Early Lead Proves Enough for Victory

The Mountain Hawks made like the pheonix and rose up from the ashes on Saturday afternoon, but their resurgence was not enough to overcome an early deficit.

The Harvard men’s basketball team (2-3) jumped out to a 22-point first-half lead at Lavietes Pavilion against Lehigh (2-5) and held off the second-half charge of the Mountain Hawks for an 83-75 win.

Senior center Brian Cusworth led the Crimson (2-3) with 20 points while sophomore guard Drew Housman added a season-high 18.

Junior forward Brad Unger had 11 points off the bench and sophomore guard Andrew Pusar scored a career-high 10 points. He also had four of the team’s 15 offensive rebounds.

Last week’s Patriot League player of the week, senior guard Jose Olivero, paced the Mountain Hawks (2-5) with 15 points but was only 5-of-17 from the floor.

Trailing 41-22 at halftime, Lehigh scored on eight of its first nine possessions to start the second half. Twice, the Mountain Hawks made it a two possession game early in the period, the latter occasion at 51-45 with 14:18 left.

“I thought Harvard really did a great job of setting the tone with their level of intensity, and we had to respond,” Lehigh coach Billy Taylor said. “In the second half, we came out and played at a much higher intensity level. It got us back into the game, the hunger and passion that we showed.”

Harvard responded with a layup from Cusworth, who completed a three-point play on the next possession after he was fouled while draining a long jumper with the shot clock expiring.

On Lehigh’s next trip, Crimson senior forward Brian Darcy blocked Olivero, one of seven blocked shots by the home team, and then added a jumper on the other end. The Crimson would go on a 17-5 run to make it a 68-50 game with 8:50 left, the last two baskets coming off putbacks from Pusar.

The Mountain Hawks did not go away, however, as they answered Harvard’s run by outscoring the hosts 16-4 over the next seven minutes. But when it looked like Lehigh would cut the lead to four, Crimson captain Jim Goffredo stepped up.

After Olivero stripped Unger, he fed senior guard Kyle Neptune on the fast break. But Goffredo, who struggled offensively, scoring a season-low five points, got between Neptune and the basket and drew a charge.

“[Goffredo] did a good job all night on defense,” Harvard coach Frank Sullivan said. “His matchup with Olivero was more important than him scoring points. He didn’t have the offensive game he is capable of, but he stayed within the game. He didn’t force anything and that was a big plus for confidence for everybody. When things weren’t going well, it could have been ‘rife-shot Jimmy.’ He didn’t do that.”

Housman then beat the Lehigh press and scored on a layup, making it an eight-point game.

The Mountain Hawks would cut the Crimson lead back to six on two more occasions, the latest with 52 seconds left in the game and the score 77-71.

Harvard would not let Lehigh get any closer, though, as the Crimson made seven straight free throws to close out the game, including four from Unger. Harvard was 25-of-32 from the free-throw line for the game.

“There was some sloppy play in the second half, but we were still in a position to put the game further away from the Mountain Hawks by getting to the free-throw line,” Sullivan said.

Harvard never trailed in the game. Leading 14-11 midway through the first half, it went on a 22-6 run to take its largest lead of the season to date when it went up 39-17 with 1:31 remaining in the half.

The team shot 51.6 percent from the floor on the way to a 19 point halftime lead.

One reason for the Crimson’s success on the offensive end was that for the first time all season, Harvard had more assists than turnovers.

Harvard had 14 assists, including 10 in the first half, and only 13 turnovers on the game. Housman led the team with four assists.

“In the first half, the ball moved better, more guys had touches, we finished more plays, came in at halftime with a very good assist-to-turnover ratio,” Sullivan said. “[The ratio] has to be 1-to-1. It has to be.”

—Staff writer Ted Kirby can be reached at tjkirby@fas.harvard.edu.