Cagers Open Ivy Slate Tonight

The Harvard men's basketball team concluded the pre-season portion of its 1986-'87 schedule on a positive note earlier this week by defeating Holy Cross, 75-69.

With the victory, the Crimson snapped a two-game losing streak and kept in tact its perfect home mark in '86-'87, raising its overall record to 5-6 on the year.

But as far as the Crimson is concerned, its record--as of this morning--is 0-0. That's because the real season, the league season, begins tonight at Briggs Athletic Center.

This is the time of season when the Ivy League turns to its annual two month round-robin tournament in which each Ancient Eight will face the seven others twice.

Fourteen of the Crimson's remaining 15 games of the season are against Ivy opponents.

So throw out your five wins, and throw out your six losses. The real season commences tonight when Harvard hosts Penn (7:30 p.m.) in the 1987 Ivy opener for both schools.

The Quakers (1-6) enter tonight's match-up as one of the league's preseason favorites, while the Crimson has been picked to retain its cellardwelling status of a year ago.

Harvard, averaging a whopping 85.7 points per game, is led by Co-Captains Keith Webster and Arne Duncan. Webster, a senior guard, is averaging a team-high 15.5 points per game on the year, and he leads all regulars in free throw accuracy (89 percent) and three-point baskets (30).

After missing all of last season, Duncan has returned to lead the Crimson in minutes played (364), field goals made (63), rebounds (50), assists (58), and steals (26). The Chicago native poured in a career-high 29 points in a losing effort at Boston College earlier this year, and is averaging 15.2 p.p.g.

Much improved over last year is junior forward Kyle Dodson, who leads Coach Pete Roby's squad in field goal accuracy (58 percent) and is third in both scoring (12.6 p.p.g.) and rebounding (46).

Guard Kevin Collins (7.5 p.p.g.) and center David Lang (7.2 p.p.g.), both sophomores, round out Harvard's starting five. Bill Mohler and Mike Gielen have been the most productive cagers off the bench.

The Quakers are led by senior center Bruce Lefkowitz, who tops Penn in scoring (16.3 p.p.g.), rebounding 7.0 r.p.g.), minutes played (239), and both field goal and free throw percentage (57 and 74 percent respectively).

Helping out Lefkowitz are seniors Perry Bromwell (13.1 p.p.g.) and Chris Elzey, junior Tyrone Pitts, and sophomore John Stovall. Penn and Harvard split last year's two meetings, though the Quakers own a 90-20 lead in the all-time series.

Tomorrow night, the cagers will entertain Princeton, which swept Harvard a year ago and held the Crimson to a mere 87 total points in the two meetings.

The Tigers (6-4) are led by Alan Williams (15.3 p.p.g.), sophomore guard Bob Scrabis (14.5 p.p.g.), and senior guard Joe Scott (12.1 p.p.g.).