Michael James is the RTC correspondent for the Ivy League. You can also find his musings on Twitter at@mrjames2006 and @ivybball.

Reader’s Take

A Look Back

In by far the toughest Ivy since the 1970s, Harvard delivered exactly as expected, slogging through the treacherous league slate with a 12-2 mark and a second Ivy title. What wasn’t expected was the company the Crimson would have at the top. The average expectation had no other Ivy teams eclipsing the 10-win plateau, but Penn paid no heed to those projections. After losing to Harvard 56-50 at home to fall two games off the pace, the Quakers ripped off an amazing stretch of seven straight wins to climb even in the loss column after the final Ivy back-to-back weekend. But tradition left Penn with work to do. Its second-most difficult game of the season still remained – the annual meeting with rival Princeton after the rest of the league’s regular seasons had already drawn to a close. The Tigers double-teamed Quaker star Zack Rosen all game, stifling the Penn offense, and executed efficiently on the other end, cruising to a 10-point victory and ending the Quakers’ title hopes.

It was a historic year for the league by a variety of metrics. The league has never posted a higher Pomeroy Rating in the efficiency era, has never had seven non-conference wins over Pomeroy Top 100 teams in a season, and has never had a higher ranked team in the Pomeroy era than Harvard at No. 37. It is also currently hanging on to the 13th spot in the Conference RPI rankings, which would eclipse the 2001-02 mark of 14th, and could have as many as four teams earn postseason bids. With so many pivotal seniors, it will be hard for the Ivies to avoid a collective step back, but with a solid incoming freshman class, don’t expect a return to the dark ages of 2008 and 2009.

Tommy Amaker and Harvard Paced An Outstanding Ivy League Campaign (AP)

Yale and Princeton each posted solid campaigns, flirting with the RPI Top 100 for most of the season and building postseason-worthy resumes – the former by its quantity of wins and the latter with its quality. Columbia had a great non-conference run followed by an incredibly unlucky Ivy campaign, while Cornell did just the opposite, stumbling a bit outside the league, before putting together a solid 7-7 mark in Ivy play. Brown and Dartmouth had forgettable seasons, but the Bears will return several players from injury and ineligibility while the Big Green will see its talented freshmen continue to grow and mature.

Conference Accolades

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Matt Patton is an RTC correspondent. He filed this report from Saturday’s Harvard-Penn game in Cambridge.

With just under two minutes and thirty seconds left to play in the biggest Ivy League matchup of the season, Zack Rosen cut Harvard‘s lead over Penn to one. The lead had gradually dwindled from nine points six and a half minutes earlier, despite four opportunities for the Crimson to push the lead to double digits. Forty seconds later Henry Brooks fouled out, sending Kyle Casey to the charity stripe where he re-upped Harvard’s lead to three. Rosen answered again. A missed three from Harvard senior co-captain Oliver McNally meant the Quakers possessed the ball with just under a minute left only down one.

Zack Rosen Scored Penn's Last 9 Points to Lead the Quakers over Harvard. (credit: Meghan Cadet / Daily Pennsylvanian)

This was Harvard’s year. The Crimson are the most deep, talented, and experienced team in the Ivy League. Talk to coach Tommy Amaker and he’ll praise the team’s “bench and balance” repeatedly. Prior to conference play, the only true slip-up for the Crimson was their loss at Fordham. Amaker’s team (which didn’t lose any players from last year’s team) blitzed the nonconference slate compared to its prospective challengers. Princeton started the season 1-5 before finally righting the ship; Yale fared slightly better, but against far worse competition; and Penn couldn’t crack .500. After drubbing Yale on the road 65-35, the Harvard hype grew to an all-time high.

After Fran Dougherty grabbed an offensive board, Penn coach Jerome Allen called a timeout. Everyone in sold out Laveites Pavilion knew where the ball was headed. Rosen owned the Quakers’ last seven points. This was his moment. The senior inbounded the ball, immediately stepping in and taking a handoff from Rob Belcore near halfcourt. Rosen proceeded to drive straight past Brandyn Curry, the Ivy League’s best on-ball defender, forcing Casey to send him to the line with 23 seconds left.

