Defense Leads Men's Basketball Past MIT in Season Opener

The personnel may have been different, but the plot was the same.

In a game against Division III MIT that marked the first collegiate start for four Crimson players, the Harvard men’s basketball team relied once again on its stingy defense to secure a 69-54 win.

After the Engineers opened the game Friday night at Lavietes Pavilion on a 10-0 run, Harvard clamped down defensively over the final 36 minutes of play, holding the Engineers to 44 points on 32 percent shooting.

“Certainly coming out of the blocks they put us in a hole, but I thought our kids settled in and dug in,” said Harvard coach Tommy Amaker, whose team responded to the 10-0 deficit with a 20-2 run. “We’re going to try and pressure and hopefully wear people down with how hard we play defensively.”

Harvard, which registered 10 blocks and nine steals, did enough on the other end of the court to maintain its lead, shooting 46.4 percent from the field and 40 percent from beyond the arc.

Three Harvard players finished in double figures with sophomore forward Jonah Travis leading the way, registering 14 points on seven shots in 21 minutes off the bench.

“I loved how Jonah Travis played. I thought he gave us a toughness, an energy, and a grit around the goal,” Amaker said. “He’s an undersized post guy for us, but he uses that to his advantage with quickness…. He’s a heart-and-soul kind of kid. He’s going to put on his hard hat and bring his lunch pail and put his work boots on.”

In his first collegiate start, sophomore Wesley Saunders scored 11 points before leaving the game with leg cramps late in the second half.

Junior co-captain Laurent Rivard finished with 10 points despite attempting his first shot with just 2:25 remaining in the opening half.

Senior point guard Mitchell Kates led MIT with a game-high 20 points, albeit on 6-of-16 shooting from the field.

Senior forward Will Tashman added 15 points and nine rebounds for the Engineers, who entered the season ranked No. 1 nationally in Division III.

MIT was without senior starting center Noel Hollingsworth—a Division III preseason All-American—who missed the game due to injury.

With the 6’9” Hollingsworth out, the Crimson controlled the post, outscoring the Engineers, 38-20, in the paint.

“They pushed us around a little bit,” said MIT coach Larry Anderson, whose team surrendered 12 offensive rebounds which turned into 15 second-chance points for Harvard.

The Crimson also had the edge in the backcourt, finishing with nine turnovers to MIT’s 18.

But Harvard struggled holding onto the ball in the early going, opening the game with four straight turnovers.

MIT took advantage, building its 10-0 lead behind the play of Kates, who knocked down a jumper, finished a layup, and hit a three-pointer on his first three shots.

Harvard co-captain Christian Webster entered the game for sophomore center Kenyatta Smith with 16:25 to go, which helped jump-start the Crimson offense.

The senior wing got to the free-throw line with 14:44 to go, giving Harvard its first points of the game off a pair of free throws.

On the Crimson’s next possession, Saunders found Webster under the basket, and the senior finished an up-and-under layup to pull Harvard within six.

Travis scored the Crimson’s next four points by cleaning up freshman point guard Siyani Chambers’ miss and finishing a layup off an entry pass from Webster.

Saunders evened the score on a transition basket with 10:36 to go, and Smith gave the Crimson its first lead one possession later with a hook shot.

Harvard extended its advantage to as many as eight in the first half and went into the break with a 31-26 lead.

“We had a little jitters,” said Saunders, who scored eight first-half points. “I think we just had to settle down and get into the rhythm of the game, and everything kind of worked its way out.”

The Crimson opened the second frame with a 6-0 run to go up 11, and its lead never dipped below six the rest of the way.

In his collegiate debut, Chambers finished with nine points, three assists, and two turnovers in 36 minutes.

Rivard was the only player to play more minutes for the Crimson, shooting three of seven in 37 minutes.

Also making his first career start, Smith recorded eight points, eight rebounds, and five blocks in 21 minutes.

—Staff writer Martin A. Kessler can be reached at martin.kessler@college.harvard.edu.