A road sweep for Columbia breaks a seven-year streak

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With nine seconds left, Kyle Castlin was suddenly all by himself.

Isaac Cohen had flung a floating touch pass, a perfectly weighted through ball that would make the likes of Mesut Ozil proud, over the pressing defense of the desperate Yale Bulldogs. Castlin, breaking away from his man, hauled in the pass in stride, nothing but an empty basket ahead of him.

The freshman rose up and put down a two-handed slam, sending a disappointed crowd of 1,900 out into snowy New Haven. The small clique of Lions fans behind the bench went nuts as Kyle Smith let out a celebratory fist pump, Castlin’s dunk providing the exclamation point on a weekend to remember for Columbia.

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Crimson vanquish P’s, secure sole possession of first place

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Harvard appears to be closing in on a fifth straight Ivy crown, but the Crimson aren't in the clear just yet. (Robert Crawford)
Harvard appears to be closing in on a fifth straight Ivy crown, but the Crimson aren’t in the clear just yet. (Robert Crawford)

It was about 4:00 on a Saturday afternoon in late January. Harvard had just suffered a crushing defeat to Dartmouth at home. The Crimson’s record was 1-1 in Ivy play. The Ivy season was still young, but to many this loss proved that Harvard was not the team it once was. The door was left wide open for Yale – in fact, the door had swung off its hinges. A few minutes after the buzzer sounded, the distraught Crimson players came back onto the floor to sign autographs for their young fans. At the time, the smiles on these kids’ faces made them look naive – but knowing how insignificant that loss seems now, perhaps those kids’ prophetic smiles proved they knew more about the Crimson’s future than the rest of us.

That hypothesis is supported by the next day’s headlines and the initial reaction to that second Harvard-Dartmouth game. A trusted source for Ivy basketball on Twitter ripped into Tommy Amaker for his lineup decisions and then stated, “When [Harvard] loses the league, this will be why.” A writer for our own Ivy Hoops Online wrote in a piece about Yale that “Harvard is not that good.” In the face of all of this negativity, Harvard basketball’s mantra became “regroup and respond,” and over the last month (during which the Crimson have won eight straight Ivy games), that’s just what this team has done. Harvard’s two wins this past weekend over Penn and Princeton, combined with Columbia’s victory over Yale on Saturday night, have placed Harvard in sole possession of first place (9-1), one game ahead of Yale (8-2).

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Ivy Saturday Roundup

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Brown 57 Cornell 56

Cornell’s proven it can snatch defeat from the jaws of victory better than anyone. The Big Red fell to 0-5 in games decided by three points or fewer in devastating fashion, blowing a 40-23 second-half lead and falling following Cedric Kuakumensah’s game-winning shot with two seconds left. Minus Shonn Miller, the Big Red managed to shoot sub-30 percent against the conference’s worst defense. Cornell’s offense is broken, but credit to Brown for coming back in the second half of the second game of a back-to-back.

Harvard 63 Princeton 55

Wesley Saunders and his 23-point, nine-rebound, four-steal, three-assist performance proved to be too much for Princeton, which finished with just one player – Clay Wilson – in double figures. The Tigers led 33-21 with 3:56 left in the first half, but Harvard embarked on a gradual comeback with characteristically solid defense, forcing 19 Princeton turnovers. The Crimson took first place in the conference at 9-1 after…

Columbia 56 Yale 50

Yale couldn’t get much going offensively against the Lions, falling to 8-2 in Ivy play. Justin Sears was stifled early and often, notching just seven points on the night for the Elis. Columbia finally hung on in a high-profile matchup thanks to Maodo Lo, who posted 18 points and six rebounds. As Sears goes, so goes Yale, and tonight, it went down.

Dartmouth 67 Penn 62

A see-saw game in Hanover finished with the hosts on top. Alex Mitola was shut down by the Quakers at the Palestra earlier this season, but he rebounded with an 18-point performance tonight. Penn shut down Miles Wright, who scored just 2 after scoring at least 16 in his previous five games, but it wasn’t enough. Dartmouth got two bench efforts in double-figures from Tommy Carpenter and Connor Boehm. Penn now occupies sole possession of last place in the Ivy League.

Q&A with Princeton coach Courtney Banghart

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Courtney Banghart can't stop winning. (goprincetontigers.com)
Courtney Banghart can’t stop winning. (goprincetontigers.com)

Our Richard Kent caught up with Princeton women’s hoops coach Courtney Banghart, whose No. 16 Tigers are 24-0 with just six regular-season games left. Princeton’s 56-50 win at Yale last Saturday was its closest margin of victory all season.

IHO: Did Yale present any problems which were unanticipated?

CB: Yale played a really solid game. They were physical and ran with us on both ends. They made tough shots and capitalized on a sub par defensive night for us. On the offensive end, we forced too many early shots — albeit shots that we make on a regular night. When we moved the ball deeper into the possession we had more success. Our starting guards didn’t play well, but our posts were the difference. Sometimes, the reverse is true. That’s why they call it a team.

