Yale all-time moment No. 1: Elis share the 2015 title

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We’re counting down the top 10 moments in each Ivy school’s history as part of our Ivy League at 60 retrospective. We did Yale next by request of Justin Sears:

We all know the 2014-15 Yale men”s basketball season didn”t have a storybook ending. Just four months ago, Harvard edged out Yale at the Palestra, 53-51, in an already legendarily back-and-forth Ivy playoff game after the Bulldogs let a last-second lead literally slip away at Dartmouth that would have clinched the Elis” first NCAA Tournament appearance since 1962. Then the NIT online casino inexplicably slipped away too.

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Yale all-time moment No. 2: CIT final berth in 2014

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We’re counting down the top 10 moments in each Ivy school’s history as part of our Ivy League at 60 retrospective. Yale is next by request of Ivy Player of the Year Justin Sears.

Yale”s run through the CollegeInsider.com Tournament (CIT) first round in 2014 was quite the roller coaster. First, a three-pointer banked in by Justin Sears with 0.07 seconds left gave Yale a 69-68 squeaker over Quinnipiac. Then in the second round, Yale prevailed at Holy Cross, 71-66, overcoming a 66-65 deficit with 1:43 remaining to make James Jones online casino the winningest coach in Yale basketball history (surpassing Joe Vancisin). Yale”s next win came by a 72-69 at Ivy rival Columbia, which had beaten the Bulldogs 62-46 on the same Levien Gym floor.

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Yale all-time moment No. 3: First ever postseason win

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We’re counting down the top 10 moments in each Ivy school’s history as part of our Ivy League at 60 retrospective. Yale is next by request of Ivy Player of the Year Justin Sears.

Yale won its first ever postseason game on March 14, 2002. It took a while, but the payoff was sweet.

Yale earned a NIT appearance three years removed from a 4-22 campaign in 1998-99 by virtue of its share of the Ivy title (part of our No. 9 moment). The Elis drew a road matchup with favored Rutgers at the Louis Brown Athletic Center (better known as the RAC), a notoriously difficult place for visitors to play where the Scarlet Knights were 15-1 prior to facing Yale.

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Yale all-time moment No. 4: Beating Pistol Pete

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We’re counting down the top 10 moments in each Ivy school’s history as part of our Ivy League at 60 retrospective. Yale is next by request of Ivy Player of the Year Justin Sears.

Yale made some history at the 1969 Rainbow Classic in Hawaii by defeating LSU in the championship game, 97-94.

LSU was anything but a pushover that year, led by senior Pete Maravich, who averaged 44.5 (!) points per game, still the highest scoring total in NCAA history. But Yale’s Jim Morgan (who turned in 21.3 points per contest that year himself) outscored Maravich head-to-head 35-34 on Dec. 30, 1969, giving the Elis the edge they needed. LSU went on to finish second in the SEC that season, making Yale’s victory even more impressive. Yale finished 11-13 (7-7 Ivy, good for fourth in the conference), but beating Pete Maravich (and having a player outscore him) validates any season.

Yale all-time moment No. 5: Bulldogs’ 1961-62 season

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We’re counting down the top 10 moments in each Ivy school’s history as part of our Ivy League at 60 retrospective. Yale is next by request of Ivy Player of the Year Justin Sears.

The 1961-62 Yale Bulldogs are undoubtedly one of the greatest teams in school history, finishing 13-1 in Ivy play and 18-6 overall while securing the Ivy League championship, the program’s second in a six-year span.

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Yale all-time moment No. 6: James Jones takes over as head coach

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We’re counting down the top 10 moments in each Ivy school’s history as part of our Ivy League at 60 retrospective. Yale is next by request of Ivy Player of the Year Justin Sears:

Yale had suffered seven straight losing seasons, including a 4-22 finish in 1998-99, when it hired James Jones as its head coach on April 27, 1999. Things got better quickly.

