But any momentum Harvard may have carried into halftime disappeared quickly in the opening moments of the second half. Brown opened the period on a 12-2 run to effectively put the game out of reach for the Crimson. Harvard did pull within six at 65-59 on junior guard Courtney Egelhoff's two free throws with 2:23 left to play. But Brown freshman point guard Emily Troupe connected on a three-pointer on the ensuing possession to dash the Crimson's comeback hopes.
Harvard lost despite an excellent performance by senior center Rose Janowski. The Glover, Ver. native made up for Sturdy's absence with a team-high 18 points on 6-of-9 shooting. She also pulled down seven rebounds and recorded a block.
"I don't think I've been playing up to what I should be doing," Janowski said. "With Laela gone it's going to be a little bit harder. I think the starting forwards need to give a little bit of incentive to the people coming off the bench."
Harvard was also plagued by turnovers once again. Shaken by Brown's aggressive full-court press, the Crimson committed 23 turnovers in the game "Their press was a huge factor because it tookaway 15 seconds of our offense," Miller said. "Ittook us so long to get up the court, we didn'tmake them pay for it. It was doing exactly whatthey wanted it to do." Troupe led all scorers with 19 points. Brownall-time leading scorer Vita Redding netted 17,and junior forward Cathy Miller added 12 pointsand seven rebounds. Egelhoff recorded 14 points and seven rebounds,and Monti added 10 points and six boards. Brown won the rebounding battle by a 40-34margin. It was the first time in eight games thatHarvard was outrebounded. Yale 59, Harvard 44 For the first 4:34 of Saturday's game, itlooked like Harvard would cruise to an easyvictory. The Crimson came storming out of thegate, scoring 10 points in that span withoutmissing a shot and using relentless defense tomake the Bulldogs work on every possession, toopen a 10-4 lead at the John J. Lee Amphitheater. Then Things got ugly--on both sides of theball. Neither team scored a point for five minutesuntil Harvard freshman guard Katie Gates converteda free throw with 10:27 remaining in the half.Following a lay-up by Yale freshman forwardCaitlin Bair that brought the Bulldogs to withinfive, the Crimson reeled off the next five pointsand staked itself to a 16-6 lead. Harvard's offense must have thought the gamewas over at that point because it left the gym anddid not return. The Crimson mustered only twopoints--on a lay-up by Sturdy with 1:07 showing onthe clock--over the final 7:39 of the first half,allowing Yale to take a 20-18 lead into halftime. "When things start going poorly, we panic,"Miller said. "The reason we did not win is becausewe did not communicate and we did not run ouroffenses. Had we simply run one of our offensiveplays, we would have won the game." The situation only worsened for Harvard in thesecond half. Yale opened the period with a 15-7run to build a 10-point advantage that it rode tothe finish line behind the inside-outside tandemof seniors Katy Grubbs and Autumn Braddock. TheCrimson would pull no closer than five points, andthe Bulldogs scored their final eight points onfree throws. The game's most disturbing moment came 5:03into the second half. Sturdy was running back ondefense when she tripped over a stumbling Yaleplayer. She remained on the floor in obvious painand was helped off the court without puttingweight on her ankle. Braddock and Grubbs finished with 15 and 16points, respectively, to lead Yale with Sturdyout. Janowski fouled out with over nine minutesremaining in the game, Harvard had no answer forGrubbs in the paint and Braddock hit three crucialthree-pointers during the Bulldogs' run to openthe second half. "Losing Rose and Laela against a post playerlike Grubbs does hurt you," Delaney-Smith said."Different players were instructed not to come offAutumn Braddock in the zone, but they bogged down.If you have a breakdown like that against a teamwhere Autumn Braddock is hot, you're going tolose." Miller was the only Harvard player to score indouble figures, finishing with 13 points on 5-of-7shooting. Russell chipped in five points and addedfour rebounds, while Monti handed out sevenassists. Both teams shot 36 percent from the floor forthe game, but the Crimson managed only 17.6percent shooting from distance. Harvard alsocommitted 25 turnovers to Yale's 12, and theBulldogs scored 22 points off of Crimsonturnovers.