Penn men’s basketball fell just a few inches short of holding onto a share of first place in the Ivy League standings Monday after it took a tough road loss to Harvard, 64-63.
The Quakers (9-8, 2-2 Ivy) rallied back after giving up an 11-0 run that spanned the end of the first half and the beginning of the second to take multiple leads.
The Crimson (10-8, 3-1) seized back momentum after their star sophomore, Robert Hinton, delivered a highlight-reel, and-one dunk over Quakers big man Augustus Gerhart with 5:31 to play. Penn rallied back to tie the game twice after Hinton’s one-handed flush thanks to the efforts of sophomore point guard AJ Levine, but surrendered baskets at the rim to Harvard on five straight possessions in the game’s final three minutes.
Despite that interior defensive collapse, the Quakers had two long-shot chances to tie or win the game in the final two seconds. But Levine was unable to intentionally miss a free throw with 1.9 seconds left and Penn down two. Harvard missed the front end of a one-and-one after Levine’s unintentional make, but TJ Power’s desperation heave came up short.
There’s nothing wrong with splitting two games on a tough road trip, but it’s hard to shake the feeling that Penn let a big opportunity slip through its fingers.
What did fans learn from a tough afternoon?
Penn’s offense is hard-pressed to handle an off day from Michael Zanoni.
After Saturday’s win over Dartmouth, I wrote about the risk of fatigue after playing two games in short succession.
The worst-case scenario came true for Zanoni, whose dead-eye shooting has elevated the Quakers’ offense this season. The senior guard shot 0-for-8 from the field on Monday and couldn’t convert on several looks which are pretty much automatic for him.
The 0-fer snapped a six-game streak of double-digit scoring for Zanoni, who finished with a KenPom offensive rating of zero in 25 minutes played. Off nights happen, but it was a shame it happened to Zanoni in such a tough game.
Penn entered Monday shooting better than 40% from three as a team but finished 6-for-19 as a team against the Crimson, which translates to a roughly 31% three-point shooting percentage.
The Quakers didn’t get enough out of their bigs.
Penn’s biggest issue is in its frontcourt. The Crimson got far too many easy baskets at the rim down the stretch.
The worst moment came when the Quakers chose to play straight-up defense down three with roughly 30 seconds left. Harvard’s Tey Barbour blew right by defensive specialist Lucas Lueth on a drive from the wing. Penn’s help defender in that situation was the 6-foot-0 Levine, who was placed in an impossible situation to try and contest the shot.
A few minutes earlier, Lueth got beaten off the bounce by Harvard big Thomas Batties II, who gave the Crimson the lead for good after an easy layup finish with 2:57 to play.
Outside of some excellent tipouts and offensive rebounding from Gerhart, the Quakers didn’t really get a whole lot from the “five” spot on the other end of the floor. Gerhart, Dalton Scantlebury and Lueth (who is really more of a “four”) combined to score six points.
Levine and Ethan Roberts remain bright spots.
It’s hard to overstate how much Levine has improved in these last few weeks. He turned up the intensity big-time when the Quakers were down by as much as eight in the second half and began attacking the basket, generating numerous mismatches in the process.
Levine stuffed the stat sheet with 15 points, eight rebounds, four assists and four steals. He looks like the point guard of both the present and future for the Quakers.
Penn also would have been run out of the gym if not for Ethan Roberts, who again carried the team in the firs half when it struggled to find any offensive flow. The senior wing dropped 27 points on 15 shots from the field and has now scored at least 20 points in three straight Ivy contests.
At this rate, Roberts will earn serious consideration for Ivy Player of the Year honors.