 20-9 overall and 11-3 in the Ivy League.
• Following the season, Nia Marshall was named first-team All-Ivy, while Megan LeDuc took home honorable mention accolades.
 
UP NEXT: The Big Red hits the road for a pair of contests at Yale (Feb. 23) and Brown (Feb. 24).