Late Dartmouth Surge Downs Men’s Basketball in Pivotal Road Battle

Harvard men’s basketball team (7-13, 2-5 Ivy) headed to Dartmouth (10-10, 4-3 Ivy) Saturday afternoon looking to keep pace in the intensifying race for the Ivy Madness playoffs, but a late-game surge by the Big Green left the Crimson empty-handed.

Entering the game sixth in the Ivy League standings and one win behind the Big Green in fourth place, the Crimson needed a win to pull level with Dartmouth in the table. Instead, the team still trails Dartmouth and will have to find victories elsewhere to secure its place in Ivy Madness.

In the midst of a four-game road swing, Harvard split last weekend's results 1-1, defeating Columbia 90-82, before being outplayed in the second-half against Cornell and falling, 75-60.

Dartmouth jumped out to an early 6-0 lead, but freshman guard Robert Hinton and junior captain Chandler Piggé quickly resumed their scoring presence for the Crimson, scoring a rapid six points of their own and combining for 20 of Harvard’s first 25 points.

Hinton and Piggé have been pivotal for Harvard this year offensively, averaging 13.8 and 13.9 points respectively.

Last season, Crimson freshman guard Mailk Mack earned Ivy League Rookie of the Year honors after tying the conference record eight rookie of the week awards. After Mack’s transfer to Georgetown at the end of last season, Hinton has filled that scoring gap, already earning six rookie of the week awards himself.

After playing neck and neck with Dartmouth for most of the half, with six minutes left it looked like Harvard might have found the spark it needed to pull ahead.

Hinton hit his fifth jumper of the game, before the Crimson defense forced a travel on the other end of the court and got the ball to senior guard Louis Lesmond, who was waiting in the corner to sink Harvard’s first and only three of the first half.

Sophomore forward Thomas Batties II then stifled a second consecutive Big Green possession with a timely block, before running the floor to lay it home, for a 30-24 lead.

In a streaky first period, the Crimson next went on a 6-0 run to lead 31-24, before Dartmouth responded with a 9-0 run of its own to go into the half up two points, 33-31.

The tension continued in the second half when, by midway through, the Big Green led 48-46. The game seemed destined to go down to the wire.

That’s when things got ugly for the Crimson. Dartmouth roared into life, going on a 15-2 jolt to take control of the game 63-48, with six minutes to play.

Now facing an enthusiastic home crowd, things would get worse yet for Harvard, as the Big Green sank three after three. With less than a second on the shot clock at around the two-minute mark, senior forward Cade Haskins hit a one-footed buzzer beating three as he fell out of bounds, encapsulating Dartmouth’s unreal form and giving the Big Green a 22 point lead.

Harvard simply could not find an answer to the Big Green’s hot hand, and played out the rest of the game to a 76-56 loss.

“They are a really good shooting team,” said head coach Tommy Amaker after the game. “I thought we did some really good things to negate that in the first half and part of the second half. We couldn’t make ours when we needed to. I just thought when the dam broke, it really broke for them. I think they will be a tough out coming down the stretch for anybody.”

Although it was a mostly even matchup for the majority of the game, it was clear that the Crimson were without the personnel to match Dartmouth in rebounding, recording a 40-25 deficit at the end of the night.

Despite the loss, Harvard took care of the ball well, recording only six turnovers compared to the Big Green’s thirteen.

However, the Crimson weren’t able to capitalize on those possessions, shooting 3-of-23 from three point range compared to Dartmouth's 10-of-25.

Those shortcomings will likely be a focus for the Crimson as it returns home next weekend for its second back-to-back of the season, with a Friday night Valentine’s Day rematch against Cornell, before taking on bottom-of-the-table Columbia Saturday evening.

Harvard now sits two games back of the fourth and final Ivy League tournament spot, trailing Dartmouth and sitting level with Brown (10-10, 2-5 Ivy) who also lost Saturday, after Columbia (12-8, 1-6 Ivy) came back from 10 points down inside the final three minutes to secure its first win of the season, 74-72.

– Staff Writer Alexander K. Bell can be reached at alexander.bell@thecrimson.com.