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A wild Saturday capped the regular season for the Ancient Eight. When the dust settled, Yale and Princeton tied for the league title, while Penn settled for third place and Cornell captured the final spot for this weekend’s Ivy League Tournament at Jadwin Gymnasium.
In what was arguably the conference game of the year, it was the worst of times in the opening half and the best of times in the second stanza for the hometown Tigers.
ITHACA, N.Y. — Two things needed to happen for the Cornell men to make it to the Ivy League Tournament: beat Columbia and hope Brown loses to Yale.
Part one of that equation has been completed.
The conference’s next-to-last weekend began on Friday night with a nationally televised game between Princeton and Harvard, two of the four teams headed to the Ivy Tournament. The last time they met in January, the Crimson came away with a 67-59 victory, ending the Tigers’ 42-game Ivy League win streak.
Playing in front of more than 1,700 fans at Jadwin Gymnasium, Harvard took a 14-12 lead after the first quarter. The visitors used a late 13-2 run to open up a 12-point lead before Princeton cut it to 10, 30-20, at the half.
In the league’s penultimate weekend, each of the three first place teams won, while Brown pulled a game ahead of Cornell for fourth place.
Penn and Dartmouth had their offenses clicking at the Palestra on Saturday afternoon.
The Quakers shot 73% from two and 42% from three, while the Big Green made 62% from inside the arc and 45% from outside. With most shots going in from the field, the Red & Blue pulled away for their eighth straight win on the strength of their free throw shooting (17-for-18 vs 8-for-14) and rebounding (28-21).
The victory allowed Penn to remain in first place, while the defeat ended Dartmouth’s chance for their first Ivy Tournament berth.
Trying to rebound from a huge second half collapse against Yale last weekend, Princeton used a 10-2 run over the last five minutes of the opening half to take a 37-23 halftime lead at Harvard. The Tigers upped their advantage to 18 at the 15-minute mark of the second half, but the Crimson used a 20-4 run to make it a two-point game with five minutes left in regulation.
Contrary to last week, the Orange & Black would not give up the lead.
The teams combined to make one of the next ten shots from the field, as Princeton held a three-point advantage with twenty seconds remaining. An Evan Nelson layup cut the deficit to one, but Ryan Langborg sank two free throws to make it 56-53. Tigers coach Mitch Henderson followed Jon Rothstein’s advice and fouled Nelson, who missed the first of a one-and-one. Caden Pierce came down with the rebound and hit both free throws to put the game away.
The win sets up a showdown with long-time rival Penn to claim at least a piece of the regular season championship.
Despite being without Matt Knowling for the second straight game, Yale posted a convincing win over Cornell in the team’s final game at the John J. Lee Amphitheater. The Bulldogs, who were up 34-28 at the half, stretched their lead to 21 by the 11-minute mark and the Big Red didn’t get any closer than 11 points the rest of the way.
The win was Yale’s eighth in the last nine games and allowed them to keep pace with the Ps. It was also the 200th regular season Ivy victory for coach James Jones. Jones, who is wrapping up his 24th year in New Haven, is 200-121 in league play and 110 conference wins away from former Princeton coach Pete Carril.
For Cornell, Saturday’s defeat was the fifth in their last six games and puts them on the wrong side of the Ivy Tournament bubble with one game to go.
Brown had a 14-point lead in the first half, but Columbia used four three-pointers in the latter part of the half to cut the Bears lead to five at the break. The game was tied at 59 with 8:30 to go, but a 9-0 run over the next two minutes gave Bruno enough of a cushion to dash the Lions’ hopes of getting their third league win.
The win breaks Brown’s two game losing streak and allows Bruno to control its own destiny for the program’s first-ever spot in Ivy Madness.
Yale completed its revenge tour of teams against defeated the Bulldogs earlier in the season with a decisive 76-58 win over Cornell at John J. Lee Amphitheater Saturday.
And oh, what a Senior Night it was for senior forward EJ Jarvis.
In a critical game in the fight for an Ivy Madness berth, the Cornell men’s offense never made the trip up to New Haven.
The Big Red scored fewer than 60 points for the second consecutive game, losing 76-58 to Yale for their fifth loss in the last six games
The loss takes Cornell out of the driver’s seat for the final spot in Ivy Madness.
The Ivy League Tournament bubble.
Certainly not uncharted territory for the Cornell men. But after the way the season started to trend for the Big Red, it’s a bit of a surprise we’re talking about this.
Cornell has lost four of its last five games, dropping the team from a tie for first to a tie for fourth. By virtue of a tiebreaker, the Big Red would be in Ivy Madness over Brown since it beat Yale and Penn. The Bears have only beaten Princeton among the trio of teams tied for the conference lead.
But that tiebreaker is by no means safe.
What happened?
In a must-win game, the Cornell men came through when it mattered most, outscoring Dartmouth 15-3 in overtime to win 95-83.
Sophomore guard Nazir Williams scored 27 points, 18 of which came in the first half. He connected on all three of his three-pointers and dished out six assists.
Junior forward Sean Hansen recorded an 18-point, 10-rebound double-double. He hit three of his six three-pointers, including a perimeter shot to give the Big Red a 79-76 lead with 1:18 remaining.
That was the last field goal Cornell scored in regulation. Dartmouth freshman Ryan Cornish split a pair of free throws to cut it to two before Hansen missed on the other end.
Dartmouth freshman forward Brandon Mitchell-Day split free throws, as did Williams for Cornell. Down two points, senior forward Dame Adelekun rolled off a screen and slammed down a thunderous dunk to tie the game.
After a pair of Cornell timeouts, the Big Red wanted to hold for the final shot. Senior guard Greg Dolan backed down in the post with the ball and lost it, giving the Big Green a final opportunity. Adelekun missed a three-pointer at the buzzer to send it to overtime, where the Big Red dominated.
Junior guard Isaiah Gray and Dolan each scored 17, and junior guard Chris Manon, who was inserted into the starting lineup five games ago, added 11.
Cornell and Dartmouth battled back and forth throughout the first half before Williams hit a three-pointer at the buzzer to give Cornell a 45-39 lead at the half. The Big Green battled back but never led by more than one in the second half.
Cornish and junior forward Dusan Neskovic each scored 19 points to pace Dartmouth. Junior guard Jaren Johnson added 11.
Cornell shot 48% from the field and 42% from deep, while Dartmouth shot 44% and 37%. The Big Red paced rebounding, 37-35.
Cornell hosts Harvard on Saturday while Dartmouth travels to Columbia.
Following Saturday afternoon’s action, the upper division pulled away from the bottom half, while the Brown rebuild took a positive step forward.
Columbia bounced back from a disappointing result against Princeton by taking it out on Yale in front of 1,485 fans at Levien Gymnasium. The Lions jumped out to a 32-17 halftime lead on the strength of a 14-0 second quarter run. The Light Blue made it a 20-point game after three and widen it to a game-high 28 points with just under four minutes to go in the contest. Defensively, they limited the Bulldogs to 32% shooting and only 49 points, the first time they held an Ivy opponent under 50 this season.
Week seven for the Ancient Eight saw Yale avenge its shocking opening day loss at Columbia and move into a tie at the top of the conference leaderboard. After a close half that saw the Bulldogs holding onto a slim 31-26 lead, the Bulldogs outscored the last-place Lions 58-32 for the dominant 31-point win. Yale, winners of six straight, had 13 different players in the scoring column and shot 65% from the field.