Women's Basketball Keeps Columbia From Its First Ivy Win

Despite its top two scorers combing to shoot 5 for 21, the Harvard women’s basketball team topped Columbia, 68-56, Saturday in New York.

While co-captain Brogan Berry and sophomore Christine Clark struggled from the field, they made up for it from the charity stripe, making all 14 free throws they attempted. The rest of the team was just as perfect from the line, as the squad finished 21-21 on the day. Never before had a Crimson (11-8, 4-1 Ivy) squad been perfect on more than 15 free throw attempts.

Clark led the squad from the stripe, going 12 for 12. In doing so, the sophomore tied the program record for best single-game free-throw shooting performance. Despite shooting 4 of 15 from the field, her free-throw excellence propelled her to a team-high 21 points. Junior Victoria Lippert added 19, and junior Elle Hagedorn finished with 11 coming off the bench.

Columbia was led by sophomore Courtney Bradford, who tallied 17 on the night. Junior Tyler Simpson contributed 15 and Melissa Shaffer had 11, but it wasn’t enough to keep up with the Crimson.

Harvard grabbed an early 5-0 lead but couldn’t hold it as the Lions (2-17, 0-5) stormed back to tie the game at five. There were five more ties during a tightly contested first half before the Crimson went on a 9-0 run to end the period to go up, 32-23.

Coming out of the break, Harvard succumbed to an offensive lull in yet another game as the Lions clawed back into a 37-37 tie. Before a Clark layup six minutes into the half, the Crimson was shooting one of five with four turnovers in the period.

“That’s something that we are not happy with,” Harvard coach Kathy Delaney-Smith said. “We’ve done everything to try to address that particular ‘M.O.’, and we will just keep working until we find that answer.”

During that stretch, Harvard prevented more damage from being done by playing stingy defense, as Columbia began the half shooting two of eight from the field.

“We did a lot of changing defenses and making adjustments, and they worked,” Delaney-Smith said. “We had to switch our defenses a lot to shut them down. Hats off to our team for doing that.”

With the game tied at 37, the Crimson rediscovered its offense just in time. Hagedorn nailed a three-point shot and finished an old-fashioned three-point play to fuel an 18-7 run that ended with the Crimson leading, 57-44. Harvard never faced another scare as it coasted to a 68-56 finish.

On the night, Hagedorn provided key points as the team’s stars faltered.

“Miriam [Rutzen] has been doing that at times. Emma [Golen] has been doing that at times. Last night, it was Elle who did it for us,” Delaney-Smith said. “They are capable of doing some damage. We are trying to get the other players to realize they are scorers as well.”

Berry finished with only five points, just her third single-digit outing in her last 14 matchups

“She’s a pretty unselfish player. She’ll put on her assist hat at times,” Delaney-Smith said. “She’s too good of a shooter to stop shooting. Teams come in and put their best defender on her…and try to wear her down. She loves to get the big assist, so if she misses a few, she will get a little too generous when I think she can shoot more.”

Even without the consistent scoring of the Crimson captain, the squad posted one of its most complete performances to date. For the first time in 2012, Harvard outscored its opponent in both halves on Saturday. The team has now won six of its last eight and appears to have hit its stride in the middle of Ivy League play.

The Crimson currently sit in second in the Ancient Eight at 4-1 in conference and will have a chance to claim the No. 1 spot when Princeton comes to town on Saturday. Next weekend, the Crimson will also get two chances to tally its 300th conference win and become only the second Ivy League member to reach the milestone.

—Staff writer Jacob D. H. Feldman can be reached at jacobfeldman@college.harvard.edu.