Read the rest of this entry »

Michael James is the RTC correspondent for the Ivy League. You can also find his musings on Twitter at @mrjames2006 and @ivybball.

Reader’s Take

Looking Back

Not Your Older Brother’s Ivy League: By Adjusted Pythagorean Winning Percentage – the same method used by Ken Pomeroy to rank teams – this year’s Ivy League is far and away the best since roaring ’70s, which culminated with Penn’s Final Four run. Turns out, the RPI isn’t far behind. The previous high-water mark for the league was 2002, when Penn won the league in a three-way playoff with Princeton and Yale. That year, the Quakers finished with the highest RPI ranking (#37) that any league team has had since Princeton’s amazing 1998 season. The Tigers wrapped up the season at #79 and the Bulldogs closed their campaign at #98, marking the first time the Ivies had three Top 100 RPI teams. The league’s average RPI was #160, best in the era for which data is available, barely edging last season’s average of #173.

After a rough start, this year’s edition of the league has made an assault on that 2002 mark. Harvard sits comfortably in the RPI Top 50, while Penn, Princeton and Yale are hovering on the cusp of the Top 100 to make four Ivies in the Top 125. The 2012 average RPI currently stands at #169, but that’s primarily because all eight 2002 squads finished ahead of this year’s laggards Brown and Dartmouth. While it’s completely within the Crimson’s control to track down the 2002 Quakers for best RPI since the 1998 Princeton squad, the league’s teams will need a bit of help from their non-conference opponents to claim the mark for best average, since league play tends to be mostly a zero-sum game from a rankings perspective.

As Teams Like Brown Drop From Contention, Keith Wright And The Crimson Continue To Hold The Keys.

Given that the Ivy League does not have a conference tournament, there is no second chance to save a season once a team falls out of the league race. With each Ivy Check-In for the rest of the year, this section will break down which squads’ seasons came to a premature end, and which are sliding quickly into the danger zone.

MAYBE NEXT YEAR:

• Dartmouth (0-4): The Big Green has been full of surprising moments all year, including holding a seven-point lead in the second half at Harvard in each school’s Ivy opener. But Dartmouth got outscored 90-51 over the next 55 minutes to drop both ends of the travel partner series to the Crimson and then blew second-half leads at both Brown and Yale to fall to 0-4.
• Brown (1-3): After getting swept by Yale to kickoff the Ivy campaign, the Bears narrowly avoided the cellar by grabbing a comeback win over Dartmouth at home. Brown had to have a win over league favorite Harvard the next night to stay in the race and hung in with the Crimson for 20 minutes before a 13-0 run gave the visitors all the cushion they would need to cruise to victory. Now the Bears have been relegated to the role of spoiler with Penn and Princeton coming to town next weekend.
• Columbia (1-3): A 20-6 run to pull even with Cornell at 53 seemed to give the Lions new life in what was quite properly referred to as an Ivy elimination game. The Big Red responded with big bucket after big bucket over the final six minutes to withstand the charge and edge Columbia, 65-60.

THE WAITING ROOM:

• Cornell (2-2): A series of mediocre results has the Big Red alive heading into its trip to Boston next Friday, but a win over Harvard is an absolute must to stay in the race. An upset there could give the Big Red a clear shot at 6-2, which would keep it in the thick of things heading into back-to-back road trips including dates with Penn, Princeton and Yale.
• Princeton (1-2): The results weren’t expected to be great for a team with five-straight road games to start Ivy play, but two losses are still just as damaging if they come against good teams or bad. The Tigers now need to sweep a tricky road swing to Yale and Brown and take care of Dartmouth at home to set up an opportunity to get back into the race with a visit from Harvard.

Power Rankings

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Michael James is the RTC correspondent for the Ivy League. You can also find his musings on Twitter at @mrjames2006 and @ivybball.

