The Penn Quakers men's basketball program is a college basketball team that represents the University of Pennsylvania. The team plays at the Division I level of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). They compete in the Ivy League of the NCAA, where they have been since 1897. They play their home games at Palestra in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, named after palaestra, the ancient Greek wrestling school.
The men's team has had 20 official head coaches in its history. The team has played in 3,066 games over 124 seasons of collegiate play from the 1896–97 season to the 2016–17 season (excluding 1897 to 1901, when the Quakers did not play due to low attendance and lack of interest), compiling a record of 1867–1198–1 (.609).
For the first five years they played, the team had no coach. Russell Smith became the first head coach for the team in 1905. In Smith's four seasons as head coach, the team went 74–22–0 (.771), the best winning record out of any of the coaches in team history. The team made their first NCAA tournament appearance in 1953, under Howard Dallmar. 17 years later, Dick Harter was the next coach to bring the team to an NCAA Tournament bid. Under coaches Chuck Daly (1971–1977) and Bob Weinhauer (1977–1982), the team made nine tournament bids in 11 years, including an appearance in the Final Four. Fran Dunphy (1989–2006) compiled the most conference and overall wins as head coach with 310 wins and 191 wins, respectively. He also has the most NCAA Tournament appearances out of any head coach (10), but in nine of those appearances, the team was knocked out in the first round. Steve Donahue was named as head coach in 2015. In his tenure as head coach, the team won the 2018 Ivy League Championship and the 2019 Big 5 Championship and compiled a record of 131-130–0 (.500). On March 27, 2025, Fran McCaffery was named head coach and in the 2025-2026 season, the team compiled a 18-12 record, the 2026 Ivy League Tournament Championship and the first NCAA tournament appearance since 2018.
List of coaches
OverallConference Name Years Won–Lost Pct. Won–Lost Pct. Note No coach1897; 1902–0533–28–2.5407–11.389 R. B. Smith1905–0973–22.76823–5.821 2× EIL Champs Charles "Kid" Keinath1909–1236–25.59011–7.611 Arthur Kiefaber1912–1410–24.2945–13.278 Lon Jourdet1914–20; 1930–43227–143.614105–86.550 6× EIL Champs Edward McNichol1920–30186–63.74762–40.608 3× EIL Champs Donald Kellett1943–45; 1946–4846–31.59723–15.605 1945 EIL Champs Robert E. Dougherty1945–467–10.4124–4.500 Howard Dallmar1948–54105–51.67348–26.649 1953 EIL Champs Ray Stanley1954–5631–19.62019–10.655 1955 Ivy League Champs Jack McCloskey1956–66146–105.58287–53.621 1966 Ivy League Champs, 1× Big 5 Champs Dick Harter1966–7188–44.66749–21.700 2× Ivy League Champs, 2× Big 5 Champs Chuck Daly1971–77125–38.76774–10.881 4× Ivy League Champs, 4× Big 5 Champs Bob Weinhauer1977–8299–45.68862–9.873 5× Ivy League Champs, 2× Big 5 Champs Craig Littlepage1982–8540–39.50628–14.667 1985 Ivy League Champs Tom Schneider1985–8951–54.48636–20.643 1987 Ivy League Champs Fran Dunphy1989–06310–163.655191–49.796 10× Ivy League Champs, 3× Big 5 Champs Glen Miller2006–0945–52 .41227–15 .643 2007 Ivy League Champs Jerome Allen2009–201565–104 .38438–46 .452 Steve Donahue2015–2025131–130.50263–63.500 2018 Ivy League Champs, 2019 Big 5 Champs Fran McCaffery2025–present18–12.6009-5.643 2026 Ivy Tournament Champs
Source: https://www.thedp.com/article/2025/03/steve-donahue-out-penn-basketball-coach
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