Moving On and On The Move: Less Clemente, M. Hoops Goes Run 'n Gun

Kyle Wente is alive and well, starting at guard for the Princeton Tigers. But his ghost continues to haunt the Harvard men’s basketball team.

The date was Feb. 10, 2001. After his 29 points lifted Harvard to a historic victory over Penn the night before, Dan Clemente hit a crucial jumper to put Harvard ahead of Princeton 67-66 with seven seconds left to play. But on the next trip down the floor, Wente hit an awkward, off-balance three-pointer at the buzzer, sending the Crimson into a tailspin. Harvard dropped its next four games and fell out of the running for the Ivy League title.

Ten months later, the Crimson is 4-1 through its first five games. So why does this shot continue to haunt Harvard hoopsters?

“A loss like that hurts. I’m not going to lie. Things just fell apart,” junior guard Brady Merchant said.

Indeed, Harvard’s subsequent collapse was perhaps more painful than the loss itself.

“It had a lot to do with mental toughness, mental focus,” junior guard Elliott Prasse-Freeman said. “After a really emotional loss like that, a championship-caliber team bounces back and dusts itself off and comes back the next day. Not to say we didn’t have guys who really wanted to win, we just didn’t have the mental toughness. We let it slip just enough to let it spiral in on itself.”

Clemente—Harvard’s captain, its go-to guy and the school’s third all-time leading scorer—has since graduated. But while Clemente, the heart of last year’s team, is gone, the Crimson is hardly a Tin Man.

“We obviously miss Dan—he was a great scorer, a great leader to have on our team,” Harvard captain Andrew Gellert said. “By the same token, everybody’s a year older, more experienced, and we’ve got [senior center] Tim Coleman back. We’re playing well as a team, that’s what’s important. I don’t want to compare ourselves to last year.”

Harvard veteran guards Patrick Harvey, Gellert and Prasse-Freeman have more than enough talent and resolve to put last year’s late-season woes behind them. The backcourt trio is Harvard’s main offensive weapon and the glue that holds the team together.

“Having three guards provides a matchup problem for other teams,” said Harvey, a 5’10 junior from Chicago, Ill. “It allows us to create opportunities for our frontcourt as well.”

Long-range shooting will remain a big part of the Crimson offense. Last year’s squad set a school record with 203 treys, leading the Ivy League in three-point percentage. Harvey led the way with a superb 41 percent from behind the arc, while Prasse-Freeman and Merchant were close by at 37 and 36 percent respectively.

But the Harvard guards aren’t the only Crimson players who can hit from long-range—Harvard’s big guys can shoot as well. Senior center Tim Coleman, who sat out last season, hit 11 threes in the 1999-2000 season, and junior forward Sam Winter has also shown some capability from outside.

“The fact that our big guys—Sammy and Timmy—can both shoot threes, means that all our starting five, and our first guy off the bench—Brady [Merchant]—are really good three-point shooters,” Prasse-Freeman says. “That means that even if there’s a shot blocker or even if they clog the lane on us, we’re hopefully able to dissect defenses that way.”

Still, Harvard knows that threes alone cannot win championships.

“If you live by the three, you die by it as well,” Prasse-Freeman says. “We need to go inside more. We need to get to the foul line more. We need to be more aggressive.”

Aggressiveness on defense has never been a problem for Gellert, who has led the Ivy League in steals the past two seasons. The Harvard senior is on pace to eclipse the school record of 213, held by Mike Gielen ’89. This season, however, Gellert will be asked to take on a bigger role offensively.

“For Harvard to do well, everbody on the court’s got to be a legitimate threat to score,” Gellert said.

Prasse-Freeman, Harvard’s point-guard, will also be called upon to put points on the board. Prasse-Freeman led the Ivy League in assists as a freshmen and sophomore, but increased his scoring output last season, averaging 9.8 ppg. Prasse-Freeman rebouds well and plays solid defense, though he has been plagued by turnover problems. His 1.7-1 assist-to-turnover ratio was one of the worst in the country. Holding on to the ball will be crucial if Harvard’s offense is to be succesful.