Reader’s Take

Looking Back

Contenders and Pretenders: The first Ivy League back-to-back weekend is in the books, though for only half of the league’s teams. In true 14-game tournament fashion, it took just one weekend for the Ivy title race to change pretty drastically. With a road sweep of Cornell and Columbia, Pennsylvania immediately vaulted into the number one contender spot behind Harvard. The New York trip will be the second-toughest in the Ivies this season (the Princeton/Philadelphia swing will be slightly more treacherous), so escaping it with a 2-0 mark puts the Quakers in great shape to hang around the title race deep into the season.

Zack Rosen And The Quakers Hope They Have All Their Kinks Ironed Out So They Can Make A Run At Harvard.

The weekend wasn’t as kind to Columbia, which had two separate comeback bids fall short against Pennsylvania and Princeton, losing both games by a combined six points. The Lions had entered Ivy play at 9-1 in their last ten games, but all it takes is one rough back-to-back to see title hopes get dashed. Columbia still has a chance at a postseason berth in one of the 16-team events, but will likely need to close with eight or nine wins in its final 12 games – a slate that includes two meetings with Harvard.

The Tigers and Big Red emerged from the weekend alive, but endangered.Princeton is in better shape than Cornell, as road splits are excusable, while home splits can be deadly. The Tigers face the daunting task of playing their first five games on the road, which also means seven of the final nine at home, so Princeton can fall a little behind early and still maintain a realistic hope to catch the leaders down the stretch. Cornell doesn’t have that luxury. The Big Red must sweep travel partner Columbia over the next two weeks to stay in the race and set the table for a battle with preseason favorite Harvard at Lavietes Pavilion.

Yale survived a surprising scare at home against lowly Brown, trailing by seven at the half and six with just over three minutes to go before closing the game on a 13-3 run. The Bulldogs look to complete the sweep this weekend to remain perfect heading into their meeting with Harvard on January 27. Read the rest of this entry »

Michael James is the RTC correspondent for the Ivy League. You can also find his musings on Twitter at @mrjames2006 and @ivybball.

Reader’s Take

A Look Back

• Turnaround Experts: Unless your school’s name was Harvard, November wasn’t the best month. High expectations had been placed on a league that suffered relatively few key graduation losses and had vaulted into the teens in the conference rankings. As the calendar flipped to December, however, the Ivies had just two teams above .500 and the league’s overall record against Division I competition was a disappointing 21-28 with one of the nation’s worst strength of schedule ratings to boot. Led by Columbia’s and Yale’s 4-0 Division I mark in December thus far, the Ivy League has gone 20-14 this month and currently has six teams in Pomeroy’s Top 200. Even some of the losses have been impressive, which has buoyed the conference rating in the possession-based ranking systems. Pennsylvania played both Villanova and UCLA tough on the road before ultimately falling, and Princeton gave Drexel all it could handle in Philadelphia before losing by four. Meanwhile, Harvard has paced the league with a 10-1 mark, hanging around the Top 25 in almost every type of ranking and keeping the Ivies in the national spotlight.
• Quality Wins:  With almost three-quarters of the non-conference season in the books, the Ivy League has racked up some wins that would make any one-bid conference jealous. Harvard has led the way with neutral-site victories over Florida State and Central Florida en route to the Battle 4 Atlantis title. The Crimson hasn’t been the only team taking down quality opponents, though. The Quakers have come close to a few major upsets – none closer than their overtime loss to Temple – but still have a win over Top 100 Robert Morris to their name. Princeton joined the party with wins over Buffalo and Rutgers and like Pennsylvania came close to a couple others. Finally, Cornell and Columbia have each knocked off some quality teams from the one-bid leagues – Lehigh and Manhattan, respectively. Depending on the rating system, the Ivies have registered as many as 21 of their 41 wins against the Top 200, including 10 in road or neutral settings, and the average ranking of the league’s wins is roughly 210. That profile makes the Ivy League the #13 conference in the country according to the Pomeroy Ratings. It also has this year’s edition of the league on pace to be the toughest top-to-bottom since the inception of the Academic Index Floor (a test-score and GPA based system for ranking the academic qualifications of potential admits) in the early 1980s.
• Top Performers: With Harvard cracking the Top 25 in the ESPN/USA Today Coaches Poll again this week, you might expect to see a bunch of Crimson players in a section on the league’s top players. Harvard has been so balanced this year though that its highly efficient offensive players including forwards Kyle Casey and Keith Wright and guard Laurent Rivard haven’t been able to post the raw stats that would lead to recognition. Any discussion about Player of the Year to this point starts and ends with Pennsylvania guard Zack Rosen. He’s the only Ivy player to be on the floor for more than 90% of his team’s minutes, and his output has been historically strong with an offensive rating close to 130 and a usage rate of nearly 25%. His backcourt mate, Tyler Bernardini, has been having a stellar senior campaign as well with efficiency and usage rates that may not match Rosen’s but are still easily All-Ivy caliber. Princeton’s Ian Hummer has been carrying the Tigers this season, using 33% of his team’s possessions and establishing himself as the league’s second most productive player behind Rosen. Yale big man Greg Mangano has to be part of the POY discussion, though he’s had a little more support as guards Austin Morgan and Reggie Willhite, along with forward Jeremiah Kreisberg, have all played very well this season. Some other guys to watch as league play approaches are Columbia’s Brian Barbour, Brown’s Sean McGonagill and Cornell’s Drew Ferry, who has stabilized a Big Red team that has yet to get the usual high quality output from its star Chris Wroblewski to this point.

