At the opening tipoff of the Crimson basketball team's game at Princeton Saturday, the Tigers' Bill Bradley took the ball, raced into the corner, and swished a jump shot.

It was obvious from that one play that Bradley, who usually spends the first half of a game being a "team player," was going to take personal charge of avenging the Tigers' loss to Harvard two weeks ago. The Princeton All-American did just that: he scored 51 points, shattered a multitude of Ivy records, and singlehandedly dealt the Crimson its most ignominious defeat in years, 87 to 56.

Man-to-Man and Zone

Crimson coach Floyd Wilson employed the same defensive strategy that had shackled the Tigers in the LAB: a man-to-man with guard Leo Scully on Bradley, and then a zone. But nothing worked Saturday. Bradley sank an eye-popping 13 of 24 field goals, 15 of 13 free throws, and grabbed 15 rebounds.

The Crimson, perhaps suffering from a letdown after a heartbreaking loss to Penn Friday, couldn't do a thing right. The team hit on a pathetic 24 of 79 field goal attempts, and was outrebounded, 61 to 44. The Crimson's first string played only about half the game; no one in the entire lineup scored more than eight points.

Bradley's phenomenal output set Princeton and Ivy League records for scoring in a single game, Princeton and Ivy records for field goals in a game, a Dillon Gym scoring record, and the Princeton season scoring mark with 695 points.

The Tigers' win kept them in a three-way tie for the Ivy lead along with Penn and Yale. All possess 7-2 records. The Crimson (4-5) is firmly ensconced in fifth place, and has probably lost all chance of finishing in the first division for the first time since 1947 unless it can beat Cornell next weekend.