Cardinals Trip Crimson, 75-68

Sometimes things get so bad on the road that even the dingy fourth floor of the IAB looks good. For the Crimson men's hoopsters, last night must have been one of those nights.

It's not that they got blown out. Instead, the Crimson just couldn't come up with that big point or that important offensive rebound, falling just short on an impressive second half comeback and losing to an unexpectedly strong Catholic University squad, 75-68.

Way down at the half, 45-30, the Crimson controlled the flow for much of the second half, pulling to within two points, 63-61, with just three minutes left in the game.

As the 1293 patrons in Catholic's Brookland Gym braced themselves to watch the Cardinals lose yet another last minute thriller, sophomore guard Geoff Mack hit two free throws with a minute left to put Catholic up by six, 69-63.

A baseline jumper by Catholic forward Joe Colletta cancelled out a tally by Crimson forward Joe Carrabino, but the yardling hit again to make the score 71-67, with 20 seconds left.

Two Colletta foul shots and a last second Mack jumper, sandwiched around a lone Tom Clarke free throw, brought the score up to the final 75-68 margin.

A couple of old Crimson problems spelled defeat. Perhaps hoping to take advantage of the Cardinal's reputation as a slow, methodical team, Crimson coach Frank McLaughlin opened with a man-to-man defense which had proven less than effective against Brandeis and MIT earlier this season.

The Cardinal's four corner attack--mobilized about five minutes into the game--spread out the Crimson defense and consistently opened up the passing lanes inside.

Catholic took advantage of the free lanes down deep to make some easy layups and six-foot baseline jumpers. Sharp perimeter shooting by Mack--nine for 14 and 23 points overall--helped pull Catholic up by the 15-point halftime margin.

Another old nemesis--lack of strong rebounding on the offensive boards--didn't make the Crimson's comeback any easier, particularly in light of Harvard's uncharacteristically poor shooting.

The Crimson ended up just 32 for 73 from the floor for 44 per cent, compared to Catholic's 56 per cent (29 for 52) clip.

If you don't count Carrabino's team high 11 for 13, 23-point performance, the Crimson shot an abysmal 21 for 60 from the floor.

Choke

Catholic's sagging zone defense effectively choked the Crimson's inside game, and coupled with the lack of offensive rebounding forced Harvard to the perimeter.

The Crimson sorely felt the absence of senior co-captain Tom Mannix, virtually the squad's only effective long-range shooter. Mannix is out for the rest of this week with two dislocated fingers on his right hand, and will not play against Holy Cross on Thursday (7:30, IAB).