Greg Mangano Enters The Ivy POY Discussion With Averages of 17 Points And Nearly Nine Rebounds Per Game To Go Along With A Low Turnover Rate.

• Cousy Award Watch List: Over sixty players made the annual list of the top point guards and combo guards in the nation, including four from the Ivy League. Seniors Chris Wroblewski and Zack Rosen made the cut along with Columbia junior Brian Barbour and Harvard junior Brandyn Curry. The list of quality point/combo guards in the league hardly stops there. Brown sophomore Sean McGonagill was last year’s Ivy Rookie of the Year and is having a fine sophomore campaign. Princeton’s Douglas Davis has struggled a bit before having a monster game last night in a loss at Siena. Finally, Yale’s Austin Morgan has quietly put up First-Team All-Ivy numbers that rival any of the league’s four players that made the Cousy List.

Power Rankings

1. Read the rest of this entry »

The theme for UCLA’s game Saturday evening against Penn was a new beginning. Not only were the Bruins playing their first game without junior forward Reeves Nelson, who was dismissed by head coach Ben Howland on Friday following a couple of suspensions for behavioral reasons, but the squad shifted to zone defense for much of the game for the first time this season. While the 77-73 victory was by no means a crisp performance, it was a sign of things to come and a chance for the struggling Bruins to experience some positivity.

Ben Howland: "A Lot Has Happened This Week And We're Getting To Where We're Figuring Stuff Out." (Credit: Blaine Ohigashi)

UCLA went to a 2-3 zone for the first time about midway through the first half while trailing by one, and spent every half-court possession for the next six minutes in that defense. Howland is primarily known as a man-to-man coach, but he confirmed that you’ll be seeing plenty of zone out of UCLA the rest of the way. “Zone is not preferred, but it is what is fitting for our team now,” he said. “It is something that you’ll be seeing when we’re changing things up. We need to use it and it will be helpful for us, especially as we get better at it.” At times the zone gave Penn trouble, as on the first possession where the Quakers were unable to find a good shot and had to settle for a fallaway three-point attempt by senior Tyler Bernardini as the shot clock expired; and true to another theme of the day, the shot dropped. Bernardini torched the Bruins throughout the day, regardless of the defense employed, hitting eight of his 12 shots on his way to a career-high 29 points. At times the defenders on the perimeter of the UCLA zone failed to close out on the three-point shot, not even putting a hand in a face, something that will surely be pointed out in practice this week. UCLA has already displayed terrible perimeter defense this year, and even after Penn shot 38.7% from three against them, they are still allowing their opponents to shoot 48.7% from three-point range on the season.

