Crimson Madness to Showcase Long-Range Shooting

The Harvard men’s basketball 2014-2015 season will, fittingly, kick off with a shooting contest. The Crimson has historically been one of the nation’s best long-range shooting teams, ranking seventh in the nation in 2012-2013, when it stunned the New Mexico Lobos in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, and 39th last year.

The contest features one member of each class: sophomore Corbin Miller, junior co-captain Siyani Chambers, freshman Andre Chatfield, and co-captain Steve Moundou-Missi. Each member brings something different to the table. In a contest that has historically deviated from the script at the NBA level—Jason Kapono and Daequan Cook have three times as many combined wins as Ray Allen and Reggie Miller—anyone can win. With that in mind, here is a quick preview of each candidate.

CORBIN MILLER

The contest will represent Miller’s first court appearance for the Crimson since the then-freshman left after the 2011-2012 season for his Mormon mission. As a freshman, Miller was basically Steve Novak—lights-out from long range and shooting little else. The Utah native shot threes on nearly 75 percent of all his attempts, sinking a cool 45.6 percent. Much like departed senior and last year’s winner Laurent Rivard ’14—who roughly shot a mind-boggling seven threes for every two-pointer he attempted last year—Miller will be an important floor spacer for the offense this year.

SIYANI CHAMBERS

Chambers is the most interesting candidate in the contest. The two-time All-Ivy point guard has started since his freshman year and, following the departure of Brandyn Curry ’13-’14, he and returning Ivy League Player of the Year Wesley Saunders will be forced to shoulder the ball-handling duties for the offense. This means Chambers will play less off the ball, where he is very effective as a shot-up shooter.

The junior is also a high-variance shooter. Chambers made four or more threes in four separate games last year—including a stretch where he made 14 of 21 treys—but also started the year by making only four of his first 21 bombs. In this contest, where second is last, a high-variance strategy might not be such a bad thing.

STEVE MOUNDOU-MISSI

Talk about a sparse track record. Moundou-Missi, Harvard’s best rebounder and offensive finisher around the rim, took one three all of last year, against Brown with the shot clock running down. The senior forward has a feathery jump shot from 15 feet out and if he can extend his range out a couple feet, then he will be a factor here.

ANDRE CHATFIELD

Although only the seniors on campus have seen Miller play for Harvard, Chatfield is the big unknown heading into the contest. The 6’4” guard from Lilburn, Georgia was a highly regarded recruit when he committed to Harvard—along with fellow freshman Chris Egi—last fall. Luckily, there are some highlight tapes of the guard online—one of which features Chatfield draining three after three in an empty gym. Although there is obvious selection bias in there—Chatfield doesn’t miss a shot the entire way—one notes that Chatfield has what his teammates call ‘nerd swag.’ Sounds like a winner to me.

—Staff writer David Freed can be reached at david.freed@thecrimson.com.