W. Hoops Enters Ivy Play With 8-4 Record

It’s time to bring on Dartmouth.

The Harvard women’s basketball team closed out its pre-Ivy schedule in style by winning three of four games over winter break, most recently a 75-69 win at home over Manhattan on Jan. 2. The Crimson (8-4) now enters tomorrow’s Ivy opener against Dartmouth at 6 p.m. with its best pre-Ivy record since 1998.

Freshman center Reka Cserny added an exclamation point to Harvard’s last victory by scoring 33 points—the most any Crimson player has had in a single game since current WNBA mainstay Allison Feaster ’98 scored 35 in Harvard’s upset of top-seed Stanford in the 1998 NCAA tournament.

After the game, Cserny turned her thoughts to her first taste of Harvard-Dartmouth, Ivy women’s basketball’s greatest rivalry. The last Harvard-Dartmouth Ivy opener at Lavietes two years ago attracted over 2,000 fans and the team hasn’t had a better home draw since.

“The whole team is really excited about that game,” Cserny said. “I’m sure it will be a great game because we’re playing better and better every game.”

Dartmouth (4-6) has been headed in the opposite direction of the Crimson. Though the Big Green has four consecutive losses entering tomorrow’s game, the team has put up impressive numbers individually. All-Ivy junior center Katharine Hanks is averaging a league-best 22.1 points and 9.6 rebounds per game and junior guard Keri Downs has netted 17.7 ppg—third-best in the Ivies—and shot 47.1 percent from behind the arc.

Harvard Coach Kathy Delaney-Smith praised Hanks’ versatility and Downs’ improvement but expects that the Crimson can more than match their scoring with sophomore forward Hana Peljto (20.6 ppg) and Cserny (16.4 ppg).

“We have to come ready to defend those two players [Hanks and Downs],” Delaney-Smith said. “I would rather try to stop Hanks and Downs than Reka and Hana. That’s a little tougher challenge.”

The Crimson’s opponents’ challenge of stopping Cserny and Peljto hasn’t been getting any easier either. Although the pair together is averaging 37 ppg, their output has been continually improving. After being limited to 26 points in a 66-62 win over Northeatern on Dec. 15, the pair scored 35 in a 78-66 loss to Syracuse on Dec. 20, 43 in a 67-44 win over Bucknell on Dec. 30, before draining 55 in Wednesday night’s win over Manhattan.

The improvement has belonged to Cserny in particular, as she has been making the adjustment to Harvard basketball after years of playing in Europe.

“She is just getting her comfort zone, getting better and better every game I think,” Delaney-Smith said.

Harvard 75, Manhattan 69

What makes Cserny’s 33-point effort particularly impressive is that she pulled it off despite having to sit out the last nine minutes of the first half with foul trouble.

So in what has become a commonplace occurrence this year, Harvard struggled without Cserny in the lineup in the first half but dominated the second. A 24-12 lead after 10 minutes became a 39-31 halftime deficit as Cserny sat on the bench, but the Crimson outscored the Jaspers 44-30 the rest of the way.

“Unfortunately teams go at her and she gets two quick fouls and I have to sit her,” Delaney-Smith said. “I wanted her for the second half. We were only down by eight and that was within our reach.”

Cserny got most of her scoring from behind the arc in the first half, where she shot 4-for-4, and on the charity stripe in the second half, where she shot 9-for-9. The 33 point total bested her career-high by six.

“I think I’ve become more comfortable with the style that we play here,” Cserny said. “The teamwork is much better so it is easier to score and rebound.”

Cserny’s effort matched the eighth-best single-game scoring performance in Harvard history. The seven above her all came from Feaster. But Feaster never scored 30 points in a game as a freshman.

The place where Harvard struggled the most against Manhattan was on the offensive glass. The Crimson had just one offensive rebound during the first half. One Jasper player, Rosalee Mason—the nation’s fourth-leading rebounder as of Dec. 17—singlehandedly grabbed eight offensive rebounds, as many as the entire Harvard team.

“We have kids who go to the boards but we don’t have kids who box out as consistently as they should,” Delaney-Smith said. “So we’re trying to fix that.”

The only other major negative has 19 Harvard turnovers. That hardly washed out the positives. Harvard shot an impressive 23-for-25 from the line, and Peljto, who scored 22 points, was 10-for-10 herself. Senior guard Jenn Monti, who leads the Ivies in assists, scored nine clutch points and dished out nine assists to just two turnovers.

Harvard 67, Bucknell 44

Cserny and Peljto put up nearly identical statistics on Sunday in a dominating 67-44 victory against Bucknell at Lavietes Pavilion. Cserny scored 22 points on 9-of-15 shooting and grabbed eight rebounds in 30 minutes. Peljto scored 21 points on 9-of-14 shooting and pulled down nine boards in 31 minutes.