However, regardless of some of the sloppiness of the zone, it did provide a few tangible benefits to the Bruins. First, it kept the Quakers from getting good looks inside the three-point line (more than 50% of Penn’s shots were from three), an area where UCLA has struggled all year. Secondly, it helped protect a couple of Bruin big men who picked up a couple of early fouls; Joshua Smith and David Wear both had two fouls in the first eight minutes. Also, the zone gave Smith a bit of a reprieve from his own poor conditioning, allowing him to preserve some of his energy rather than having to chase his opponents out to the perimeter, leaving him enough energy in the second half to score on three straight possessions as well as kick one pass back out for what turned into a wide-open three-pointer.

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With the completion of the NBA Draft and the annual coaching and transfer carousels nearing their ends, RTC is rolling out a new series, RTC Summer Updates, to give you a crash course on each Division I conference during the summer months. Our latest update comes courtesy of our Ivy League correspondent, Howard Hochman.

Reader’s Take

Introduction

It seems like only yesterday that Doug Davis was hitting his buzzer beating, fall-back, fall-down jumper that turned Harvard followers crimson. And not soon after, Brandon Knight’s last-second layup was a stake in the eye of the Tiger. But we must look forward and we can only hope the 2011-12 Ivy hoop season can provide the same excitement. This year, it appears seven of the Ancient Eight will be battling for second place. Harvard returns everyone, will be favored to go unbeaten in league play, and, in fact, each starter is capable of earning all league honors. But more on that later. First….

Summer News and Notes

• Providence Coaching Change Trickles Into Ivy Ranks: We have yet to hear a good explanation why a title-winning Princeton coach and alum Sydney Johnson would leave that bucolic and secure setting for traditional basketball hotbed… Fairfield. Now granted, the MAAC is an underrated conference and departing coach Ed Cooley did not exactly leave the cupboard bare after a 25-win season. In my opinion, the move is lateral at best. But never fear, Princetonians, the apple does not fall far from the tree; the Pete Carrill coaching tree, that is. Mitch Henderson, another alum, and most recently Bill Carmody’s right hand man at Northwestern, was immediately signed on, so it would be wise to keep “three-pointer” and “back-door” in your vocabulary.
• Ancient Eight Coaches Resist GMU Courtship: Speaking of coaches, when Jim Larranaga departed George Mason for the sunny climes and dollars at Miami, the school first looked north to the Ivy League for his replacement. Not surprisingly, Tommy Amaker chose to remain with his talent-laden bunch in Cambridge. What is surprising is that Bill Courtney turned Mason down. You might remember it was Courtney who was the recruiting architect of the Patriots’ Final Four team in 2006. Furthermore, the CAA is most assuredly a step up from the Ivy and enjoyed one of its finest seasons with VCU coming out of nowhere to make a Cinderella run to the Final Four. It makes one think Mr. Courtney likes what he sees on the roster and that the future may be brighter than most imagine at Cornell.
• Life Outside Campus: Last season, Greg Mangano of Yale was named the RTC Ivy Player of the Year as a junior. After a season in which his double-double average led the Elis to a third-place finish, and after some discussion with his coach, James Jones, Mangano decided to declare for the NBA Draft but did not hire an agent. A few NBA teams showed interest, but fortunately for Yale fans, he listened to the whispers in his ear and withdrew his name and everyone exhaled at Pepe’s Pizza and Louis’ Lunch. As a reward for his outstanding season, Mangano was invited to try out for the World University Games Team, beginning July 31 in Colorado Springs. The Games themselves will take place next month in China, but it won’t be as big a culture shock as most would expect for Mangano. He averaged over 21 points per game during Yale’s recent ten-day swing through the country. Only 12 (out of the 22 high-profile invitees) will make the traveling squad. We will keep you posted.

