Gone Foul

In what has become a season-long theme, Harvard found itself in foul trouble once again, committing 54 fouls on the weekend—the second-most fouls it has committed in consecutive games this season.

The effects of the foul problems were immediately evident after the departure of Beal late in the first half of each game.

With 4:31 left before halftime and Harvard leading by 12 over Cornell, Beal picked up his second foul, forcing him to take a seat. In Beal’s absence the Crimson quickly committed two turnovers and went without a field goal for 4:17 while seeing its 12-point lead dwindle to four.

“[When Beal came out], we not only lost our momentum, but we also lost our aggressiveness,” Sullivan said. “I think part of it is having a young team. But we’ve talked to the guys a lot about not getting discouraged and fighting their way through things.”

On Saturday night against Columbia, the situation was quite similar, as Beal left the game after picking up his second foul with just 3:20 remaining in the first half and the Crimson ahead by 12. By halftime, the Harvard lead had shrunk to just five as the Lions seized the momentum heading into the break.

Beal didn’t end up fouling out of either game, but the damage had already been done. The Big Red and the Lions survived their poor first-half play due to their ability to disrupt the fluid Crimson offense by forcing one of its integral components to the bench.

“Anytime your team is in foul trouble it makes you play a lot softer,” Beal said. “In the beginning of the [Cornell] game, we were doing really well because we were playing really aggressively…but when they got in the double bonus, we had to back off.”

—Staff writer Michael R. James can be reached at mrjames@fas.harvard.edu.