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Ivy Friday Roundup

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Not a lot of intrigue or drama tonight. The higher-ranked Ivies held serve, and here’s how they did it:

Yale 62, Cornell 51

This one seemed over a couple of light years before it actually ended, in no small part due to Cornell’s continued inability to shoot the basketball. The Big Red finished with a 32 percent clip from the field. Despite committing 16 turnovers, Yale was never in danger falling off. Senior guard Javier Duren led the way with 13 points and eight rebounds (all of which came in the first half), making him the second guard in six days to post eight rebounds in the first half against the Big Red after Harvard’s Saunders did it Saturday. The Bulldogs became the second Ivy to get to 8-1 in the conference play just after…

Harvard 69, Penn 46

With Tony Hicks suspended and matching up against the perennial conference champion that beat them by 25 on their home court last month, the Quakers didn’t seem to have much of a chance. They fought admirably, led by freshman guard Antonio Woods’ 12 points and four assists. Still, Harvard had this one all the way. Harvard’s Boston Three Party of Wesley Saunders, Siyani Chambers and Steve Moundou-Missi combined to shoot 15-for-20 and lock up the Crimson’s fourth straight win over Penn.

Princeton 63, Dartmouth 56

The Tigers outscored the Big Green by 12 in the second half to pull out the win in Hanover and stay within two games of Harvard and Yale in the Ivy race. Pushing Princeton over the top was senior guard Clay Wilson, who scored in double figures for the first time in nine games with 11 points on 3-for-6 shooting from downtown. (Just kidding, there’s no downtown in Hanover!)

Columbia 76, Brown 59

This game was never really a game. Columbia led 48-28 at halftime and the Bears, which continue to struggle mightily on defense and never got within 14 again. Maodo Lo posted 24 points en route to a total of 33, canning only three fewer field goals than Brown’s entire roster.

Rosenberg = Durant: On evolving expectations

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Kevin Durant

Results are not the driving factor in fan happiness. Results in relation to expectations are.

For example, many Sixers fans are incredibly optimistic about the future despite the team’s putrid results on the court for a second straight year because they understand the front office’s plan and see a light at the end of the tunnel. Oklahoma City Thunder fans expected their team to compete for a championship before the season, but everything changed once Kevin Durant suffered a Jones fracture in his right foot and Russell Westbrook broke his hand on opening night. At 29-25, the Thunder are finally healthy and have an opportunity to reach the lofty goal but will face an uphill battle come playoff time. As a fan of the team, it would be understandable if a full-strength Thunder team got knocked out by the Warriors in the first round of the playoffs. Had you told me this was the likely scenario in August, I would have been irate.

All of this brings me to the constantly shifting expectations and the ensuing questions raised by the 2014-15 Columbia Lions.

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Penn junior guard Tony Hicks suspended for weekend

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Penn Athletics announced today that junior guard Tony Hicks was suspended by coach Jerome Allen for Penn’s games at Harvard and Dartmouth this weekend. The Daily Pennsylvanian reports that Hicks did not travel with the team to New England.

Observers say Hicks twisted the hand of a Brown player in what appeared to be a sign of poor sportsmanship, which followed Hicks getting charged with a technical foul with 6:22 remaining in a 71-55 home loss to Brown for arguing with an official.

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IHO Power Poll: Columbia homer edition

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Several weeks ago, I was inspired by The Ancient Quaker’s epic power poll. If the AQ can create a ranking of the Ivy basketball teams so detached from Planet Earth that Penn would come in at No. 1, why couldn’t I do the same?

Behold, then: a totally scientific and rational power poll, with just three weekends left in the season.

I will follow the guideline established by the AQ from his power rankings: “I’ve decided to rank the teams as I see them which of course has nothing to do with reality.”

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Shot selection keeps holding the Big Red back

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This is Shonn Miller doing the opposite of hoisting a three. (ithacajournal.com)
This is Shonn Miller doing the opposite of hoisting a three. (ithacajournal.com)

We are a little more than halfway through the Ivy slate and Cornell is just as up as it is down.  12-12 on the season and 4-4 in conference.   Satisfied?  Disappointed?  I don’t think you’ll find a Big Red fan in too much anguish. To suffer over a team bouncing back from its lowest win total in school history and fewest wins in league play since the 1970-71 campaign would be unreasonable, but who said sports fans have to be reasonable?  We’re a fickle group, easily frustrated and often disillusioned.

This is why when a team picked to finish dead last finds itself in the top half of the standings past the midway point of play, we can’t help but ask ourselves, why not more?

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On the Vine – Feb. 18

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Check out our archive of the latest On the Vine podcast, in which Kristyn Brundidge of WKCR Sports and Ashley Wu of the Yale Daily News join Peter Andrews & Mike Tony to cover the latest Ivy action. Segments include reflections on Harvard’s championship pedigree, Yale’s success at Jadwin and predictions on who will prevail in this weekend’s matchups: