Men's Basketball Upends Cornell in Final Minute

Sophomore forward Evan Harris banked home a layup with eight tenths of a second remaining in the game to give the Harvard men’s basketball team a stunning 65-64 win over Cornell at Lavietes Pavilion.

Just 24 hours earlier, the Crimson (10-10, 3-3 Ivy) had been blown out by Columbia, but on this night, the game was close throughout and it would be Harvard that made the final play.

After Big Red guard Louis Dale made one of two free throws with 8.6 seconds left to give his team a 64-63 lead and cap a 6-0 run, Crimson sophomore guard Drew Housman drove the ball up the court. With his main option, captain Jim Goffredo, covered, Housman went right and dished the ball to Harris, who converted the baseline layup.

“We were running a double screen for Jimmy,” Housman said. “I saw it was clogged on that side, so I took it to the right side. I knew there wasn’t that much time left, so it was either try and shoot a fadeaway shot over a big guy, or try and get it down low to Evan, and thank God it went through [the defender’s] legs and he was able to score.”

“I don’t know how he got the ball through, but he threw it and I just saw the ball and put it up as fast as I could,” Harris added. “Luckily, there was enough time left.”

Cornell (11-9, 4-2 Ivy) still had a chance to win, as forward Ugo Ihekweazu’s long inbounds passed found guard Ryan Wittman open well behind the three-point arc. But the fadeaway shot by the Ivy League leader in three-pointers bounced off the right side of the rim.

A breakaway dunk by Harris after a steal by Housman gave Harvard a 63-58 lead with 2:16 remaining, but the home team would not score again until the final second. A jumper by forward Alex Tyler, a free throw by forward Andrew Naeve, and a jumper in the lane by Dale with 55 seconds left, sandwiched around two Crimson turnovers, tied the score at 63.

After Housman missed a long jumper that Tyler rebounded with 33 seconds left, Cornell was able to settle for the final shot. Dale was fouled by Goffredo on a drive with 8.6 seconds left.

Before Dale went to the line, Harvard coach Frank Sullivan called a timeout, both to ice Dale and draw up the winning play.

“We knew with eight seconds we could get a number of things out of it,” Sullivan said. “It could be a three, it could be a two. It’s just a play that we run.”

Dale missed the first attempt, but made the second, leading to Housman and Harris’s heroics.

Harris had one of the better games of his college career. Just one night after he struggled with foul trouble against the Lions and recorded only five points and three rebounds, the sophomore put up game highs of 18 points and 10 rebounds for his second career double-double.

“I think he was extraordinarily disappointed with how he played last night,” Sullivan said. “To his credit, he came in and not only made the play at the end of the game, but also made plays early in the game with his rebounding and deflections.”

Dale led the Big Red with 15 points, while Tyler added 14 and seven rebounds.

One day after allowing Columbia to score 54 points in the first half, the Crimson held Cornell to half that and took a 34-27 lead into the locker room at intermission.

Harvard then scored the first seven points of the second half, taking a 41-27 lead with 18:08 left after a three-point play by Housman, and appeared poised to break the game open. But it wouldn’t score again until the 11:33 mark when senior forward Brian Darcy hit two free throws. In the meantime, the Big Red went on a 15-0 run to seize the lead.

“I’m just glad we had a 14-point cushion when they went on that run, because it could have been a lot worse,” Housman said. “But we’ve weathered runs before, we’ve gone on runs ourselves. We know it would go back and forth the rest of the way.”

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