Peljto was the lone exception.
If it appears that it would have been impossible for Clark to match Peljto, that’s because it was.
Peljto outdid Clark in almost every major statistical category, including points and rebounds per game; and free-throw, field-goal and three-point percentage. Clark wrapped up her career with 1729 points.
Head-to-head, Peljto outplayed Clark each time. In Harvard’s first game against Penn, at Lavietes Pavilion on Feb. 2, Peljto scored 22, grabbed seven boards and dished four assists. Clark, in the 19 minutes she played before fouling out, had only nine, three and one, respectively. On March 6, in Philadelphia, Peljto poured in 19 points and snatched 10 rebounds compared to Clark’s 18 and six. Additionally, Peljto came up big in the final minutes, scoring nine straight points in the final three minutes and blocking Penn’s potential game-tying shot with less than 10 seconds to go.
Perhaps the other Ivy coaches, who vote for the award, were still stinging from the thrashings that Peljto dispensed during the regular season. She averaged 23.4 against Ivy competition, compared to the 19.5 that Clark posted.
Or perhaps the coaches went with the old “Give the Award to the Best Player on the Team That Wins” thing. That philosophy is all well and good for a player of the game or series award, but not for a player of the year award. The player of the year, or MVP, award should go to the best player of a competitive team. Thus Tom Brady did not win the NFL MVP even though his team owned the best record and went on to win the Super Bowl. But Steve McNair and Peyton Manning shared the award while captaining contending teams.
Peljto was certainly not toiling in futility. The Crimson finished with a 16-11 record and tied for second in the league.
Clark should not be rewarded for her team taking the Ivy League Championship. Traveling to Bridgeport, Conn. this Saturday to take on Diana Taurasi and the UConn Huskies in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, she is getting prize enough.
She didn’t need to take Hana’s.
—Staff writer J. Patrick Coyne can be reached at coyne@fas.harvard.edu.