Douglas Davis (20) was one cool customer for Princeton, sinking this heartbreaker to top the Crimson and nearly leading the Tigers to an NCAA Tournament upset over Kentucky (Associated Press/Jessica Hill)

Power Rankings

1. Harvard: Just let the names Kyle Casey, Keith Wright, Brandyn Curry and Christian Webster roll off your tongue and you have the reasons why last year’s co-title holders should repeat with ease though the middle of the league has gotten stronger. An undefeated run through the league seems reasonable and with some out-of-conference success, a Top 25 ranking appears attainable. Kenyatta Smith, a rebounding machine a la Wes Unseld at 6’7″ and 260 pounds, leads a formidable recruiting class. Pencil in a meaningful Selection Sunday for the first time in Cambridge. Read the rest of this entry »

***** – quit your job and divorce your wife if that’s what it takes to watch this game live
**** – best watched live, but if you must, tivo and watch it tonight as soon as you get home
*** – set your tivo but make sure you watch it later
** – set your tivo but we’ll forgive you if it stays in the queue until 2013
* – don’t waste bandwidth (yours or the tivo’s) of any kind on this game

Brian Otskey is an RTC contributor.

Only two games affect the bubble tonight, but four of the five listed here are for auto-bids or will go towards deciding one. All rankings from RTC and all times Eastern.

Princeton @ Pennsylvania – 7 pm on ESPN3.com (***)

Coach Sydney Johnson Will Gladly Take Another 25 From Mavraides -- As Long As It Results In a Win

The formula for Princeton is simple: win tonight and beat Harvard in a playoff on Saturday (4 pm at Yale) to earn the Ivy League’s automatic bid. Should the Tigers lose tonight, Harvard will claim the title and earn a spot in the NCAA Tournament.

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Dave Zeitlin is the RTC correspondent for the Ivy League.

The Good

A lot has already been written about Cornell’s near-miss vs. Kansas at Allen Fieldhouse. It should not have come as a surprise as this is a veteran Big Red team with two players (Ryan Wittman and Jeff Foote) who will most assuredly get NBA looks. And it also has a coach who has become a proven big-time recruiter and is finally getting his just due as a game coach. With the core of his soon-to-be three time defending Ivy champ team graduating this spring, look for Steve Donahue to be a hot name for many job openings.

The Bad

The bottom of the conference, to be kind, has been dreadful. Brown, Yale, Penn and Dartmouth (more on them later) are a combined 4-28 in their last 32 games vs. Division 1 competition. Their RPIs are respectively 247, 291, 309 and 322. Only Penn, and to a lesser extent Brown, has played a representative schedule. Fortunately for all of those except Penn (which still has two Big 5 games ahead), the conference season begins this weekend. As the saying goes — someone has to win.

The Ugly

So for all those out there wishing to do some research: when was the last time two Ivy teams fired their coaches mid-season? (The keys to the Corvette for anyone with the correct answer.) Hot on the heels of Glen Miller at Penn was Terry Dunn at Dartmouth. Talk about the inmates running the asylum — the players allegedly unanimously signed a petition indicating that they would not play unless Terry Dunn was fired. This after the assistant coaches all left in the spring. Word as to their specific grievances has not leaked out. Think there is a line out the door to take over this plum assignment?

Here are the power rankings, with a rundown on each team heading into league play:

1) Cornell (14-3): After a warm-up on Monday, the Big Red stands at a gaudy 14-3. Can you say 28-3? A perfect Ivy season is not out of the question for the best team the league has seen since the Penn teams (who should have won an NCAA game) in the early part of the decade. Look for a Top 25 ranking and – invoking the ghost of Bill Bradley – maybe even a single digit seed in the tournament. To paraphrase ESPN analyst extraordinaire Jimmy Dykes: “Don’t be fooled by the names on the uniforms — this team can win two games come March.”

2) Harvard (12-3): Technically at the top of the standings (1-0 league) after last weekend’s drubbing of the coachless Big Green, Tommy Amaker’s crew has played a tough schedule which included respectable losses to Big East powers Georgetown and UConn, and wins vs. BC, GW, and that West Coast sensation, Seattle (50-point conqueror of Oregon State). Right now they are the clear cut second choice and their 1/30 and 2/19 games vs. Cornell should be wars.

