Ivy Play

Harvard’s 88-77 Ivy opening win over Dartmouth featured end-to-end scoring—much of it coming from one player in the Crimson’s case, as Peljto scored 17 points in a row for Harvard at one point.

Dartmouth and Penn—not 2001 Ivy cellar team Princeton—were supposed to be Harvard’s toughest challenge, yet the Tigers were the team that dealt Harvard its only Ivy loss. In that game, the Crimson turned a nine-point halftime deficit into a four-point lead late in the game, but couldn’t win it. Embarressingly, the team was outrebounded 43-29 by the Tigers.

Harvard would never lose again during the regular season. The Crimson came back the next day with a 20-point blowout of defending Ivy champion Penn at the Palestra going into exam break. Getting contributions from all of its players was a key to victory.

“We almost did everything right that we didn’t do against Princeton,” Peljto said.

Harvard had to play under some adversity when it came back from exams as Cserny missed the next two games due to injury, but didn’t let down, however, thanks to junior Kate Ides stepping into the starting lineup, and senior Sharon Nunamaker making important contributions off the bench. Harvard rebounded from halftime deficits to win against Brown and Yale, then coasted over Cornell and Columbia the following weekend to gain sole possession of first place.

In its rematch against Penn, Harvard began a new discoraging pattern—blowing leads. The Crimson opened the game with a 16-6 run but found itself down by as many as five in the second half. Three clutch threes by Tubridy were the key to Harvard’s victory. It was a similar story against Princeton when Harvard went up 16-3 early but could never put the Tigers away comfortably in a 78-70 win.

Then in the most important league showdown of the season, Harvard narrowly averted disaster against top Ivy challenging Cornell, who had hung tough just a half-game back in the standings. Up 62-50 with 2:37 left, Harvard tried to run out the clock too early and let the Big Red back into the game. It took two more overtimes and a Peljto fainting spell before Harvard finally won, 77-75.

The Cornell game was so draining that Harvard fell behind by 12 early against Columbia before coasting to a 61-49 victory. The Big Red had a more difficult time recovering, however, and ended up not winning another Ivy game for the rest of the season.

Cornell’s struggles allowed Harvard to become the earliest team in school history to clinch a share of the Ivy title. The Crimson then clinched the outright title with a victory over Yale and posted comfortable wins over Brown and Dartmouth to close out its Ivy season.

Despite the victories, Harvard couldn’t be happy about everything. The team struggled in the second half of each of those last three wins, leaving the Crimson with few games all season when it could accurately say it had played a full 40 minutes.

“We’re Ivy League champions without really playing that well all year,” Peljto said the night Harvard clinched the title. “Tonight was probably one of our best games and it still wasn’t complete. Maybe in the tournament our best games will come out.”

Ivy League play might not have brought out the best of the Crimson. The NCAA tournament, on the other hand, has a longtime history of inspiring teams, and this year’s Harvard players—all making their tournament debuts—are hoping that their turn to shine is coming soon.