No. 25 Harvard Men's Basketball Tops Monmouth in Close Contest

WEST LONG BRANCH, N.J.—Things haven’t come easy of late for the No. 25 Harvard men’s basketball team, which has struggled to outplay most of its opponents over the past month. That trend continued Tuesday night, as the Crimson once again found itself in a dogfight against what, on paper, should have been a vastly inferior team.

But just as it has all but twice this year, Harvard (14-2, 1-0 Ivy) emerged with a win, hanging on for a 70-61 victory over Monmouth (3-14, 1-3 NEC) in a game in which the Crimson never trailed but also struggled to find a consistent rhythm.

Just like three-win Dartmouth had two days earlier, the pesky Hawks gave Harvard all it could handle on its home court before the Crimson could pick up its program-record 13th non-conference win.

“We thought they were a lot better than their record indicated, and we knew coming in how difficult this was going to be,” Harvard coach Tommy Amaker said. “I’m pleased that when the pressure was on for our kids in late-game situations, in making shots and getting stops, we came through.”

Harvard went into the break with a 36-25 lead and opened up a 13-point advantage ninety seconds into the second half after a three by sophomore Laurent Rivard—starting for the first time this season in place of injured junior Christian Webster—and a layup by co-captain Keith Wright.

But from there, Monmouth began to chip away at the Harvard lead, going on a 20-7 run to tie the game at 50 midway through the period. Back-to-back threes by Austin Tillotson and Jesse Steele—who led Monmouth with 16 points—cut the Crimson advantage to four at the 15:30 mark and got the home crowd into the game.

Freshman Wesley Saunders responded with a layup off a great pass from Rivard, but Tillotson then assisted Dion Nesmith on a jumper, and Nesmith returned the favor next time down to cut the lead to 48-46.

“Give them credit,” Wright said. “They played their tails off here. They’re a scrappy team.”

Co-captain Oliver McNally subsequently airballed a long ball at the other end, and Marcus Ware tied the game at 48 for the Hawks with short hook over junior Kyle Casey. After junior guard Brandyn Curry missed a three-point try, Wright grabbed the offensive rebound and found Saunders to give Harvard back the lead. But a Steele layup tied the game again.

“They played incredibly hard,” Amaker said. “Got down double-digits and certainly made a run at it. We had our hands full from tap to buzzer.”

The squads went back-and-forth for the following three minutes, with Monmouth unable to take advantage of a number of chances to pull ahead. A jumper by Mike Myers-Keitt cut the Harvard lead to one at 57-56 with 6:27 to go, but Curry responded with a layup and a three to push the visitors’ lead to six.

McNally took over from there, going a perfect 8-for-8 from the line on Harvard’s next four possessions to ice the Crimson victory down the stretch.

“He’s a guy we want at the foul line in really critical situations,” Amaker said. “Oliver being a senior, being a co-captain and a player that’s done that for us throughout his career—that’s exactly what we wanted.”

Meanwhile, Steele and Nicholas turned the ball over on back-to-back possessions, and the Hawks hit just one more shot from the field—a Steele three—the rest of the way.

“You can’t simulate some of these critical pressure moments in practice,” Amaker said. “Should we be in those positions for a tight, close game? Should we have done things a lot better and sooner to maybe not be in that spot? That’s something we’ll look at and answer honestly, but if we are [in those spots], certainly we want to see if we’re tough enough and have enough composure to make the plays necessary to put us in position to win, and we did that tonight.”

The Crimson had a far easier time in the first half with the Hawks, with three Rivard long balls helping Harvard open up a 16-8 lead early in the game.

“If our three-point shooters are hitting, that’s going to open up things inside for me and vice versa,” Wright said. “When you have that balanced attack, I think we’re a hard team to beat. Laurent hitting those three threes early was huge for us.”

“We haven’t shot the ball particularly well from the perimeter this season,” Amaker added. “To have [Rivard] get some early ones to go down like that I think gave us a great deal of confidence.”

A Ware put-back layup capped a 7-1 Monmouth spurt and tied the contest at 17, but Wright responded with a layup off an offensive rebound and six straight points by freshman forward Steve Mondou-Missi stretched the lead back to 25-19 moments later.

A 7-0 Crimson run later in the half extended the advantage, and Saunders ended the period by driving left baseline, leaping, and finishing over his shoulder with an acrobatic reverse layup to give the Crimson an 11-point lead heading into the break.

“I thought Wes gave us very, very good minutes,” Amaker said. “I thought Steve’s minutes were not many but very efficient while he was in there.”

Wright would finish with his best game of the season, registering 18 points, 15 rebounds, and six blocks one week after struggling to get anything going in the Crimson’s upset loss to Fordham.

“We went inside and were able to score,” said Rivard, who finished with 16 points. “Keith had a really good game; that’s something we didn’t have against Fordham.”

Wright said part of that success came from the inspiration of a former teammate.

“Jeremy Lin [’10] sent me a text after that Fordham game, just reminding me 'you’re a senior, you’re a Player of the Year, you’ve got to attack, you’ve got to play like it,'” Wright said. “That kind of woke me up a bit, just being able to hear him, a guy I respect and look up to a lot—it really changed my mindset. I attacked practice like I did here tonight, and it just carries over.”