Jones, a former Yale assistant coach (1995-97), led the Elis to a share of the Ivy title in 2002, though Penn would trump Yale in the league playoff game for a NCAA Tournament berth.

Yale has finished in the top half of the conference every season without fail since 2000. True, no NCAA Tournament appearances in that span (though a share of the title this season brought Yale as close as it could possibly get without getting over that hump), but still incredible consistency for a program that lacked it for decades before his arrival.

Yale all-time moment No. 7: Knocking off the national champ

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We’re counting down the top 10 moments in each Ivy school’s history as part of our Ivy League at 60 retrospective. Yale is next by request of Ivy Player of the Year Justin Sears, who had 12 points, 15 rebounds and three blocks in our next all-time moment…

On Nov. 30, 2014, Yale did something it hadn’t done before: Defeat a defending national champion. And it did so in the most dramatic way possible.

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Yale all-time moment No. 8: Elis tie Bill Bradley and company

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We’re counting down the top 10 moments in each Ivy school’s history as part of our Ivy League at 60 retrospective. Yale is next by request of Ivy Player of the Year Justin Sears.

The 1962-63 Yale Bulldogs were solid.

Fresh off a NCAA Tournament appearance the previous year and led by legend Rick Kaminsky, the Elis finished 13-10, and more importantly, 11-3 in Ivy play, including a 62-61 win at Jadwin Gym (capping a four-game win streak over Princeton).

The first-year varsity star Bill Bradley-led Tigers had their revenge, though, nipping the Elis, 61-58, in New Haven on Feb. 9 and again in the Ivy playoff game on March 9, 65-53. Thus the 1962-63 season marked the first non-NCAA Tournament season in a 53-season streak that is still running. Still, the 1963 Elis won a share of the Ivy League championship and cemented their place in Ivy history.

Big 5 doubleheader at Palestra officially slated for January

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Big 5

There have been signs that a Big 5 doubleheader was a distinct possibility for next season. Now it’s a sure thing.

Philly.com reported Wednesday that the Palestra will indeed host a Big 5 doubleheader on Wed., Jan. 20, 2016 featuring Temple vs. La Salle and St. Joseph’s vs. Penn, the first all-city twinbill since the Big 5 Classic’s last outing in 2004.

“This is how Philadelphia first fell in love with college basketball – by seeing two great games and four great teams in one night in what I think is the most intimate setting to watch a game,”
Penn coach Steve Donahue told Philly.com.

Donahue, former Penn and current Temple coach Fran Dunphy, St. Joe’s coach Phil Martelli and La Salle coach John Giannini have always publicly revered the Palestra as the hub of Big 5 hoops, and they were undoubtedly driving forces behind the 2016 twinbill.

The Big 5 office reportedly said “other facts about the celebration” will follow. What could those be? Well, Big 5 executive director and former Penn athletic director Steve Bilsky said in February that he envisioned a Big 5 week with a banquet the night before, an alumni game, students from the schools playing against each other, sponsorships and television.

 

Yale all-time moment No. 9: The Bulldogs put the ‘P’ in sweep

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We’re counting down the top 10 moments in each Ivy school’s history as part of our Ivy League at 60 retrospective. Yale is next by request of Ivy Player of the Year Justin Sears.

On the weekend of Feb. 18-19, 2002, Yale did something it hadn’t done in 14 years: It pulled off a home sweep of Penn and Princeton.

Huge crowds at Payne Whitney Gym got to see the Elis sweep the Ps in the middle of a seven-game Ivy win streak en route to a three-way tie atop the conference with … well, Penn and Princeton. By virtue of tiebreakers, Yale had to defeat Princeton before squaring off with Penn with a NCAA Tournament appearance on the line. The Elis fell to Penn, 77-58, but they weren’t done just yet. Led by four players with scoring averages in double figures (Edwin Draughan, Alex Gamboa, T.J. McHugh and Paul Vitelli), Yale still had postseason power to spare. More on that still to come in the countdown.