Junior Zach Martin joined Beatty in the frontcourt rotation and scored eight points against Long Island and College of Charleston. The 6’4 forward has been forced to play out of position throughout his Harvard career, but continues to provide quality minutes at the four spot.
Sophomore guard Jim Goffredo has struggled to find his shooting touch off the bench this season, connecting on just 25 percent of his three-point opportunities. Goffredo hasn’t been much better inside the arc, hitting just 8-of-24 attempts from short range.
Despite losing the starting point guard position to Giovacchini, junior guard Michael Beal has found his niche in the rebounding department. Beal has come off the bench to average just under four boards per game—third best on the team behind Stehle and Cusworth.
The other player jockeying for the starting point guard position at the beginning of the season was freshman Tyler Klunick. While Klunick hasn’t quite met the lofty expectations that were placed on him from the moment he stepped foot on the Lavietes floor, he has proven to be a tenacious defender off the bench and a spark plug that could help Harvard down the stretch in some close Ivy contests.
Grade: B
OVERALL
As a team, the Crimson has struggled with turnovers averaging just over 20 per game and consequently has continued to carry an assist-to-turnover ratio of well under one. Harvard has also struggled in getting to the line and has had even more difficulty converting when it has the opportunity, hitting just over 70 percent on the season.
The Crimson dominated the glass all season, outrebounding opponents by 3.4 boards a game to this point.
Harvard’s most impressive performance of the season came in a losing effort as the squad rallied from a 43-27 halftime deficit at Notre Dame to pull even at 57, before falling 66-59. The Crimson followed up with another strong effort just eight days later, as it earned its first win of the season with an 85-75 win over Northeastern.
But a difficult overtime loss at New Hampshire sent Harvard into a tailspin, and the Crimson dropped three straight.
Sitting at 1-5, Harvard more closely resembled the 4-23 team of a year ago than the squad that many thought could return to the upper division of the Ivy League this season. The Crimson snapped out of the slump on the road with a determined overtime victory over Colgate and notched two more wins in the next twelve days over Lehigh and Long Island. The Saturn Shootout holiday tournament in Charleston, Harvard’s seventh and eighth games away from the friendly confines of Lavietes Pavilion, proved unkind to the Crimson. The squad was embarrassed by host College of Charleston in the opener before dropping another tough overtime game to Tennessee Tech, leaving Harvard 4-8 heading into Ivy play.
The four early wins matched the Crimson’s total from all of last season, but fell a few games short of expectations. The last-second defeat at New Hampshire and the loss of Cusworth for the last half of December were the two biggest blows to Harvard’s bid for a .500 or better mark after 12 games.
Grade: B