Crimson Prepares to Take On Killer Ps

One year ago, the Harvard men’s basketball team (15-3, 2-0 Ivy) was scrambling to find its identity.

With senior Kyle Casey and co-captain Brandyn Curry gone on a leave of absence, the Crimson’s lack of both depth and experience was evident during the nonconference season. Picked to finish second in the Ivy League coaches poll, Harvard had narrowly scraped by in wins against Dartmouth, Yale, Brown and Cornell before its first conference loss—a 15-point upset at Columbia. As the Crimson prepared to take on its most difficult weekend of the season—hosting Penn and Princeton at Lavietes—it was make-or-break for Harvard’s chance at the Ancient Eight crown.

Powered by the play of then-sophomore Kenyatta Smith, the Crimson swept both the Quakers and the Tigers with size and strength as an inside presence.Smith earned his first career double-double against Penn with 20 points and 10 blocks, and came back the next night with 14 points and six blocks against Princeton. The center went on to be an impact player for the team throughout the 2012-2013 season, with the homestand against Harvard’s southern foes as his breakout moment.

However, this season has been a different story for Smith. After being sidelined by an injury just five days before the start of the season, Smith sat out the first 17 games of this year’s campaign. Last Sunday at Dartmouth, Smith finally donned a uniform again, and played two minutes in which he missed his only shot from the field. Smith noted nothing but routine soreness after the game.

But the Crimson will have to contend against Penn and Princeton this year without the big man who drove the victories last season, as Smith will miss the rest of the season due to a re-injury he suffered this week in practice.

Welcoming Penn (4-11, 1-0) and Princeton (12-3, 0-1) to Lavietes Pavilion, Harvard will have a lot to prove. As the Ivy League season wound down last year, the Crimson went on the road and dropped back-to-back contests against Princeton and Penn. Though Harvard stayed in both games until the final seconds, the losses dropped the Crimson into second place in the conference, hurting the team’s chances to earn an NCAA Tournament bid. However, the Tigers went on to lose two in the final week of Ivy play, forfeiting the title.

Against both teams this weekend, Harvard will seek to control the three-point line against two balanced offenses. Princeton is led by senior guard T.J. Bray—who averages just over 17 points per game as one of six impact Tigers players shooting well above 35 percent from deep. Inside, senior forward Will Barrett anchors the Tiger attack, averaging nearly 12 points a game on 42 percent three-point shooting. Penn will look to sophomore guard Tony Hicks, who effectively shut down sophomore point guard Siyani Chambers in both of last season’s matchups, to carry the team. Hicks averages 15.5 points per game on 39 percent shooting from behind the arc.

“Overall we’ve been pretty solid, but [Princeton is] very, very good at shooting the three-point shot and it’s just a big part of their offense,” said Amaker, regarding the Tigers. “It’s clear that we have to defend the three-point line. ”

Last year’s leading duo of Saunders and Chambers has continued to make an impact, even with the return of Casey and Curry. The two guards lead Harvard in scoring with 15 and 11.5 points per game, respectively. However, with Casey and Curry back on the court, this weekend’s Crimson team will look markedly different than the squad that took the court in Harvard’s final road trip of the 2012-2013 season.

The weekend marks the beginning of Ivy League back-to-back play and the start of a four-game homestand for the Crimson.

“Our philosophy is that we try a lot of different things throughout the year so when it comes time to play a certain style of opponent and we don’t have a lot of prep time, we don’t need a lot of prep time,” Amaker said. “There will be a few things this week we will prepare for Penn, but we won’t talk about Penn or have anything to say about Penn until after Friday night.”

—Staff writer Cordelia F. Mendez can be reached at cordelia.mendez@thecrimson.com. Follow her on Twitter @CrimsonCordelia.

—Staff writer Hope Schwartz can be reached at hopeschwartz@college.harvard.edu. Follow her on Twitter @HopeSchwartz16.