But after junior forward Sam Winter hit a short-range jumper to open the second half, Dartmouth reeled off 13 unanswered points. Jumpers by McLaren and Steve Callahan then moved the Big Green within two with 12:21 to play. But Merchant made four of the game's next five baskets. The last of those--a lay-up off a steal in the Dartmouth backcourt--pushed Harvard's lead back up to double digits at 50-39.
The Big Green never threatened again, as the Crimson made its free throws down the stretch. After averaging just 57 percent from the line before today, Harvard had its best free-throw shooting performance of the season against Dartmouth, nailing 21 of 26 attempts (81 percent).
"We had been struggling all season. I checked the stats today and we were the worst free-throw shooting team in the league coming into this game," Prasse-Freeman said. "A team that reasonably expects to contend for a league championship cannot miss free throws. It's all about concentration and mental toughness and we had that today."
The Crimson forwards continued to play well today. Tim Coleman had eight points and a game-high 11 rebounds before fouling out late in the game, while Winter added 10 points and 8 boards. Also encouraging was the effort of junior center Brian Sigafoos, who came off the bench and just missed a double-double with 9 points and 9 rebounds in 17 minutes.
Sigafoos also held his own defensively against an athletic Dartmouth frontcourt.
"He had a good presence tonight," Sullivan said. "I thought both Tim Coleman and Brian did a good job guarding the five spot, which is an important one with Dartmouth because of the passing angles and the amount of time that the five-man has the ball. And it's different because the five-man's really not in the low post. He's almost like a perimeter player."
Today's battle was the first Ivy contest of the 2001-02 season. League action does not resume for Harvard until Jan. 5, when the team meets Dartmouth for a rematch in Hanover, N.H. In the meantime, the Crimson will travel to Vermont this Tuesday to renew the America East portion of its slate.