HANOVER, N.H. – It’s getting to be Ted Lasso time for the Dartmouth men’s basketball team as we reach the midpoint of the 2024-25 Ivy League campaign.
The Big Green believe.
And why not? After burying Harvard 76-56 with a barrage of second-half three-pointers Saturday afternoon at Leede Arena, they are 4-3 in Ivy play, two games clear in the race for the fourth and final Ivy League Tournament berth.
Most of those reading this probably know the history, but Dartmouth (who hosts Columbia and Cornell next week) has not only never been to Ivy Madness, it hasn’t posted a winning conference record since 1998-99, and hasn’t been to the NCAA Tournament since 1959.
And this did not appear to be the season that would break that streak. Dartmouth was picked dead-last almost unanimously in the preseason poll, and after squeaking out a win against Sacred Heart, got beat by double digits by Albany, Boston University, and Marist. None of those four teams would be considered powers, and likely none of them would finish in the top half of the Ivy League.
But Dartmouth assistant coach Rich Glesmann’s offense needed time to take shape. An upset of Boston College followed, and things have pretty much trended upward ever since. The three conference losses are to Yale, Cornell and Princeton (which also prevailed thanks to the usual Xaivian Lee heroics). Dartmouth will now be favored in the four games that don’t involve those three teams down the stretch. An 8-6 Ivy record would break the losing streak and would surely be enough to make it to Providence for Ivy Madness.
However, there are four big weeks left in the regular season full of potential potholes and desperate opposition.
“I told the team they have to take care of their bodies, take care of their academics, and be ready for Monday’s practice,” Dartmouth coach David McLaughlin said. “You can get lost in a dark hole real quick either way, winning or losing. We need to have a really, really good day on Monday and that’s not just talk, that’s the way we’ve been approaching it every week.”
Harvard began Saturday’s proceedings with both urgency and a seemingly solid gameplan that involved running Dartmouth off the three-point line. Even though the Crimson struggled shooting (as they have often this season), Robert Hinton got to the rim several times, Louis Lesmond finally got one to drop, and Harvard had a 31-24 at the final media timeout of the first half.
But that’s when things started to unravel. The Big Green scored the final nine points of the half, finishing with six points in the paint (four by Brandon Mitchell-Day and two by Ryan Cornish) to grab a 33-31 lead going into the locker room.
“I thought we really set the tone at the end of the first half,” McLaughlin said. “That set the tone for the halftime discussion, which we knew what we needed to do. I thought we valued the ball, kept it simple on defense, and then we made plays.”
Evan Nelson’s layup with 9:44 left cut the Dartmouth lead to 45-44, but the Big Green were about to go on the heater of the season. When they began, they were 3-for-16 from beyond the arc and they would finish 10-for-25, so I’ll let you to do the math. Cornish’s pull-up three was the dagger, giving Dartmouth its biggest lead at 55-46.
By the time, Cade Haskins somehow hit an off-balance 35-footer while facing the bench to beat the shot clock, it was 74-52 and time to take the regulars out with 2:22 to go.
It was Mitchell-Day who took advantage of Harvard’s aggression on the outside to lead all scorers with 21 points (with nine rebounds and five assists) on 10-for-12 shooting. Cornish shot the ball poorly for much of the day, and earlier in his career that might have sunk him. But he seems to have put inconsistency behind him, still managing 19 points and seven rebounds.
“I think we’ve built a culture where everyone is ready to step up when we need them. If someone isn’t doing what they need to, teammates are there to pick him up,” Mitchell-Day said. “When Ryan was struggling shooting, everyone was behind him, and in the second half, he started to shine again.”
Mitchell-Day and Cornish are emblematic of Dartmouth’s success, players that have stuck it out, matured and now have a chance to make some history for the program. While the offense has gotten plenty of attention, the Big Green are third in conference defensive efficiency, also thanks to the diligence of players like Mitchell-Day and Cornish. Dartmouth does not force turnovers (338th nationally, last in the Ivy League) but also does not foul (13th nationally) and cleans off in the defensive glass (34th).
“We preach being solid on defense, and that’s what really made that run go, getting defensive rebounds and being able to push and then hitting big shots,” Mitchell-Day said. “We knew they would fall eventually when they weren’t.”
It was particularly effective against a Harvard offense that just hasn’t been able to shoot for large portions of the season. The Crimson were a dreadful 3-for-23 from behind the arc Saturday and only went to the free-throw line five times. Even getting 20 points from Hinton and 23 points off turnovers didn’t help significantly, with the Crimson finishing at 0.88 points per possession and frustrated.
“We couldn’t make our shots, and when the dam broke, it really broke,” Harvard coach Tommy Amaker said. “You could smell it almost. I don’t know what to say about our shooting. We just have to be better at making some of the ones we get because we just can’t manufacture enough points in the paint and off our defense if we can’t make any shots. We have to be able to make open threes.”
Harvard hosts Cornell and Columbia next weekend as well and would have to do something dramatic now to break its six-year Ivy Madness drought, although it does host Dartmouth in the season finale if it can climb to within a game.
But to do that, the Crimson will have to find offense from somewhere. Its 1.008 points per possession are .044 behind everyone in the league (ironically, Princeton sits sixth).
Meanwhile, there are many reasons to believe in Hanover, and you can sense it in the crowd, which included the 1996-97 team that went 10-4 in the Ivy League (and honored with its coach Dave Faucher at halftime), as well as other alumni (it was Alumni Weekend) who made the trip to see with the buzz is all about.
“There must have been 35 alumni in the locker room after the game and that’s shared experience,” McLaughlin said. “We have two alums on staff as well (Jabari Trotter and Taurus Samuels), it makes it special. We hope to keep it going for everyone.”
Buzz and Dartmouth men’s basketball have not been in the same sentence much this century.
“They are definitely a hot team,” Amaker said. “Cornish with the swagger he brings, their toughness, Mitchell-Day is a real tough kid, I think they’re going to be a tough out for anybody down the stretch.”