AROUND THE IVIES: Men's Basketball Travels to the Killer P's

UPDATED: January 30, 2015, at 2:05 a.m.

So we meet again, dear Around the Ivies reader.

Last we parted, the Crimson was traveling to Yale with a chance to sew up its fourth consecutive league title. Harvard would wrap up a historically dominant 13-1 Ivy League season with consecutive road victories over Yale and Brown before advancing to the third round of the NCAA Tournament, where it took a brief second half lead against Michigan State before falling late. Yale reached the finals of the CIT—a notable accomplishment for a team that hasn’t made the Dance since 1962.

Two games into conference season, the teams appear to have swapped roles. Harvard (11-5, 1-1 Ivy) began the season in the top-25, prompting some exuberant undergraduates to pronounce them the best mid-major in the country. Since, it put forth an underwhelming nonconference season before giving up a 26-2 run to Dartmouth Saturday to drop out of the top two in the league for the first time since 2009. Yale (13-6, 2-0), meanwhile, knocked off defending champion Connecticut in December and came back last weekend to knock off Brown at home and move into first place. Tuesday, Joe Lunardi slotted the Bulldogs into his bracket for the first time this year.

Princeton (8-9, 1-0) —which holds a losing record—rounds out the top three; were the standings to continue, it would be the sixth consecutive year the three teams finished in the top four. Dartmouth and Columbia simmer in a tie for third, dark horses with their share of weaknesses. For the Big Green (8-8, 1-1), it is a lack of outside shooting beyond sensational guard Alex Mitola and a new ban on hard alcohol. For the Lions (9-7, 1-1), the missing presence of Alex Rosenberg—who withdrew from college after breaking his foot in the fall—looms large for a team whose best player is best known as “Chairman Maodo.”

Cornell, Penn, and Brown round out the standings—each with fundamental flaws. The Big Red (9-9, 1-1) has an excellent defense but a poor offense, with few prolific three-point shooting threats beyond Robert Hatter. The Bears (9-10, 0-2) are tough inside, but shaky on the perimeter. The Quakers' (5-10, 0-2) Ivy opener—more on that later—prompted a local column that suggested coach Jerome Allen may be on the hot seat. Of course, 10 months ago members of the Penn women's lacrosse team were reported to be defacing local bars—stealing alcohol, breaking furniture, and, most offensively, tipping less than four percent on a $1300 tab. On-court concerns seem secondary.

Amidst all this upheaval—and, well, debauchery—the Ivy League is a solid 15th in Jeff Sagarin’s conference ratings. At the time of year where small sample sizes have fans overreacting—West Virginia is great! Look out for Georgia!—nobody has separated themselves from the pack in the Ivy League. The 14-game tournament often has the unpleasant side effects of killing teams’ title hopes by the fourth week of the season; this year, no team looks to be the clear juggernaut Harvard was last year, when it blazed a path through the league General Sherman would have been proud of.

Without further ado, onto the action, boss.

BROWN at CORNELL

Perhaps the most underappreciated team in the Ivy League is the frisky Big Red. Since starting a Cornell-like 2-4, the Big Red has won seven of 12 and were three points from sweeping Columbia earlier this year. Previous columnists in this space have opined we should kick them out of the Ancient Eight, but I have a soft spot for the Big Red.

Pick: Cornell

YALE at COLUMBIA

Two years ago, this column saluted Yale forward Brandon Sherrod for not quitting the game of basketball after Harvard senior Wesley Saunders embarrassed him with a SportsCenter Top Ten-quality posterizing. Sherrod saw our ante and three bet under the gun, quitting basketball last May to join Yale’s most exclusive a capella group, the Whiffenpoofs—whose name was chosen, to nobody’s surprise, by a man referred to as ‘Goat’.

If Yale chokes away the Ivy title in what Sherrod noted “is supposed to be THE year”, I’m officially naming this the Brandy Goat Curse. It’ll be like the one that plagues the Cubs, only with much more hard liquor and sweater vests.

Pick: Yale

DARTMOUTH at PENN

The Quakers’ first Ivy League contest of the year was fitting. Up 15 at archrival Princeton, Penn blew its best chance at ending a six-game road losing streak to the pesky Tigers. For a team that finished in the top three eight consecutive times at the beginning of the century, the Quakers’ quick fall from grace makes Lindsay Lohan’s twenties look gradual by comparison.

However, Penn snapped a 12-game losing streak to Big Five opponents Sunday with a win over St. Joe’s, prompting The Daily Pennsylvanian columnist Riley Steele to note that “it’s hard not to feel some sort of positive emotion”. If Penn wins again here, ol’ Riles might even approach what the rest of us call ‘excitement’.

Pick: Dartmouth

HARVARD at PRINCETON

Since 2009, neither of these teams has finished worse than third in conference play. The two do it in different sides of the floor; watching Princeton’s beautiful cutting offense attack the suffocating Crimson defense is basketball at its best. Last year, Harvard won in Jadwin Arena for the first time in a quarter century despite the efforts of Spencer Weisz, who had 12 points and seven rebounds. The sophomore, who leads Princeton in scoring this year with 13.1 points a game, will look to join a history of successful Princeton guards with a history of beating up on the Crimson. In fact, many of this legion, including David Blatt, John Thompson III, and New York Knicks GM Steve Mills, have gone on to have very successful basketball careers post-graduation.

Well, scratch that last one.

Pick: Harvard.

BROWN at COLUMBIA

I expect roughly the same things from this game and this weekend's senior class First Chance Dance: a poor two-hour showing of missed chances, poor footwork, and inability to finish that sets the tone for a semester of extended nostalgia and day drinking.

Pick: Columbia

YALE at CORNELL

The stats tell us that this is the conference’s best team going against arguably its top player—Cornell forward Shonn Miller, who leads the league in defensive win shares. Unfortunately for Cornell, the Big Red have had roughly the same amount of success recently defending their home court that Tom had chasing Jerry.

Pick: Yale

DARTMOUTH at PRINCETON

A week into the new year, The Dartmouth reported that 64 students have been implicated in a cheating scandal for a class titled “Sports, Ethics, & Religion.” The class was targeted to student-athletes, who made up just under 70 percent of the total enrollment. I’m going to avoid the temptation to make jokes about cheating in an ethics class. Especially because, with Dartmouth professors suggesting we celebrate the kids who didn’t cheat instead of focusing on the ones who did—roughly analogous to spending Hall of Fame conversations talking about Jeff Francoeur and not Barry Bonds—the jokes here all write themselves.

Pick: Princeton

HARVARD at PENN

This contest looms as a classic trap game for the Crimson. Although Harvard waxed the Quakers by a combined 50 points in its two meetings last year, this year’s Crimson has not proved it deserves the plaudits of last year’s edition. Harvard has already dropped winnable contests to Holy Cross, Boston College, and Dartmouth after fading late, holding on by the skin of its teeth against Bryant and Vermont.

Penn has the horses to give Harvard trouble, however. The Quakers boast a strong frontcourt headed by junior Darien Nelson-Henry—a punishing body down low and the unofficial captain of last year’s All-Ivy Facial Hair Squad. Two years ago, a similar Crimson squad lost here to put its Ivy League title hopes on the brink. If Harvard loses Friday, it may find itself in a similarly desperate situation.

Pick: Harvard

—Staff writer David Freed can be reached at davidfreed@college.harvard.edu.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

CORRECTION: January 30, 2015

An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that Yale won the CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament in 2014. In fact, Yale reached the finals of the tournament.