“I thought she did much better—much, much better—[this week],” Delaney-Smith said. “She’s been working on being aggressive and being in attack mode. She’s very coachable, and that showed up.”
Boehm ended the game with 12 points and 11 rebounds. Not only did the freshman forward have an impressive outing, but also the veteran Nunley tallied a double-double on 10 points and 12 rebounds. The Texas native has posted solid statistics the past couple weeks and been a rock that the Crimson can count on.
“When there is adversity and things not going your way, like missed shots or officiating, there are things you can do on the court to keep you in the game,” Delaney-Smith said. “One of those things is being relentless in your rebounding. That is what Destiny has been doing for sure.”
In the fourth quarter, freshman guard Katie Benzan performed like a veteran, scoring 12 of her 24 points then to seal the deal.
“I don’t really think about how many points I score,” Benzan said. “I’m just worried about what my team needs me to do. That’s what is most important to me, and I know it’s the same for my teammates.”
Saturday afternoon’s victory has the Crimson taking a sigh of relief going into its final regular season weekend against top Ivy League opponents Penn and Princeton.
“It’s going to take our best games,” Nunley said. “We had a really tough road trip, and they were games that we were capable of winning. I think we have a lot to prove, and we just need to get rest this week, get our shots up, and need to be as ready as we can for the games.”
YALE 57, HARVARD 52
Falling to Yale for the first time since 2012, the Crimson was out of sorts and could not get out of its own way at Payne Whitney Gymnasium.
In front of a rival crowd, Harvard could not build a substantial lead until late in the game. Due to turnovers and fouls, though, the Crimson would not keep the lead for long and found itself suffering another loss on the road.
“We played tight and had far too many turnovers,” Delaney-Smith said. “It wasn’t because of anything Yale was doing; it was tightness on our part. Turnovers were our demon last night. Many shooters didn’t want the shot.”
The Crimson, who was behind 28-23 at the end of the first half, clawed its way back into the game following a dominant third quarter when it outscored the Bulldogs 18-12. Big play by Benzan and Destiny brought Harvard to a point where it could win the game.
However, a disappointing performance in the fourth quarter derailed the Crimson. Along with three crucial turnovers by Harvard, 11 personal foul calls gave Yale free points at the charity stripe and put the game out of reach.
Junior forward Jen Berkowitz of the Bulldogs matched her season high with 26 points, along with grabbing 10 boards to lead her team to victory.
“It just didn’t have the same feel that we had pre-conference play,” Nunley said. “We kind of lost the fun of it.”
As Harvard regroups after the weekend’s events, the team will get back to the film room and seek to fix outstanding issues. Certainly, the Crimson hopes to have much more dominant games against the two Ancient Eight opponents sitting between it and an Ivy League championship.
“I think the weekend down at Penn and Princeton wasn’t indicative of us as a team,” Benzan said. “We weren’t playing like ourselves…. I think it will be a totally different atmosphere, and I feel really good about it.”
—Staff writer Stuart Johnson can be reached at stuartjohnson@college.harvard.edu.