To put the duo’s performance in perspective, Bucknell, as a team, was 16-for-55 from the floor. Peljto and Cserny were a combined 18-for-29.

“Reka is such a great addition to team,” Peljto said. “She makes everyone else on the floor look better and makes my job a lot easier.”

Harvard raced to a 38-21 lead at the half, paced by Peljto’s sharp shooting and Cserny’s inside prowess. Peljto began the game on fire, hitting her first four shots including one three-pointer. At one point, Cserny scored 10 points in a row for Harvard, including three put-back lay-ups.

Bucknell did not have a player on its roster who could match up with Cserny in the paint, and Delaney-Smith expects that her star freshman should continue to wreak havoc on opponents when the Ivy season begins. Cserny had three blocks and six steals in the game on the defensive end, both career highs.

“I think [Reka Cserny] is better than Allison Feaster was when Allison was a freshman,” Delaney-Smith said. “Reka is very talented on both offense and defense. We knew we had an edge if we went inside, and she took advantage.”

In the second half, Harvard’s defense took over, preventing a potential Bison comeback. Sophomore guard Dirkje Dunham played sensational defense all game on Bucknell’s star scorer Molly Creamer. Dunham held Creamer to only 13 points on 5-of-18 shooting, nearly six points less than Creamer’s 18.9 ppg average entering the contest. Sophomore forward Tricia Tubridy grabbed 12 rebounds and junior forward Kate Ides showed flashes of brilliance, connecting on two beautiful inside baskets that halted Bucknell’s momentum before any damage could be done.

“Bucknell is a much more talented team than they showed,” Delaney-Smith said. “I have to credit our defense, especially Dirkje’s job on Creamer. Dirkje has done a great job jumping into the starting lineup. She makes few errors on offense and is a great defensive presence.”

Delaney-Smith ended the game by granting playing time to freshman Katie Murphy and senior Sharon Nunamaker. It was Murphy’s first varsity experience, and she is currently tied for the national lead in field goal percentage, connecting on her only shot for her first two points in a Harvard uniform.

“Katie Murphy did a nice job, and I find it very difficult to play all of our players,” Delaney-Smith said. “That’s the number one challenge for me right now, to keep everyone on the team confident in their abilities by spreading the playing time.”

If the Crimson continues to hold opponents to 29 percent shooting while getting 43 points from the Peljto-Cserny combination, Delaney-Smith will have the opportunity to play everyone and rack up the victories at the same time.

Syracuse 78, Harvard 66

SYRACUSE, N.Y.—While the snow fell outside Manley Field House in Syracuse on Dec. 20, the Crimson shooters had a hard time getting anything to fall when it counted.

Harvard was up 44-40 with 14:52 left but could not widen that lead over the Orangewomen. Syracuse (6-3) fought back and capitalized on Harvard miscues to eventually pull out the victory, 78-66.

Harvard was led once again by Peljto, who finished the game with 23 points and 11 rebounds, for her third double-double this year. She led the Crimson in scoring for the eighth time in ten games. Cserny, her partner in points, added 12 of her own and pulled in eight boards.

“They are a very-well coached team,” said Syracuse Coach Marianna Freeman. “Their post players [Peljto and Cserny] are very good. We were very impressed.”

The Orangewomen were led by a balanced scoring attack, as six players scored more than eight points. Leading the way for Syracuse was Jazmine Wright who had 18 points and 5 boards while Chineze Ngwabo put up a double-double, 16 points and 11 boards.

Coming out of the locker rooms after the intermission, the Crimson went on a hot streak, drawing the Orangewomen to within striking distance. Harvard went on a 13-5 run to take a 44-40 lead with 14:52 to play in the contest.

The game would stay very close with many lead changes down the stretch. Peljto made a layup with 11:05 to play, giving the Crimson a 48-46 lead. But after a free throw by Syracuse’s Shannon Perry and a three-pointer by Wright, Syracuse went back up, 50-48, and Harvard would never lead again.

The Crimson was able to tie the game 52-52 with 7:40 left to play after junior center Sarah Johnson recorded a steal and dished to Peljto for a jumper. Syracuse then took advantage of turnovers by Dunham and Johnson to take a 56-52 lead with 6:04 left.

Harvard was outrebounded on the offensive end, 14-13, but Syracuse was able to pull down the most important boards, getting more than its fair share of second-chance opportunities.

“They had too many offensive rebounds,” said Harvard Coach Kathy Delaney-Smith. “I didn’t feel we boxed out as well as we could have.”

Harvard’s game seemed to unravel around the two-minute mark. On the inbound pass, the ball flew over a jumping Peljto’s head and into the Syracuse side of the court. Julie McBride, the Big East’s leading scorer, grabbed the ball and laid it in for a 66-58 Syracuse lead with 1:53 to go.

The next Crimson trip down the floor resulted in a turnover and McBride, a 93-percent free-throw shooter was fouled once again. Sinking both ends of the one-and-one, she pushed her team’s lead to 68-58.

