Despite the excitement, the matchup was not the best basketball game I had ever seen, and the best play was at the beginning. The Crimson and the Tigers went back-and-forth for the first 10 minutes of the game, and it remained knotted through the first half. Only a last-minute Princeton foul from behind the arc gave Harvard the chance to take a one-point lead into the intermission.

As the Crimson pulled away in the second half, the crowd became increasingly more raucous. Harvard opened it up with solid play in the paint, clutch free-throw shooting, and consistent rebounding, never letting the Tigers get too close.

For better or for worse, that’s not what the fans in attendance will remember.

To the sports fan in me, that’s a disappointment.

To the Crimson fan in me, that’s how it should be. I can always go back and watch Kyle Casey’s dunk on YouTube, and I certainly have.

But it’s impossible to recreate the elation that came with it. I won’t recall which Princetonian he beat to the rim, but what I’ll remember is high-fiving total strangers who shared the moment with me.

We all know that it was just a game. Certainly, it was an important one, and possibly the most significant in the history of the program, but it was still just a game.

What made it special was the atmosphere. For a few hours on Saturday night, the school was unified because of this basketball game.

Watching Casey control the game’s momentum in the second half was memorable. Chanting “I believe that we just won” in the waning seconds of the game, falling onto the people in front of me, and getting ready to storm the court will be the stories that I tell.

Don’t get me wrong—I’m very excited for the next few days of Harvard basketball.  In the words of Mel Brooks, “it’s good to be the king.” The Crimson, even if just for the next few hours, holds that throne alone.

As I rushed out of the stands after the game, my glasses nearly broke, and I really couldn’t see anything more than the haze of the masses bouncing around and streaming towards me. But in a way, I’m glad that I only remember the blurred pandemonium.

—Staff writer E. Benjamin Samuels can be reached at samuels@college.harvard.edu.