“I’m concerned because they’re similar in ways to what Penn can do, which is to spread you out and dribble drive,” Harvard coach Tommy Amaker said. “The kid Barbour is very, very good off the bounce. Instead of trying to run their plays, [they might say], ‘Let’s just open the floor up and see if we can drive it by them.’ That’s what I anticipate they’ll look to do.”
But Columbia has struggled defensively as of late. The Lions sit at or near the bottom of the league in forcing turnovers and opponent field goal percentage, and their opponents shoot over 40 percent from beyond the arc.
Luckily for Columbia, Harvard sits in sixth in three-point percentage in league play after going 6 of 27 from three against Princeton and Penn.
The Lions’ travel partner Cornell (11-15, 6-6) will take the final scheduled crack at the Crimson after having fallen in Cambridge a month ago, 71-60.
This time around, the fifth-place Big Red will have the support of a sold-out Newman Arena, as well as the pressure of an ESPN3.com broadcast, to help its attempt to eclipse last season’s conference win total.
By all accounts a dangerous team—it carrying home wins over Princeton and Yale—Cornell took care of business at Brown with a six-point victory before being blown out at Yale on Saturday by 31.
The Bulldogs held Cornell to 18 percent shooting from three-point range, a debilitating mark considering that the Big Red rank among the top teams in the country in the proportion of its field goal attempts that are three-pointers.
The Crimson defense will have to contend with veteran guard Chris Wroblewski, who totaled 34 points, 15 rebounds, and seven assists at Brown and Yale.
“[Barbour and Wroblewski] are good players; they’re going to score; they’re going to hit tough shots. My sole job is to make it as tough as possible,” junior guard Brandyn Curry said. “After having to guard players like Rosen, it makes it a little bit easier to guard other guards.”
Former walk-on Johnathan Gray is the team’s second leading scorer in conference play and was the only Big Red player to reach double-figures in the game at Harvard.
—Staff writer Dennis J. Zheng can be reached at zheng12@college.harvard.edu.