Reeling from a 73-69 overtimes loss Friday to Northeastern and playing without forward James Brown, Harvard's Basketball team put it all together last night and literally crushed the Huskies in a rematch, 105-63, to win its second straight Beanpot Basketball Tournament.
Now, you've heard of teams not even having a smell of a chance to win a game. Well, last night at Boston Garden, the Crimson didn't even offer the Huskies half a sniff as Bob Harrison's club raced to an insurmountable 50-25 halftime lead.
A crowd of 1291 witnessed a complete offensive and defensive breakdown by coach Jim Calhoun's team. Harvard broke from a 4-4 tie to a 20-7 lead as the pitiful Dogs turned into marshmallow puppies incapable of handling the soup in "Gravy Train."
The final statistics verify the Crimson's superiority last night as they shot a blistering 59.2 per cent from the field (42 for 72) as compared to U.N.'s 37.3 per cent (25 for 67). However, perhaps the most responsible factor in Harvard's turn around from Friday night was its awesome dominance of the boards.
Paced by co-chairman of the boards Marshall Sanders and Tony Jenkins, who each hauled in 1.3 bounds, and front line teammate Floyd Lewis (12 bounds), the Crimsono was able to run at will on the hapless Huskies. In fact, sophomore center Jeff Wheat, who came into the game for Harvard with only 2:56 remaining, collected six rebounds before the final buzzer, one more than the highest rebounder for N.U.
The rebounding edge allowed Harvard to score on 18 layups through the course of the laughter.
Another factor in the thumping of the Dogs was a defensive adjustment employed by Harrison to stop N.U.'s Mark Jellison, who scored 32 points and single-handedly dumped the Crimson Friday.
Last night, Harvard took away Jellison's bread and butter play, a high post pick which gave him an un mollested easy jumper. By helping out at the top of the key, Harvard's man-to-man defense held Jellison to 10 points.
As lie was Friday night, Ken Wolfe was high scorer for Harvard, hitting his 18 points on 8 of 17 from the field and two of two from the line. He often led the Crimson fast break and dished out five assists in playing an excellent game.
Jenkins and Him Fizsimmons were close behind with 16 points each, while Sanders and Lewis, who both fouled out in the second half, had 14 and 12 points respectively. All four shot over 50 per cent from the field.
"I wouldn't say this is the best we've played all year, because I did think we played very well against Penn and Princeton," Harrison said afterwards. "But the kids did accomplish what they set out to do. They wanted this game real bad and they set out to put a whippin' to 'em."
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Dum,Da,Dum...Futuite B.U.!