It was Yale-Harvard, so ignore the records. The Crimson ended Yale’s 13-game winning streak, 74-69, before a crowd of 1,636 at Lavietes Pavilion Saturday, handing the visitors their first loss in Ivy League play.
“I thought they had a really good game plan,” coach James Jones said. “Hopefully we can take this as a learning tool going into our last game (at Brown) and the Ivy tournament.”
It took a long-range, banked trey by frosh guard Austin Hunt with 23 seconds remaining and one second left on the shot clock to secure the Harvard victory.
“I had to get a shot up and saw a little space,” Hunt said.
A layup by senior guard Bex Mbeng cut the deficit to 72-69 after the Hunt triple, but Hunt then made two free throws.
Harvard led 38-27 at the half on 53% shooting (15-for-28).
Yale cut the Harvard lead to 47-42 on a Nick Townsend layup off of a nifty assist from Mbeng.
A trey by senior guard John Poulakidas cut the deficit to 69-65, and junior forward Nick Townsend scored underneath to make it 69-67 with 51 seconds left.
Harvard switched up man-to-man and zone defenses and played perhaps its most physical game of the season, with the referees letting both teams play. Only 23 total fouls were called.
Harvard had 26 defensive rebounds to 23 for Yale.
Mbeng led Yale with 20 points, and Townsend added 18.
Junior guard Chandler Pigge led Harvard with 13 points. Senior guard Evan Nelson added 12.
Harvard had 23 bench points to only six from Yale.
Yale had defeated Harvard at John J. Lee Amphitheater in January, 84-55.
Yale (19-7, 12-1 Ivy) had already clinched the Ivy tourney No. 1 seed. Harvard (11-15, 6-7) still has a slim chance at the tourney and must win next Saturday at home against Dartmouth and get some help from either Penn or Columbia, against the loser of Sunday’s Princeton-Cornell game at Newman Arena.