Crimson Cagers Trim Big Red, 93-81

Collecting 17 points apiece and grabbing 15 and 14 rebounds respectively in their final home game for Harvard, Floyd Lewis and James Brown paced the Crimson to a 93--81 victory over Cornell Saturday night.

Coach Bob Harrison's squad overpowered the Big Red on the boards 64 to 30 en route to Harvard's 14th win against 10 losses. The win gave the Crimson a 7--5 Ivy mark as compared to Cornell's 0--12 record.

The Big Red, which now holds a 3--21 overall mark, kept close to Harvard in the first half, holding frequent two or three point leads before falling behind at intermission, 39--37.

Coach Tony Coma's squad, which consists of only seven players due to injuries, disputes, and ineligibilities, was simply outmanned, outgunned, and out-muscled by the taller and more talented Crimson.

Still, it is to Cornell's credit that the Crimson could not pull away from the Big Red until 11:53 of the second half when a nine-point splurge by Harvard put the men from Ithaca down 60--49, and out for good.

Inside Shooting

"In the second half we started getting the ball inside more and that's what we wanted to do," Harrison said afterwards. "We gave to our guys underneath and we got some better shooting. All and all I'm really sorry to see this group [the seniors] leave; they've taught me a lot about more than just basketball."

Harrison started the game with a senior unit consisting of Brown, whose 17 points pushed him into the second spot on the all-time Harvard scoring list, Lewis, Marshall Sanders, Jean Wilkinson, and Hal Smith.

At 6:49 of the opening half, with Harvard ahead, 27--25, Haarison inserted Jim Fitzsimmons, Ken Wolfe and Tony Jenkins in an effort to break away from the pesky Big Red.

Sports Illustrated

Coma's squad, which was featured in an article in the current issue of Sports Illustrated, would not cooperate and matched Harvard basket for basket until the Crimson's spurt to its nine point cushion in the second half.

Speaking on the article--which discussed racial schisms on his team--Coma said, "You bet it's a distortion. Just like an afterbirth is a distortion. They didn't play like they hated me, did they?"

Both teams finished the game shooting 43 per cent from the field, but the Crimson was able to get off 87 shots to Cornell's 78. Harvard had 22 turnovers to the Big Red's 19, but this was more than compensated by the Crimson's wide board superiority.