Crimson To Face Crosstown Rival

The five games remaining on the non-conference schedule for the Harvard men’s basketball team run the widest gamut possible: from the cellar of collegiate hoops to the highest tier in the land.

Over the upcoming weeks, the squad will travel to No. 7/9 UConn on Dec. 22 and then host lowly Monmouth a week later.

On New Year’s Eve, MIT—a Division III program—will visit Lavietes Pavilion before the Crimson heads to Boston College Jan. 5.

The wide range of match-ups—in which Harvard will be either a heavy favorite or underdog—makes tomorrow afternoon’s contest against Boston University (4-6) an even more crucial test for the Crimson (6-2) before it begins Ivy League play next month.

“Just being able to regroup in practice and come out and play well is pretty important for our team,” junior co-captain Oliver McNally said. “Obviously we want to win, but we just want to play better as a team, and BU gives us a chance to do that.”

Hoping to avenge a 78-70 loss suffered to Harvard last November, the Terriers will enter Lavietes Pavilion fresh off a heartbreaking 84-81 defeat by La Salle Thursday evening.

The team’s leading scorer at 17 points per game, senior wing John Holland had a rough night coming off the bench, picking up 15 points and three assists against the Explorers.

“Holland is such a fierce competitor and an attacking scorer—very much a player that we’re very concerned with,” Crimson coach Tommy Amaker said. “He just has an aggression about him that puts you on your heels a lot, so we need to make sure we play him before he gets the ball.”

Arguably the top player in his conference, the two-time swingman poured in a team-high 18 points in BU’s loss to Harvard last year.

The Terriers’ main force down low is junior Jake O’Brien, a versatile big man averaging 11 points and six boards a contest.

Junior guard Darryl Partin, a transfer from La Salle, has also been a solid offensive contributor alongside Holland and O’Brien. He had a team-high 20 points to go along with six rebounds and five assists against his former team Thursday.

Nabbing a second consecutive victory against its crosstown rivals will be no easy task for Harvard—now without guard Jeremy Lin ’10, who keyed his team to a win over BU last year with an outstanding 16-point second half performance.

After reaching the semifinals of the postseason College Basketball Invitational last year, the Terriers were selected as the preseason favorites to capture this year’s America East title, in what is coach Pat Chamber’s second year at the helm.

Most notably, BU carries on its resume a nail-biting home win over Cornell two weeks ago but has fallen on the road to Northeastern and Bucknell this season.

Regardless of the caliber of its opponent, Harvard will have its own goals in mind, as it aims to rebound from an underwhelming performance against WPI on Tuesday evening.

After falling in a narrow road loss to Michigan last Saturday, returning home turned out to be more difficult than expected, as the Crimson proved unable to convincingly put away its Division III visitors. Boosted by McNally’s game-high 20 points and sophomore guard Christian Webster’s 17, Harvard ultimately came away with the 69-54 win—not to mention several areas to improve upon.

“Defensively, I think we need to be better—just staying in front of the ball,” McNally said. “And rebounding—we didn’t do a good job of either those two things.”

A big boost on both ends of the floor could come in the form of sophomore star Kyle Casey, who did not play against WPI and saw only seven minutes of action at Michigan due to a virus.

Amaker said that Casey—the league’s reigning Rookie of the Year—practiced Thursday afternoon and that he was hopeful he would be available tomorrow.

Harvard’s other front-court mainstay, junior co-captain Keith Wright, will attempt to have his way inside against O’Brien, who at 6’8 is the tallest player in the Terriers’ regular rotation. Look for Chambers to utilize a four-guard lineup versus his hosts, which will counter with plenty of backcourt firepower of their own.

Hot-shooting freshman Laurent Rivard, who was named league Rookie of the Week, not to mention McNally and Webster, will all have the green light to fire away as they try to lead Harvard to its seventh win of the year.

—Staff writer Dennis J. Zheng can be reached at dzheng12@college.harvard.edu.