Most important among Harvard’s point producers is Harvey. Though Coach Sullivan insists that “we don’t really have a go-to-guy,” it seems likely that Harvey will be called upon to take the Clemente-type shots. Harvey, a terrific free-throw shooter, has shown signs of being up to the task. He hit two crucial free throws with 3.6 seconds remaining in a 79-78 win over Dartmouth, a buzzer beater to down Hartford 80-78 and had four points in the final 10 seconds to lead Harvard over Columbia 66-61. He’s already demonstared his scoring prowess early this season, as he currently leads the team in scoring with 19.6 ppg.

Merchant will again be called upon to provide a lift off the bench. He’s averaging 6.6 ppg as Harvard’s sixth man so far this year. Freshmen guards Jason Norman, Kevin Rogus and David Giovacchini may see some minutes as well, though the backcourt is already crowded.

“It’s a tough group to crack, when you’ve got four experienced guys in the backcourt,” Sullivan said.

Harvard’s frontcourt will also look to contribute. Leading the way will be the 6’8 Coleman. Though Coleman sat out last season, he looks to be a big factor this year. He’s in the best shape of his life and is scoring and rebounding effectively.

Junior Brian Sigafoos emerged as an effective center in the second half of last season. Though bothered by foot injuries, the 6’11 New Jersey native adds much needed size to a small Harvard lineup.

Winter and freshman Graham Beatty will also see some action. Sullivan has high hopes for the 6’8 Beatty, Harvard’s most athletic forward.

“He shown tremendous energy to compete for the basketball around the rim,” Sullivan said.

Sullivan will look to put different combinations in at frontcourt, even utilizing Sigafoos and Coleman on the floor at the same time. Harvard’s big men run the floor surprisingly well.

“It’s such a blessing to have kids in the frontcourt who can move up and own [the court] and do it so quickly,” Sullivan said.

In addition to replacing Clemente offensively, Harvard will be looking to improve on its effective but erratic defense. Last year’s squad led the Ivies in turnover margin (+2.6) while setting up mostly in a tough man-to-man. When asked about Harvard’s task for this season, Sullivan was clear about the team’s goals.

“We have to improve our defense significantly,” said Sullivan. “What happened during [last year’s five-game losing streak] revolved around our inability to score... [and] our defense in each of those games wasn’t really good enough to get us over the top.”

Sullivan also mentioned rebounding as an area for improvement.

“Our defensive rebounding numbers were fair, they have to improve,” Sullivan said.

Solid defense will help bail out streaky Harvard shooting. Even when Harvey—the team’s best shooter—hit only 3-of-12 against Fairfield and 3-of-10 against Stony Brook, the Crimson defense held on to win those games. Harvard has held three of its first five opponents under 40 percent from the field this season.

“Our thinking [on offense] gets back to defense—creating easy baskets for ourselves, creating offense from our defense, creating more posessions by being a good defensive rebounding team. I think those things can help negate the whole component of times when shooting can be fickle,” Sullivan said.

In a league traditionally dominated by Princeton and Penn, Harvard finds itself in the middle of the pack. Brown and Columbia both have candidates for Player of the Year: Bears guard Earl Hunt may be the top player in the league and the Lions’ Craig Austin is last year’s award winner. Harvard may not have an individual to compare with those two, but as a unit they should be able to make some noise.

“Strange things can happen—I know they haven’t [in the past],” Sullivan said.

Gellert and Harvey are more optimistic.

“Our goal at the beginning of the year is to win the Ivy League championship, and it’s a legitimate goal,” Gellert said. “We’ve been in the games against the top teams the last couple of years, and we’ve won games against the top teams. All it’s going to take is the consistency to win on the road, which we haven’t been able to do,” he added.

“We have the talent to be in the hunt,” Harvey added. “The Ivy League is pretty wide open. Anybody can beat anybody.”