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roywhite
01-07-2009, 09:28 PM
http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/recap?gameId=290070103

Great win for Tommy Amaker and his team. First win ever for Harvard basketball over a ranked team.

Richard Berg
01-07-2009, 09:37 PM
So, Amaker > Roy?

mgtr
01-07-2009, 09:40 PM
So, Amaker > Roy?

Well put!!!

TillyGalore
01-07-2009, 09:43 PM
I have never been more proud of this alma mater!!!

Go Crimson!!!!! Woo hoo!!!!!!

CameronBornAndBred
01-07-2009, 09:45 PM
Congrats to Tommy, was fun to watch their scores scroll across the screen tonight.

Cameron
01-07-2009, 09:50 PM
Awesome win for the school (Harvard's first ever victory over a ranked opponent) and for Tommy. Although the Crimson are only 7-6 after tonight's win, this type of signature win over a ranked Atlantic Coast Conference team can do wonders for confidence. Hopefully Harvard avoids a flop next game and builds off this.

Once again, a good night for Duke Basketball all around.

eddiehaskell
01-07-2009, 09:55 PM
Just another example of nothing being guaranteed in college basketball.

Carolina undefeated? BC said no in UNC's first conference game.
BC under rated? Not so sure after getting trounced by Harvard.
Carolina a shoe in for the national championship? Lets play the game...

DukePA
01-07-2009, 10:30 PM
http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/recap?gameId=290070103

Great win for Tommy Amaker and his team. First win ever for Harvard basketball over a ranked team.

Go Crimson!!! GTHC!!

KenTankerous
01-07-2009, 11:07 PM
Just another example of nothing being guaranteed in college basketball.

Carolina undefeated? BC said no in UNC's first conference game.
BC under rated? Not so sure after getting trounced by Harvard.
Carolina a shoe in for the national championship? Lets play the game...


Geeze, if this were football, Louisville would be playing Princeton for the National Championship next Thursday.

bulldog44
01-07-2009, 11:36 PM
So, Amaker > Roy?

I thought that was an already known fact. ;)

calltheobvious
01-07-2009, 11:40 PM
Just saw the highlights ESPN managed to scrape up from this game. Floor-level camera angle, so you could get a good idea of the level of quickness, or lack thereof. Ugh. Great win for Tommy, but OMG, BC should be able to roll out of bed at 3am and beat a team that slow of foot. There are let-downs, and then there's Harvard-BC, now in a league by itself.

calltheobvious
01-08-2009, 12:16 AM
Okay, so I forgot Chimanade.

JasonEvans
01-08-2009, 09:52 AM
This is a really bad loss, one which could easily come back to haunt them come March.

I mean we are talking about an Ivy League team. The Ivy is one of the two or three worst leagues in all of Division 1. When lower-level teams in the Southern Conference and the Metro Atlantic are looking for guaranteed wins, they turn to the Ivy. Arrrggghh!

Harvard was 7-6 coming into this game with losses to William and Mary, Rice, Northeastern, Boston University, and others. They did have a win over a decent Santa Clara team, but still...

BC was 13-2 coming into this game and had a very respectable ranking in the computers and the such. The Eagles are likely to be firmly on the bubble come March. This game is going to look quite bad on their resume at that time.

--Jason "for more info on a very related story, click here!! (http://www.dukebasketballreport.com/forums/showthread.php?p=238725#post238725)" Evans

jv001
01-08-2009, 09:57 AM
Congratulations TA..To me this makes unc look even worse, but what can I say. I hate unc. Go Duke!

CameronBornAndBred
01-08-2009, 11:19 AM
Reminiscent of one of Tommy's first wins at Harvard when his new team took down his old one, Michigan.

roywhite
01-08-2009, 11:26 AM
This is of course a big upset, but it sounds like Tommy is getting together a pretty good team at Harvard. I recall reading about him having success in recruiting, though I think one verbal commitment went elsewhere when there was controversy about his admission.

During our broadcast last night, Jeff Van Gundy commented that he worked at a summer camp where there were several Harvard players and he was shocked (in a good way) about their level of talent.

Love to see Tommy win the conference and get the team to the NCAA Tournament.

Olympic Fan
01-08-2009, 11:44 AM
This is of course a big upset, but it sounds like Tommy is getting together a pretty good team at Harvard. I recall reading about him having success in recruiting, though I think one verbal commitment went elsewhere when there was controversy about his admission.

That would be Frank Ben-Eze, a 6-9, 225-pound forward from Nigeria, who played prep basketball in Arlington, Va. He committed to Harvard but failed to qualify for admission. He enrolled at Davidson (must be a real dummy! :))

You might have noticed Ben-Eze last night -- he played briefly (less than a minute) against Duke ... just long enough to pick up a foul (he rank over Henderson after a defensive rebound), He's been a bit player for the Wildcats this season as a freshman, but should play a lot more in the future.

