If you missed the Ivy League’s own men’s All-Ivy awards, you can find them here. As selected by Ivy Hoops Online’s contributors, here are the IHO 2017-18 Men’s All-Ivy Awards:
Alex Copeland
Ivy Madness media day tidbits
- Penn men’s coach Steve Donahue noted Penn’s “interesting path” to the Ivy League Tournament, which included a 0-3 start to league play for the second time in three seasons, Antonio Woods noted he’ll shoulder the burden of guarding Bryce Aiken, and AJ Brodeur said that it may be more difficult to play Ivy teams than Big 5 teams because the Ivies know the Red & Blue so well and are more prepared to face them.
Ancient Eight thoughts – Ivy Saturday men’s edition
Eight thoughts on the Ivy men’s basketball, which, per KenPom, gave us the highest percentage of games decided by three or fewer points or in overtime in all of Division I for the second straight season:
Crimson are No. 1 for a reason
Harvard conquered its house of horrors, Levien Gym, 83-81, after an obligatory overtime period to claim its seventh Ivy League championship under Tommy Amaker and the No. 1 seed in the Ivy League Tournament. But is Harvard a vulnerable No. 1 seed?
Harvard emerges victorious at Yale in Ivy heavyweight thriller
There are probably three tiers in the parity-filled Ivy League this season. They tend to conflate at times, but there is no questioning that the top tier is comprised of Yale and Harvard. So why not expect them to play the game of the year at John J. Lee Amphitheater before a sold out, whiteout throng?
And the tier one battle played out consistent with its script, although perhaps the last act of the game was a bit of a surprise to Ivy fans and scribes. But should anyone by now be surprised by anything Harvard’s Bryce Aiken accomplishes, injured or fully healthy?
Ancient Eight thoughts – Ivy Friday men’s edition
Eight thoughts on the men’s side:
1. Columbia was due
Columbia hadn’t won an Ivy road game since its very first under Jim Engles at Cornell on Jan. 14, 2017: 17 such games ago. The Lions were 3-8 in games decided by one possession this season, including a 72-70 loss to Penn at Levien Gym three weeks prior, and were 4-20 in games decided by six points or fewer dating back to the start of last season. So when Maka Ellis’s stunningly easy layup off an inbound pass went in with 0.4 seconds left in overtime to clinch the 79-77 win for the Lions at the Palestra, it was a long overdue coup de grâce for a program that had long been far more competitive under Engles than its win-loss column showed. Kudos to Gabe Stefanini for coming up just two rebounds shy of a triple-double (20 points, 10 assists, eight boards) and Ellis for pitching in five of his 14 points in the final 1:24 in overtime as a rookie on the road to erase Penn’s 77-72 lead at that point.
How this season’s Yale squad compares to the 2015-16 NCAA Tournament team
Despite a weekend of travel woes, Yale swept the always challenging Columbia-Cornell trip and now sits at 17-4 and 7-1 in the Ivies. The Elis maintain first place alone.
Is it too early to ask how this team compares to the Ivy champion and winner in the NCAA Tournament over Baylor from 2015-16? Coach James Jones would say yes. Other Ivy coaches and former players have opinions which are all over the map.
Defense nonexistent as Yale tops Cornell, 98-92
In a matchup between two of the league’s best teams, Yale was able to escape Ithaca with a 98-92 win in a game in which nobody really seemed to play much defense. Both teams shot 53 percent from the field and well over 40 percent from three. Yale moved up to 17-4 overall (7-1 Ivy) and Cornell dropped down to 13-11 (5-3) but still remain two games over fifth place in the league, with a Penn loss.
Yale sweeps Princeton and Penn at home for seventh time in past eight years
A weekend sweep in the Ivies is always sweet. For Yale coach James Jones, it is especially sweet when it’s against historic Ivy powers Princeton and Penn.
This weekend, his Bulldogs notched a home sweep of the Ps for the seventh time in the last eight years.
Both games bore significant similarities. Princeton and Penn got off to fast starts, Yale made defensive adjustments and took large leads, only to see both opponents close the gaps but overtake the home team.
Yale sweeps Brown, giving James Jones his 300th career win
Tom Beckett knows talent.
The recently retired Yale athletic director oversaw more than 120 Ivy League championships and many national championships, most recently in national sports like hockey and lacrosse, among teams headed by coaches hired by him. Rarely did the former baseball star both at the University of Pittsburgh and the minor leagues swing and miss on a coaching hire.
He certainly did not on Apr. 27, 1999. James Jones had a great interview with Beckett and Beckett saw a charisma which he felt would lead Yale out of the Ivy basketball doldrums. The Bulldogs had just come off of a disappointing 4-22 season under veteran coach Dick Kuchen.
Yale falls to Duke again after early back-and-forth
It’s not a bad gig, covering Yale and getting to see the Elis play twice at Cameron Indoor Stadium since 2015, not to mention an inspirational NCAA game in Providence in 2016.
But let’s start from the beginning. The flight to Raleigh on Friday was simple and a tour of the Duke Basketball Museum & Sports Hall of Fame and Krzyzewskiville, where Duke students have camped out for tickets since about 1986, was a blast.
The privilege to attend the Yale shootaround on Saturday at 11:30 a.m., was even better thanks to coach James Jones, who was methodical in his preparation but sure to give ample time to some of his own family, including his peripatetic son Quincy, a great athlete in his own right. As always, he preached toughness and crafted a sound game plan against one of the top two teams in the country.