Harvard completes season sweep over Yale
Harvard couldn’t deny Yale its eighth Ivy League title — but the Crimson accomplished the next best thing.
Harvard completed a series sweep against its avowed rivals with an 83-69 victory in the season finale on Saturday night at Lavietes Pavilion. Harvard beat Yale 78-77 in New Haven, Conn., on Feb. 7.
“Playing against the league champions, the best team consistently all year and us playing one of our better games,” said Harvard coach Tommy Amaker. “It was evident that it meant something for us even though Yale had already clinched the regular season. We had to beat a very good team and I thought we did in a very convincing fashion.”
Harvard finished at 21-8 overall and 10-4 to secure the No. 2 seed and will face No. 3 Princeton (14-13, 9-5) in the Ivy League Tournament semifinals next Saturday at Lavietes. Harvard and Princeton split in their regular season matchups, with each winning at home by one point.
Yale (23-7, 11-3) is the No. 1 seed and will face No. 4 Penn (16-11, 8-6) in the playoff opener.
“We are excited about it and honored and proud to have made again the Ivy tournament and we are having it here,” said Amaker. “We are looking forward to the weekend locked into the No. 2 seed and all the teams that are in it are all good teams.”
Harvard shot 50.8% from the floor with eight treys, 32 rebounds and 12 assists. The Crimson’s leading scorer, Noah Kirkwood (12.2 ppg), sat out the game with an undisclosed injury.
“The trainers and doctors looked at him (Kirkwood) and said he was out,” said Amaker. “The guys rallied around this opportunity to close out senior weekend and not have second loss.”
Justin Bassey led Harvard with 19 points while Rio Haskett and Idan Tretout combined for 25. Forward Robert Baker had eight points, four blocks and three assists.
Leading by four at the break, Harvard opened the second half with a quick 14-7 surge to take a 5039 lead at 14:42 on consecutive slam dunks by forward Mason Forbes.
Harvard maintain its pressure on Yale’s end and took at 60-43 lead on a helicopter dunk by point guard Chris Ledlum, a crowd-inciting play that prompted Bulldogs’ coach James Jones to call timeout with 9:27 to play.
Harvard went ahead 72-53 when Baker converted a 3-point play with 4:18 remaining. The Harvard band had the final say, chanting “get on the bus” through garbage time.
“I thought Ledlum was terrific with his energy plays and I don’t just mean the 360 or whatever the heck it was dunk he had,” said Amaker. “He made the tough plays a team has to have and we feed off it.”
The opening 20 minutes was equal parts quality college basketball and fan-involved sports entertainment. The order of the Ancient Eight has designated Harvard vs. Yale its signature rivalry and both camps played to expectations.
The half included six lead changes, one tie, one sustained run and 3-ball at the buzzer. Yale contained Harvard’s inside game with aggressive defensive rebounding while the Crimson countered with six spectacular rejections.
Yale took it first lead, 12-10, on a 3-point play by Paul Atkinson at 14:39. The game settled into a back and forth affair when Azar Swain put Yale ahead 22-20 on a trey from off the key at 7:51.
Harvard closed out the half 16-10 surge to take a 36-32 lead at the break. Harvard junior forward Danilo Djuricic beat the clock with an NBA trifecta.