on the brink

allgame’s beloved lions launched their ivy league season with losses to cornell, yale and princeton. those are the three toughest teams in the league and the light blue managed to hang with each of them for better than a half. today they host the quakers of pennsylvania in perhaps the most important game of the year. we will quickly critique the three defeats before assessing their chances in saturday’s fraught contest.

brian earl’s big red is playing the best ball of his now seven year tenure in ithaca. the current squad stands at 14 – 3 overall with two of the losses coming to a tough, if not overwhelmingly fine, syracuse five and the golden bears of baylor who will likely make the ncaa tourney field. they play an up tempo, shoot first ask questions later offense. their frenetic pace is keyed by a trio of guards (chris manon, isaiah gray and nazir williams) who lead an aggressive man to man defense that turns opponents over frequently. though the team may lack a singular hero, coach earl has crafted an unselfish, all for one rotation that allows all his entire band to participate in the hunt. the lions found themselves dropped amid and fighting off this wolfish crew on january 10 sans their statistical leader, geronimo rubio de la rosa who nursed an injured hand. still, led by second unit guard kenny noland, the light blue raced evenly with their hosts on the ithaca hardwood through a first half that ended with them down four, 48 – 44. our heroes hung on through the second period and were down only 65 – 62 when blair thompson drained a trey with ten minutes remaining. four and a half minutes later they would pull within three once again at 71 – 68 when avery brown broke away for a dunk. here, at last, cornell pulled away behind two three pointers in thirty seconds by their eighth man, one keller boothby, and six straight free throws by nazir williams (who led all scorers with 24) down the stretch. the 91 – 79 final score belied the nip and tuck nature of the battle and almost directly reflected the big red’s ten free throw advantage.

from that frying pan the lions raced into the cauldron that james jones keeps aboil in new haven. while coach earl has labored to reenergize the hoops program in ithaca, coach jones has enjoyed the third decade of his tenure on the eli bench with repeated stints atop the ivy league during regular seasons followed by visits to the post season tourney. for thirty plus seasons the ancient eight was headed by the killer p’s of princeton and penn. the twenty first century has seen yale emerge as an ever present power. jones’s squads are defensively resolute, physically powerful in the paint and generally possessed of one or more three point marksmen who can break the heart of any team that has slowed yale’s attack inside. columbia entered the ancient, dark and, let’s be honest, slightly fetid atmosphere of newman arena on january 15 and gave their hosts hell for twenty minutes. the light blue trailed by 12 with nine minutes left in the opening period when john poulakidas hit a jumper in the paint to put the yalies up 25 – 13. seven minutes later though, the lions knotted it at 37 – 37 when blair thompson nailed a jumper in the paint of his own. the teams left for intermission with columbia trailing only 41 – 39. coach jones must have lectured convincingly during the break because his bully boys emerged to “play their best ball of the season,” according to the maestro. seven foot sophomore center danny wolf would tally 17 points while defying anyone who ventured near the backboard and grabbed 15 rebounds. wolf’s brutally efficient work down low was exquisitely matched outside by the aforementioned poulakidas. the 6’6″ junior guard drained five second half treys (on his way to a 7 – 9 performance from beyond the arc) and finished with 26 points for his evening’s work. the heart of this destruction was worked over a three minute span that saw the eli lead explode from six to nineteen points. columbia could not keep pace despite the fine efforts by kenny noland (17 points in place of the still injured gero rubio de la rosa) and zavian maclean who tallied 16. the 89 – 70 drubbing was the worst this team has absorbed since a similar nineteen point loss to providence on opening day.

the light blue had only another five days to shake that whipping off before they would play hosts to the defending league champeen princeton tigers. spearheaded by sophomore guard xavian lee, who currently leads the ivies in scoring, and his classmate 6′ 7″ forward caden pierce (allgame’s favorite baller in the league), mitch henderson’s team boasted a 14 – 1 record as they raced into levien. they have not slowed down since last spring’s exhilirating run to the ncaa sweet sixteen. they have demonstrated the validity of henderson’s decision to abandon the sanctities of the “princeton offense,” installed by the astonishingly great, physically diminutive, pete carril and honored by his heirs, for a more free roaming attack better suited to the era of the shot clock. henderson has made this change despite having executed carril’s system to perfection as an undergrad in the tigers’ ncaa tournament upset of a tough ucla club back in 1996. enough background. when lee and pierce can’t finish the job, the ball will find itself in the hands of upperclassmen blake peters or matt allocco who are always happy to launch a trey when required. this no nonsense efficiency on offense is complemented by a rugged but foul averse defense. they presented the lions with their toughest task to date. and when the tigers neatly executed one of those pick and rolls and drained a three pointer, while locking down columbia to start the game, a mismatch seemed to be in store. allgame and the other 2,306 fans were in for something far more entertaining than a rout. the light blue, particularly forward blair thompson, played terrific defense for the rest of the opening stanza. princeton rarely found room for an open three pointer and messr lee, in particular, struggled to live up to his statistical resume. caden pierce filled that deficiency by tallying 21 on the afternoon while snagging 10 boards. still, buoyed by the return of rubio de la rosa, the lions played their guests evenly after that opening five point salvo and left court at halftime down 37 – 32. nor would they experience the kind of let down they had in new haven during the second period. they tied the contest at 44 with 12:50 on the clock. six minutes later, though, they trailed by nine. yet again the lions rallied and pulled to within 64 – 60 with 3:39 still to play. during this giddy counteroffensive, messr rubio de la rosa produced a series of screamingly good acrobatic drives to the rim en route to going 7 – 8 for the day in the paint. his heroics were not to be fully vindicated, though, as princeton steadied and nailed down their hard fought 70 – 62 win at the free throw line where the tigers’ were gifted 11 more attempts tor the contest than our heroes.

having demonstrated what we already knew – that the lions are not yet one of the three best teams in the ivies – they prepare to take to levien’s hardwood this afternoon against steve donahue’s quakers. penn stands at 1 – 2 in league play. the philadelphians made last season’s ivy hoops tournament at 9 – 5, finishing third behind princeton and yale. coach donahue surely had high hopes of a return after this campaign, especially with the ivy scoring champ jordan dingle scheduled to return. the new landscape of college athletics intervened, however, and dingle departed for jamaica queens and the hardwood at st. john’s where rick pitino now presides. penn has replaced some of that departed fire power via first year tyler perkins who is providing 14.2 ppg. that is a substantial addition to the 17.4 dropped per game by senior clark sjachert who scores his three point attempts at an impressive .434 rate. the lion defenders who were so diligent versus the tigers will have to limit these two shooters if they are to prevail this afternoon. perhaps even more importantly, the trio of centers playing for coach engles – 6’6″ senior josh odonowu, 6’9″ soph jake tavroff and his classmate zine beddri who stands 6’10” – will have to outplay the penn center, the beefy 6’9″ senior nick spinoso who tallies ten points per game while grabbing better than seven rebounds. the lions must win the interior battle to take the game.

we don’t like touting particular contests as the game but today’s battle will determine if columbia has a realistic shot at fourth place in the ivies. penn and harvard are statistically slightly better than the lions right now. penn visits today and friday next columbia travels to cambridge. two straight wins will greatly reassure us that a programmatic corner has indeed been turned two straight losses and almost certainly we will be thinking “wait till next year.” no time like the present. go blue!! nuff said.

d up and peace out,

paulie b