After the sloppy turnovers around the two-minute mark, Harvard would make a few last-gasp efforts to get back in the game but could never get any closer than seven after a three-pointer by junior Laura Barnard with 1:12 to go closed it to 71-64.

At the break, the ’Cuse held a firm 35-29 lead over the Crimson on the strength of Nwagbo’s first half ten points and five rebounds. The Crimson couldn_t seem to come up with an answer for Nwagbo who dominated the defensive area below the basket for Syracuse.

The difference in the first half was Syracuse’s ability to control the ball. The Orangewomen turned the ball over two times in the entire first half, as compared to Harvard’s ten giveaways.

With Nwagbo patrolling the area under the hoop, the Crimson was forced to push the ball outside and take some longer range shots. Harvard put up 16 first-half threes, making six of them. Both Monti and Peljto notched two treys before the first-half buzzer and kept the Crimson in the ball game at the break.

Harvard was hurt by the absence of Cserny for much of the first half. She received her second foul less than eight minutes into the game and was forced to the bench for precautionary reasons. It was the second straight game that Cserny had suffered foul trouble early in the first half.

Harvard 66, Northeastern 62

BOSTON, MA—Harvard came back from a 16-point late first-half deficit to defeat Northeastern 66-62 on Dec. 15.

The Crimson, who had defeated Rhode Island four days earlier despite an eight-point halftime deficit, acknowledged that it can’t expect to continue that pattern all season.

“We won’t win bigger games if we don’t play a full game,” Monti said. “What we did today, you can’t do that against Penn or Dartmouth.”

Harvard trailed Northeastern (1-6) 46-33 at halftime but outscored the Huskies 33-16 in the second half and limited them to just 19.2 percent shooting. Northeastern sophomore forward Melissa Kowalski, who exploded for 20 points in the first half, was held to just two points in the second half.

“We have a tendency to start slow with a lack of defensive intensity,” said Peljto, who scored a team-high 16 points. “This is typical of every game we play. We’re going have to learn to pick it up before the Ivy season begins.”

Fittingly, Harvard took its first lead of the afternoon on a rebound and putback by Tubridy, whose 12 clutch rebounds and 14 points kept the Crimson in the game. That lead, which came with 7:29 left, was bolstered by three-pointers from Monti and Peljto, who added another outside jumper with three minutes left to extend the Crimson lead to 63-56.

The Huskies cut the deficit to 64-62 on a third-chance layup with 21 seconds left, but the Crimson played out the remainder of the game to perfection. In an impressive display of keep-away, Peljto, Tubridy, Dunham and Cserny cycled the ball around the perimeter as the Huskies tried in vain to foul. Dunham was finally caught, but not before 19 seconds had run off the clock. Her two free throws iced the game.

Dunham, who started in place of injured co-captain Katie Gates for the second game in a row, also hit a crucial coast-to-coast layup in the final minute of the first half to cut the peak Husky lead of 16 down to 14.

Peljto and Cserny, who both posted career-high scoring totals in combining for 55 points on Tuesday, scored just 26 together against the Huskies. Cserny struggled with foul trouble and played just seven minutes in the first half. Peljto was not her usual sharp self and was held scoreless for the first 13 minutes of the game before heating up.

With Peljto and Cserny having average games offensively, Monti and Tubridy stepped up. Monti, who had just five three-pointers entering the game, hit four three-pointers on seven attempts. The rapid change in Monti’s production was likely the result of a conversation she had with Delaney-Smith.

“We have these meetings,” Delaney-Smith said. “I said, ‘Jenn, I like your shot. You don’t take bad shots and you’re very accurate. But for some reason that’s gone south this year. I like you when you’re open to take the shot.’ And so she did it, and it worked.”

Three of Monti’s treys came in the first half and kept Harvard in the game while Cserny and Peljto were being kept off the scoreboard. By proving herself to be a three-point threat, she freed up room for the post players inside.

“[Delaney-Smith and I] had a little talk about all the pressure Hana and Reka are getting in the posts,” Monti said. “I always thought it was a better-percentage shot near the posts, but when I’m wide open, I need to shoot and open things up for them. I wasn’t really being guarded in the first half.”

Defensively, Harvard played a mixture of zones and man-to-man in the first half. Neither worked.

Delaney-Smith thought the Crimson was allowing easy baskets outside. The Huskies shot 6-of-12 behind the arc in the first half but just 1-of-7 in the second half.

“I wasn’t happy with any defense we were playing,” Delaney-Smith said. “I did stay man-to-man in the second half because their three-point shooters were hot. We needed to play better defense on their three-point shooters, and we did in the second half.”

Northeastern Coach Willette White said she was thoroughly disappointed with her team’s lack of intensity in the second half.

“Maybe [my players] felt good about their lead, but I sure didn’t,” she said. “I think we played into their hands.”