Something had to give on Sunday afternoon at Rose Hill Gymnasium, with both Harvard and Fordham riding four-game winning streaks. Unfortunately for the Crimson, the Rams withstood a late second-half rally and emerged with the hard-fought 68-60 victory in the Bronx.
The two teams battled evenly through the first half with the score knotted at 24 at the 1:53 mark of the opening frame, but Fordham scored the last seven points to go into the locker room with a 31-24 advantage.
The Rams’ Darius Quisenberry hit a three-pointer to stretch the lead to 13, 51-40, with just under 10 minutes left in regulation and the game seemed to be slipping away for the visitors. The Crimson had other thoughts and limited Fordham to one basket over the next eight minutes as they clawed their way back.
A floating jumper from junior guard Sam Silverstein cut the deficit to two, 58-56, with 1:52 left, but that’d be as close as it would get.
Coming out of the game’s last timeout, the Rams forced two turnovers and a missed hook shot from Silverstein while making two straight layups and four consecutive free throws to make it an insurmountable 10-point contest with only 20 seconds to go.
Harvard entered the game shooting 61% from two, which was 11th-best in the nation. On Sunday, the Crimson managed to hit 50% (18-for-36) of their inside shots, but that decrease from the season’s average wasn’t buoyed by their outside effort.
The Crimson arrived in the Bronx hitting only 29.9% of their three-pointers on the year, good enough for 279th in Division I. Playing without top three-point threat Louis Lesmond, who has missed the last two games, Harvard only made 21.7% (5-for-23) of its long-range shots.
The Crimson held the Rams to 34.2% two-point shooting, but they sent the Rams to the line 19 times. The home team capitalized, making 18 of those attempts.
The Rams also made hay from deep. They ranked 51st in the country in three-point shooting at 37.8% at the start of the game and managed to hit 36.4% (8-for-23) of their long-range attempts on the day.
Turnovers were the other big concern for Harvard, which committed 18 on the afternoon and gave up 16 Fordham points. On the defensive side, Harvard only managed to force 10 turnovers.
Silverstein led the way for the Crimson with a career-high 17 points. He was seventh in the league shooting 62.2% from the field, but finished the day hitting only 42.9% due to a 3-for-10 performance from downtown. Chris Ledlum, the team’s leading scorer (20.7 points per game) and rebounder (seven boards a contest), secured nine boards on Sunday but only posted a season-low seven points.
Coming off the bench, first-year forward Chisom Okpara added 11 points despite going 1-for-7 from deep, and senior Idan Tretout netted 10.
For the victors, Abdou Tsimbila notched career highs of 16 points, 15 rebounds and five rebounds, while Quisenberry, Kyle Rose and Khalid Moore added 18, 14 and 10 points, respectively. Antrell Charleton finished with a balanced seven-point, nine-rebound, six-assist effort.
Tommy Amaker’s team will look to start a new winning streak when it travels to Holy Cross Wednesday night and then welcomes UMass for their yearly battle Friday evening.