Ivy League Notebook
Ivy League play has begun in earnest, and with two full weekends in the books a few things have already become clear.
Most notable is that Cornell is the team to beat. The Big Red have run out to a 6-0 start and have a two-game lead on everyone else. While there is still a lot of basketball left to play, a team can sometimes ride that kind of early momentum to a title. For good measure, that start includes three wins on the road.
Also of note is that the contenders to topple the Big Red look to be in short supply, with a big drop-off after that. Brown, Yale and Columbia have all taken their best shots to no avail, the first two doing so on their home courts. The other four teams all look to be a notch below the top four, although Penn probably has the most talent but also the least team experience.
Last, but not least, something requiring further elaboration has become abundantly clear: it’s tough to win on the road.
Home Teams Rule
The home team won all eight games in Ivy League play this weekend, and only one of them was close as Columbia’s 58-53 win over Princeton on Saturday was the only game decided by single digits. While part of it is that the better teams in the league were at home this weekend, the dominance of home teams is still noteworthy.
The first weekend of play, the Penn/Princeton weekend looked like it always does for teams traveling down I-95 to play them as they each swept the weekend. But this weekend, the Quakers and Tigers were swept on the road to fall to 2-2 each.
The first weekend was home to the biggest aberration in this trend thus far, as Yale was swept at home by Columbia and Cornell. Both teams now stand 3-3 after sweeping their home weekend games this past weekend, but they’re also each three games back in the loss column behind Cornell and may as well be another game behind since Cornell swept Columbia and has won at Yale.
Columbia’s win at Yale is currently the only road win in the league besides the three that Cornell has.
Bears Come Alive, Sweep in Blowouts
After last Friday’s loss to Cornell, Brown came back to beat Columbia the next night. Then the Bears went out and dismantled Dartmouth and Harvard at home this weekend.
While head coach Craig Robinson highlighted the big lead the Bears built up on Friday night and how it allowed him to rest his regulars for a lot of minutes, he was also happy from just about every intangible perspective.
“We challenged these guys with the fact that this is the first weekend that we’re expected to win on Friday and expected to win on Saturday,” said Robinson after Friday’s win. “To have it go like this on Friday just helps us for Saturday.”
It certainly did, as the Bears were in control on Saturday night in much the same way, although the defense didn’t lead the way quite like it did Friday night. Against Dartmouth, the Bears created turnovers and turned them into quick points, especially Mark McAndrew. The senior guard scored 25 points on 8-10 shooting, making all of his three-pointers along the way.
“He’s been dying to have a game like that, and it started with his defense,” Robinson said of McAndrew. “He was really active on defense. He was tipping balls, getting rebounds and cutting hard. I think the freshmen coming around is helping him rest.”
Robinson pointed to an important development there – the continuing improvement of his freshmen. Peter Sullivan now starts, and Adrian Williams gets more minutes off the bench in the rotation now, and each clearly is better than they were earlier in the season. That’s one more reason the Bears have continued to play well and have already equaled the number of wins they had all of last season, which is yet another hurdle this team has cleared.
After Friday’s game, Robinson saw that his team wasn’t celebrating. Then on Saturday, they were concerned a bit because they knew they didn’t play better in the second half on Saturday than in the first. The latter was probably helped by a timeout he called with less than three minutes left and the game in hand where he ripped into his bench players. He made it clear he expects no less of them than anyone else, and they’re taking notice of how serious this is.
“We have to understand that we can’t celebrate too much on any occasion, because we’ve got bigger things to do,” said Robinson.
Included in that is picking up road wins, as the Bears play their next four games away from home.
Crimson Happy to Go Home
Of all the teams on the road this weekend, few will be happier to get home than Harvard. After opening with a win against Dartmouth in Cambridge last month, the Crimson proceeded to lose the next five league games, all on the road. Only one of them, a 73-69 loss at Penn over a week ago, was decided by single digits.
It’s not just being away from home that has hampered the Crimson, as injuries haven’t helped, either. T.J. Carey missed Saturday’s game against Brown, while sophomore Pat Magnarelli may be out for the season with a leg injury suffered at Dartmouth. Magnarelli had been coming along nicely, with two double-doubles in the last three games before the injury.
The Crimson now play four home games the next two weekends, with Cornell and Columbia in town this weekend.
“We’ve struggled like you wouldn’t believe on the road this year,” said senior forward Brad Unger. “Hopefully we can get home and come back and get some more wins.”
It will be a tall order against the league leaders and a very capable Columbia team that beat them handily in Cambridge last year. Columbia also has the only road win in the league besides the three that Cornell have.
What Do We Know About Dartmouth?
A hard team to figure out is Dartmouth, which stands 1-5 after being blown out in two road games this weekend. But there are a couple of things we do know about them.
Most notably, Alex Barnett could be the league’s best player. Although his numbers weren’t great against Brown, he made a number of plays that further show his potential. He’s always been able to shoot, though at times he’s more of a volume shooter, but he’s very athletic and has a lot of tools to help offensively and will get some rebounds when he goes in. He’s just behind Brown’s Mark McAndrew for the scoring lead and leads the league in rebounding.
We know that they can hang their hat on Johnathan Ball when he’s healthy. He’s undersized in the frontcourt, but he’s a warrior who will bang with bigger players and is among the league’s rebounding leaders.
While their inside game isn’t great, we know there is one big man they may be able to hang their hat on a bit.
Other Notes
- Although he’s been erratic at times, promising Penn freshman Harrison Gaines has the second-best assist/turnover ratio in the conference at a 1.91.
- Freshman Alex Zampier gives Yale a lift off the bench, but not just with his shooting. Zampier does make over 39 percent of his shots from behind the arc, but he also leads the league in steals.
- One way to slow down Cornell might be to defend the three-point line: the Big Red are making shots from behind the arc at a 42.4 percent clip.