3) Princeton (8-5): Tigers begin the Ivy season winning six out of their last seven games, albeit vs. weaker opposition. They should be battling Columbia for the minor awards in the league. With Cornell’s graduation losses looming, the Tigers may be the 2010-11 pre-season Ivy pick with underclassmen Doug Davis, Dan Mavraides and Patrick Saunders all returning.

4) Columbia (6-8): Quick – which Division 1 player has the best 3-pt fg pct? You’re right if you guessed the Lions’ Noruwa Agho. The sophomore from N.Y. boasts an unheard of 62.5% from behind the line (52 attempts). He also leads the team in scoring, averaging more than 18 points per game. Columbia has played a rather weak non-conference schedule but has the pieces in place to be better than .500 in the league.

5) Brown (6-11): A 6-11 record has to be taken with a grain of salt as two of those wins have come vs. Division 2 opposition. Nevertheless, they have played a tough schedule that included Virginia Tech, St. Johns, URI, Siena, Minnesota and Providence (all losses). The one bright spot has been 6-8 junior Matt Mullery who leads the team in scoring (15.8) rebounds, assists, field goal percentage and blocks. He may become the first Brown Bear to accomplish the near impossible Pentagon (though I just made that up).

6) Penn (1-11): With two Big 5 games (LaSalle and St. Joes) next up, it is very likely that the Quakers will enter conference play with a 1-13 record. The good news is that new coach Jerome Allen seems to have gotten the players attention and the team is, after all, 1-1 in their last two after a not-so-terrible performance against Temple on Wednesday. He has also given free reign to sophomore point guard Zack Rosen who responded to this new-found freedom with a 28-point effort vs. UMBC. The Red and Blue have been decimated by injury with starters Andreas Schreiber and Tyler Bernadini, among others, both likely lost for the season.

7) Yale (6-11): The Bulldogs returned to New Haven with two easy tune-ups prior to beginning conference play — this after a brutal five-game road trip that overlapped the new year. Coach James Jones’ squad relies heavily on holdover Alex Zampier. The 6’3 guard from the Hudson Valley in New York State averages almost 19 points per game and leads a rebuilding Yale team that includes three freshman and four sophomores.

8) Dartmouth (3-11): The Big Green, like Cornell, may be well on their way to a perfect record in conference as well — on the losing end. With Terry Dunn out (after a rare victory vs. Bucknell) assistant coach Mark Graupe will handle the coaching responsibilities until the end of the season. Not a lot of joy or promise in Hanover as no starter is averaging over eight points per game. But at least they share the rock.

Dave Zeitlin is the RTC correspondent for the Ivy League.

POWER RANKINGS

1. Cornell (6-2): The two-time defending champs have done a very nice job navigating a tricky non-conference schedule thus far.
2. Harvard (6-1): Off to its best start in 25 years, the Crimson will look to keep the momentum going against some brutally tough teams.
3. Columbia (3-3): Considering the Lions have already faced two Big East squads, a .500 record is nothing to scoff at.
4. Princeton (2-4): Tigers have dropped four straight but should have better days on the horizon.
5. Brown (4-5): Bears haven’t beaten anyone of note but have shown a lot of fight in a few of their losses.
6. Penn (0-5): Injuries to key players and inconsistent play are again coming back to bite the Quakers.
7. Yale (3-5): Bulldogs’ schedule hasn’t been as difficult as some of the other Ivy teams.
8. Dartmouth (1-5): Big Green’s lone win has come against a poor Hartford team.

COOKED RICE: The story in the league right now has to be Harvard, which with its rout of Rice on Wednesday is off to its best start since 1984-85 (though in that season three of its first eight wins came against non-Division I opponents). Keep in mind, Harvard has never won an Ivy League title – and stealing the crown from Cornell this season will be a monumental task. But Tommy Amaker’s bunch may be, according to the Boston Herald, the best mid-major in New England, which sounds like a compliment.

SEEING RED: I’ll let Ithaca Journal ace reporter Brian DeLaney catch you up on Cornell because he knows more than me and he claims he can slap his hand against a backboard (debatable). One of his messages: Cornell is so loaded this season that it doesn’t even have to play well to win at lot of times. Sounds about right.

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