Brian Earl

With 0-3 records in Ivy play, Columbia women and Cornell men look for positives

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The women’s and men’s basketball teams for Columbia and Cornell arrived at Levien Gymnasium on Saturday winless in conference play.  While the main goal for each team was to secure its first league win, it was almost as important for the individual teams to feel good about their games as they move into the hardest stretch of their seasons.  

The Columbia men had, perhaps, their best game of the season as they dismantled Cornell, 88-62.  On the women’s side, the Big Red led for 36:49 of the 40-minute contest in route to an important 57-47 road win over the Lions.  In dominating their respective games, the Columbia men and Cornell women have strong momentum heading into next Saturday’s rematches in Ithaca.  The two losing squads and their staffs, however, were left trying to come to grips with their play and figuring out how to turn things around, for next weekend and the remainder of the year.

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Ivy Power Poll – Jan. 21, 2018

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1. Penn (12-6, 3-0 Ivy)

It says a great deal that, in just his third season at the helm on 33rd Street, that Steve Donahue has turned Penn around to the point that it’s No. 1 in the Ivy Power Poll during league play.

Donahue’s predecessor’s predecessor’s predecessor Fran Dunphy and the Temple Owls still dealt Penn the 11th consecutive loss in the teams’ series Saturday, overcoming a 51-48 deficit with 4:02 to play at the Palestra. Penn went ice cold from deep (8-for-31, 25.8 percent) and notched just 0.81 points per possession against Temple’s stout defense.

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Inside Ivy Hoops – Jan. 18, 2018

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Going Inside Ivy Hoops with Brett Franklin and Jill Glessner this week are Yale women’s basketball head coach Allison Guth, IHO writer George Clark and Cornell men’s basketball coach Brian Earl.

Jill and Brett recap the action from last weekend’s conference play on both the men’s and women’s sides and and look ahead to this weekend’s matchups:

Allison Guth on Yale’s nonconference highlights, upset of Brown, what she calls “beautiful Bulldog basketball,” why she decided to stop “Coking up the world one smile at a time” and more:

George Clark explains Bella Alarie’s greatness, highlights Mitch Henderson’s top-notch recruiting and coaching in the face of adversity and Penn’s turnaround under Steve Donahue:

Brian Earl describes his relationships with Sydney Johnson and Mitch Henderson, what drew him to the ivy League as a player and to Cornell as a coach, Matt Morgan taking pride in his shooting percentage and more:

Q&A with Princeton assistant coach and recruiting coordinator Brett MacConnell

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Ivy Hoops Online’s Richard Kent caught up with Brett MacConnell, an assistant coach and recruiting coordinator for Princeton. He is a Rutgers graduate and a long-time New Jersey resident.

Ivy Hoops Online: Tell us your thoughts about this most recent Princeton-Penn game?
Brett MacConnell: Penn was tougher. They dominated the paint. (Ryan) Betley wasn’t a surprise. We couldn’t get big stops at the end. We are a young team with some new guys.

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Ivy Power Poll – Dec. 18, 2017

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There hasn’t been much Ivy action the past couple of weeks due to finals, but here’s a snapshot of the Ivy League at the moment:

1. Princeton (4-6)

We haven’t seen “Ivy Princeton” yet, so the Tigers are at the top for now. In other words, just keep in mind Princeton has always seemed to overachieve in league play and underachieve in non-league play under coach Mitch Henderson. But Princeton overcame a 16-3 hole against Monmouth with a subsequent 20-2 run last week to pocket a 69-58 victory at Jadwin Gym, building that run the Princeton way: layups and three-pointers that comprised 18 of those 20 points.

The Tigers lit up Cal Poly from downtown Saturday night, and Princeton’s point distribution has been more even in its past two games. Princeton’s got a shot to shred the “non-Ivy Princeton” narrative by upsetting Southern Cal Tuesday.

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Ivy men’s hoops roundup – Nov. 27, 2017

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1. Harvard (3-4)

The Crimson did something on Friday that Princeton couldn’t do last Saturday: beat St. Joseph’s. Sans Seth Towns and Corey Johnson due to food poisoning, Harvard raced out to a 23-9 lead in the first 10 minutes and got a boost from sophomore guard Bryce Aiken’s 8:1 assist-to-turnover ratio, which is impressive considering he had 13 turnovers in the first three games of the season (seven at Holy Cross). Sophomore frontcourt stalwart Robert Baker notched 14 points, 11 boards and three blocks against the Hawks in the Wooden Legacy Tournament. Harvard may have gotten blown out early versus St. Mary’s in the same tourney on Thursday, but Harvard’s 4-for-21 (19 percent) three-point shooting performance seems like an aberration.

Sunday night brought a 70-61 win for Cal State Fullerton over Harvard, a game in which the Titans attempted nearly three times as many free throws (30) as the Crimson (11). The Crimson’s interior defense got gouged at Titan Gym.

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Behind Enemy Lines: Q&A with The Juice Online

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It’s time for Ivy Hoops Online’s annual exchange with The Juice Online since another edition of Cornell-Syracuse is upon us. But this is not just another Big Red vs. Orange matchup. It’s the season opener for both teams, and it’s the first occasion for longtime Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim to square off with his son, Cornell freshman forward Jimmy Boeheim.
Here is IHO’s look at Cornell for The Juice, and here’s The Juice Online’s take on the Syracuse side of the Boeheim Bowl:

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2017-18 Ivy League team-by-team season preview, part 1

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This is part 1 of IHO’s 2017-18 Ivy League team-by-team season preview. Read part 2 here. 

The rise of the Ivy League is projected to continue.

The Ancient Eight is slated by KenPom as the 13th-best conference in Division I this season, just seven years after it placed 26th. That’s a quantum leap, a product of the league’s bolstered recruiting in that time frame. The Ivy hoops status quo now consists of top-25 recruiting classes, Nike Skills Academy members and expectations of NCAA Tournament success.

There’s a three-way cluster between Harvard, Princeton and Yale projected to top the league. In the Ivy Preseason Media Poll, Yale received the most first-place votes (eight) but Harvard garnered the most points overall. Without a clear conference favorite, it’s quite likely that the regular season champion will not also be the conference tournament winner, with Bart Torvik’s Ivy Tourney Simulator tabbing Penn as the favorite in an Ivy tourney as a No. 4 seed.

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Red-White Scrimmage brings growth and hope for Cornell

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Amid an 80-degree, summer-like Homecoming on Saturday, the Cornell men’s basketball team held its Red-White Scrimmage, unofficially beginning year two of the Brian Earl era.  With a year of experience under Earl’s more disciplined system, as well as the coach’s bringing in his first recruiting class, the Big Red look like a more confident and balanced unit that should improve upon last season’s 8-21 record.

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Breaking down Cornell’s men’s and women’s 2017-18 schedules

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Cornell has released the 2017-18 schedules for its men’s and women’s basketball teams.  Coach Brian Earl will look to improve upon last season’s 8-21 (4-10 Ivy, T-6th) record for the men, while coach Danya Smith looks to avoid an expected rebuilding year from last year’s 16-11 (7-7 Ivy, T-4th) squad that just missed earning a spot in the inaugural Ivy Tournament.

Coach Earl’s first season as a head coach was a challenging one.  Not only did he bring in a completely different style of basketball without any of his own recruits, but he had to confront defections and or injuries to three key members of his front court.  Heading into this season, the coach will be bringing a six-member recruiting class to campus.  With a second year in Earl’s more disciplined half-court systems and greater depth, the Big Red will try to move up the standings and earn a spot in the postseason Ivy Tournament.

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