Harvard women’s basketball, continuing to use a depleted roster, bounced back from two defeats at the Baha Mar Hoops Pink Flamingo Championship before Thanksgiving to take down Arkansas 69-51 on Nolan Richardson Court in Fayetteville Sunday.
With the victory, the Crimson improved to 4-5 on the season, while the Razorbacks dropped its first home game in six attempts and dropped to 7-2.
Sunday afternoon’s contest was put on the schedule as a homecoming for Gabby Anderson, who was born in the Natural State and whose mother played for Arkansas in the late 1990s. But the celebration of the program’s first-ever win over an SEC opponent was tempered by the loss of the senior guard due to a left knee injury early in the second quarter.
The Razorbacks entered the game averaging 83 points per game (No. 21 in the nation), so a key for the Crimson was to make it more of slugfest that would keep it more in the 60s.
While both teams pressured the ball from the start, Harvard was able to win the tempo battle, and the game was a tight 13-12 battle in favor of the visitors with two minutes to go in the opening quarter.
Despite facing a tough defensive effort from the hosts, the Crimson used strong three-point shooting to open up a 17-point lead halfway through the second quarter and entered the half with a 44-26 advantage.
After sophomore guard Nina Emnace stretched the lead to a game-high 24 points, 50-26, early in the third, Arkansas finally found its footing. Taking advantage of the absence of Anderson and Wright, who went to the bench with three fouls, the Razorbacks used its strong front court and pressure defense to cut the deficit to 11, 54-43, by the end of the frame.
Arkansas netted two quick free throws to make it a nine-point game within the opening thirty seconds of the final quarter, but Wright’s return slowed down the Razorbacks on the defensive side and Saniyah Glenn-Bello took control on the offense.
The senior guard scored seven points in the first half of the fourth quarter, and her old fashioned three after driving through two defenders to get to the hoop put Harvard up 64-49 and effectively slammed the door on an Arkansas comeback.
Four different Crimson got to double-digits with senior forward Katie Krupa and sophomore guard Alayna Rocco each scoring 15, rookie guard Aubrey Shaw adding a career-high 11 and Glenn-Bello totaling 10.
Some thoughts from a (almost) positive afternoon at Bud Walton Arena:
Threes were key
For the day, the Crimson shot 40% (12-for-30) from beyond the arc, while the Razorbacks were held to 26% (5-for-19).
Harvard was even better in the opening half, using a 9-for-15 (60%) effort from three to open up its 18-point lead. The only time things went south for the Crimson was the third quarter, when the team went 2-for-11 (18%).
Six different members of the Crimson connected on deep shots with Rocco and Shaw each knocking down three.
While the offensive result from outside was huge, the defensive effort was equally important against an Arkansas team that arrived as the No. 29 team in the land for three-point shooting (37%).
Harvard cleans the glass
The Crimson showed up with a 38% offensive rebounding rate (N0. 61) and 66% defensive rate (No. 245), but the Razorbacks had a 75% rate on the defensive glass (No. 39) and 37% on the offensive side (No. 89).
Even with Wright sitting for stretches in foul trouble and Anderson out for three-quarters of the game, Harvard finished with a +15 (42-27)/+26% advantage on the glass with a 49% rate on the offensive side and 77% on defense. This effort helped the Ivy Leaguers take 16 more shots and grab seven more second chance points than its SEC opponent.
It was a total team effort on the glass, with seven different players grabbing at least three boards and Shaw leading the way with nine.
The roster continues to resemble a MASH unit
Carrie Moore and her rotation cannot seem to shake the injury bug through the opening month of the season.
Some of the injuries have been minor, like Glenn-Bello in the opening win against St John’s, and some more serious, like first-year guard Olivia Jones, who missed a few games after tweaking her ankle last at Massachusetts, and sophomore point guard Lydia Chatira, who missed a few games from lingering off season problems and then injured her wrist after returning against Alabama earlier in the week.
Even more concerning has been the injury to Karlee White, arguably the team’s top player, who went down with a knee injury against Boston College. But the MRI was negative for ligament damage, and she is expected back from the bone bruise sometime in December.
Now, Anderson, the team’s defensive stalwart and leading rebounder, goes down and may have to miss time.
While Harvard’s depth has allowed it to deal with all these injuries and given players like Krupa, Rocco and Shaw opportunities to play bigger roles, it will be important for Harvard to get to full strength as the Ivy League schedule approaches.
Thankfully for the reigning Ivy Madness champions, the roughest part of the nonconference schedule, including an eight-game road trip that took the team to Ann Arbor, Berkeley, the Bahamas and Fayetteville, is over, and the team can recover during its four December games at Lavietes Pavilion.