Edit: I had to jump back an add ... Harvard has a chance to win the Ivy this season. They are one of two Ivy teams to enter conference play with a winning record (9-6 Cornell is the other). Cornell is the favorite in the Ivy, but Harvard is the second choice.

Remember, the Ivy does not have a postseason tournament, so keep up with the regular season standards. The two key games: Feb. 13 -- Harvard at Cornell; Feb. 28 -- Cornell at Harvard.

Go Tommy!

Classof06
01-08-2009, 11:57 AM
Bad, bad loss for BC. Even if you are on a high after beating UNC, you have to be able to beat Harvard.

I thought it was just a bad loss until I saw the highlights and realized that it was a home game for BC. That made it even worse.



That being said, I'm happy for Amaker. Leave it to a Dukie to finish what a Tar Hole can't :D

miramar
01-08-2009, 12:05 PM
I am sure that BC had a hangover after the Carolina win, but Harvard deserves a lot of credit. Apparently Tyrese Rice had three points with four minutes remaining, and I'm sure that will never happen again (he finished with 14).

Their recruiting should get a boost since Harvard has put together a whole new financial aid package where families earning $60K pay nothing, while those making $120-$180K pay 10% of their income for tuition. While that's not the same as a full athletic scholarship, I am sure that a lot of recruits would be willing to pay more for a Harvard degree.

CameronBornAndBred
01-08-2009, 03:25 PM
Here is a good article (http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601079&sid=awWthQ5f6OpA&refer=home) on how Amaker reacted to the win and some comments from him. One interesting item that stood out to me was the following statement.
"Harvard has never won an Ivy League title and has made just one trip to the National Collegiate Athletic Association tournament." (They went in 1946)
Ok, so if they have never won the league title, then how did they get in the tourney? I would not think any Ivy League team would be able to earn an at large bid.

Olympic Fan
01-08-2009, 04:21 PM
[URL="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601079&sid=awWthQ5f6OpA&refer=home"]
"Harvard has never won an Ivy League title and has made just one trip to the National Collegiate Athletic Association tournament." (They went in 1946)
Ok, so if they have never won the league title, then how did they get in the tourney? I would not think any Ivy League team would be able to earn an at large bid.

The NCAA was an eight-team at-large tourney from 1939 to 1950. Conference championships had less to do with selection than backroom politics. If Harvard got in, it was as an at large team. Conference titles had no bearing.

In 1939, when Clemson won the Southern Conference title (the only conference championship in their history), Wake Forest was picked to represent the SC in the first NCAA Tournament.

In 1941 when Duke won the SC championship, UNC got the NCAA bid. The same thing happened in 1946 -- the year UNC lost to Oklahoma A&M in the finals ... Duke actually won the SC title that year.

There were 11 "major" conferences at that time, so not every conference got a bid every year. The NCAA field was selected regionally. Region three included the Southern Conference and the SEC. Some of Ev Case's best teams at NC State -- top 10 teams -- didn't get NCAA bids because Kentucky was better (these were the Fab 5 Kentucky teams).

The whole thing blew up in 1950 when both State and Kentucky were top 5 teams. They were both so good that Virginia AD Gus Tebel, the head of the region's selection committee suggested that State and Kentucky stage a play-in game. Case agreed, but Rupp -- pointing out that his team was the two-time defending national champion -- refused. State got the bid and finished third in the 1950 NCAAs.

The next year, they doubled the NCAA field to 16 teams and awarded 11 automatic bids to the 11 major conferences at that period. From that point, a conference championship meant something and conferences were allowed to select their representatives (10 conferences picked their regular season champs; the Southern picked its tournament champ ... a tradition the ACC followed when it was formed two years later).

Even then a few teams got in that weren't at large or conference champions -- Duke made its first NCAA trip in 1955 when ACC champ NC State was on probation.

I don't know the exact circumstances behind Harvard's one NCAA bid in 1946, but they were 20-1 entering the tournament. Not sure how they failed to win the Ivy title, but it seems to be a fairly well-justified bid.

jv001
01-08-2009, 04:26 PM
Thanks Olympic for that information. Very interesting. Go Duke!

crimsondevil
01-08-2009, 05:22 PM
"Harvard has never won an Ivy League title and has made just one trip to the National Collegiate Athletic Association tournament." (They went in 1946) Ok, so if they have never won the league title, then how did they get in the tourney? I would not think any Ivy League team would be able to earn an at large bid.

The Ivy League as an athletic conference was only founded in 1954.