#3 Yale 73, #2 Harvard 71: Bulldogs Win Youth Battle

Let’s start with that Miye Oni dunk. If you’re reading this, you’ve almost surely seen it already, but you’ll click below to watch it again, because it was that good. Giving credit for the circumstances — 1:30 left in a one-possession game, national TV on Championship Week, and a chance to play for an NCAA tournament bid on the line — I’d wager that it was the biggest dunk in Ivy League history. Continue reading “#3 Yale 73, #2 Harvard 71: Bulldogs Win Youth Battle” →

#1 Princeton 72, #4 Penn 64 (OT): Stephens’ Putback Saves Tigers

The Princeton Offense is known for several things: Passing, cutting, shooting, spacing, you name it. One thing it is decidedly not known for is offensive rebounding. So it’s funny that the three biggest plays of the Tigers’ season have been second chances. The biggest of all came Saturday at The Palestra, where Myles Stephens picked up Amir Bell’s errant layup and dropped it through the net with six seconds left, sending the first men’s Ivy League Tournament game ever to overtime. Continue reading “#1 Princeton 72, #4 Penn 64 (OT): Stephens’ Putback Saves Tigers” →

Ivy Tournament Not Just About Princeton-Penn

(Please read Kevin Whitaker’s excellent previews on Penn-Princeton and Yale-Harvard before proceeding:)

Wide-eyed and full of smiles, the Brown women’s basketball team arrived at The Palestra with their phones in hand to take in everything about their experience at the inaugural Ivy League Tournament Friday.

The Ivy League tried to make their tournament a bit unique by setting up The Palestra for open practices (like the NCAA Tournament does) the day before the controversial proceedings begin tomorrow. As you’d expect, most of the attention has gone to the men’s side of the draw, mostly the 237th all-time meeting between Penn and Princeton Saturday afternoon, which should have a near full house for one of the most storied college basketball rivalries in America.

What can be wrong with that? Well, depends on your perspective. In any other year, undefeated (in Ivy play) Princeton would be sitting around waiting for Sunday night to see where (likely as a No. 12 or No. 13 seed) they would try to continue the Ivy’s run of NCAA Tournament upsets next week. Now, they face a sometimes dangerous Penn team on its home floor, and if they get past that, possibly an in-form Harvard team that the Tigers barely defeated twice this season.

Continue reading “Ivy Tournament Not Just About Princeton-Penn” →

Ivy League Tournament Preview: #3 Yale vs. #2 Harvard

Harvard and Yale have a lot of similarities. Both are among the nation’s least experienced teams, looking nothing like the squads that played in the last Palestra playoff two years ago. Both rely on athletic, highly touted underclassmen, and their best days are still ahead of them. But as they enter the first Ivy League Tournament, the rivals are going in very different directions. Continue reading “Ivy League Tournament Preview: #3 Yale vs. #2 Harvard” →

Ivy League Tournament Preview: #4 Penn vs. #1 Princeton

To steal a phrase from Joe Sheehan, the least important words of any preview are the last ones. As is customary, I’ll make a prediction at the bottom, but we know Championship Week is a crapshoot; the value of a preview is in setting the stage and showing how the game will be decided. Continue reading “Ivy League Tournament Preview: #4 Penn vs. #1 Princeton” →