Men Cagers Sweep Past Columbia, Cornell

This weekend may have had a Friday the 13th, but for the Columbia and Cornell men's basketball teams, it was more like a Nightmare at Briggs Cage.

In a sweep of Ivy League rivals, Harvard topped the Big Red, 76-69, last night after taming the Lions, 83-64, Friday night.

With the pair of wins, the Crimson (6-8 overall, 2-1 Ivy League) moved into a second-place tie with Yale in the league, one game behind undefeated Dartmouth.

"After all that we've been though, I couldn't be happier about being 2-1," Harvard Coach Pete Roby said. "We were down there for a while with everyone struggling, but we worked to find the answers because we knew we were a good team. Now, we're playing a lot better and we're coming out on the winning side."

The Crimson haunted both Columbia and Cornell with strong defense, forcing 38 turnovers, while committing only 21. The squad also shot better than 50 percent from the field on the weekend.

Harvard got outstanding play from its top three guards, Co-Captain Mike Gielen, Ralph James and Dana Smith.

After struggling from the field for most of the season, Gielen fired in 40 points on the weekend on 13-for-22 shooting, including a game-high 24 against Columbia. In addition, Gielen nailed nine of his 14 three-point attempts.

James dominated the first half against the Big Red and finished with a team-high 18 points. James also scored 14 against the Lions.

And Smith came off the bench last night to tie a career high of 13 points after scoring 10 on Friday. The sophomore also had 11 assists in the two games, while making only four turnovers.

Last night, the Crimson faced a tougher battle from the defending Ivy champion Big Red (3-8, 0-2). Cornell had a 69-68 lead with two minutes remaining in the game, but Gielen nailed a three-pointer to put Harvard up.

Cornell Coach Mike Dement called a timeout, but a freak play handed the ball and the momentum back to the Crimson.

The Big Red took too long coming out of the huddle after the timeout, so the referee put the ball on the ground and started counting for a five-second violation. Afraid he was going to run out of time, Cornell guard Monte Boykin ran over and tried to inbound the ball quickly, but instead threw it wildly out of bounds.

"We took the timeout in order to set things up offensively and try to get the ball inside to [forward Mike] Pascal," Dement said. "It was a two-point game at that point. That was a big turnover."

After getting the ball back, Harvard scored the last five points of the game, all on foul shots.

Against Columbia (4-9, 0-2) on Friday the 13th, a solid Harvard defense jinxed the Lions into playing poorly. Led by Smith's 10 first-half points and sparked by Columbia's turnovers, the Crimson went on a 16-2 run in the last four minutes of the half to take a 12-point lead, 40-28.

Behind Gielen's fiery three-point shooting in the second half, Harvard stretched its lead to as many as 22 points.

Following exams, the Crimson will host Dartmouth in Briggs Cage on January 31 at 7:30 p.m.