Women's Hoops Closes Out Season at Harvard Tonight

Complete Dartmouth Game Notes

The Dartmouth women's basketball team travels to Ivy rival Harvard for the 67th edition of one of college basketball's most exciting and competitive rivalries. The Big Green looks to win its fifth straight in the series to close the season on a high note while the Crimson seeks to avenge its loss to Dartmouth in the Ivy season opener.

GAME 28: DARTMOUTH (11-16, 6-7 Ivy) at HARVARD (19-8, 10-3 Ivy)
Date: Tuesday, March 9, 2010 • 7 PM
Location: Lavietes Pavilion (2,195) • Cambridge, Mass.
Dartmouth-Harvard Series: Harvard leads, 35-31
Last Meeting: 1/16/10 • Hanover, N.H.
Result: Dartmouth W, 45-44
Streak: Dartmouth +4
Dartmouth and Harvard get together on the court for the 67th time in one of the most storied rivalries in all of women's college basketball. The two programs have won a combined total of 28 Ivy League Championships since 1976, with Dartmouth taking 17 to Harvard's 11. The pair forms the most formidable travel partner duo in the Ivy League. Dartmouth coach Chris Wielgus has a narrow, 21-20, edge in the series against her friend and rival, Harvard's Kathy Delaney-Smith. Dartmouth has won the last four meetings against Harvard and five of the last six, including a sweep en route to the Ivy title in 2008-09 and a win in the first meeting this season, 45-44.

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THIS TIME OUT
Game Number 911. Dartmouth comes into its final game of the season after one of its toughest Ivy weekends in recent memory, losing at home to both Princeton and Penn. The Big Green cannot secure a winning season, but will look to get to .500 in Ivy play and close out on a positive note at Harvard, who has lost just one home game all season. It's the traditional end to the season for the Big Green and Crimson, though usually this game has Ivy Title implications.

DARTMOUTH PROBABLE STARTERS
*#10    Margaret Smith   G • SR • 6-1 • 5.9 ppg, 5.7 rgg, 82.4 FT Pct.
*#20    Brittney Smith    F • JR • 6-1 • 12.1 ppg, 10.3 rpg, 1.9 bpg
#25    Faziah Steen      G • FR • 5-8 • 8.8 ppg, 2.5 rpg, 1.9 spg
#32    Betsy Williams   G • SR • 6-0 • 7.5 ppg, 3.4 rpg, 1.5 apg
#34    Sasha Dosenko   F • SO • 6-3 • 7.7 ppg, 5.8 rpg, 1.2 bpg
*Returning starter

QUICK TAKE ON THE BIG GREEN

• Dartmouth played two very different halves in its contest against Princeton, controlling its preferred slow tempo in the first to take a 26-21 halftime lead before the Tigers imposed their fast pace to score 43 second half points.

• The Big Green played a dominant first half in its win over Brown, holding the Bears to just eight points on 10.7 percent shooting.

• Dartmouth struggled from downtown last weekend, shooting a woeful 16.7 percent from three-point range, including a 2-of-20 effort against Penn.

• For the first time this season, at both Brown and Yale, Coach Wielgus utilized every available player on her bench.

• Nine of Dartmouth's wins have come when either holding a lead at the half or tied, standing at 9-0 with a halftime advantage. Just twice, against Cornell and Brown, has Dartmouth overcome a halftime deficit.

CLOSING OUT THE SEASON
Tonight's game marks the final contest of the season for the Big Green. For the first time since 2004, Dartmouth will not be playing in a postseason tournament, having made the NCAA Tournament three times and WNIT twice during that stretch.

OUT OF THE RUNNING
For the first time since the 2002-03 season, Dartmouth entered its final home weekend without an Ivy Championship or postseason bid left to fight for. In fact, the 2006-07 season, when Dartmouth secured a WNIT bid on senior night, was the only season in that stretch, until now, that the Ivy title was out of reach.

A RARE LOSING SEASON
At 11-16 overall and 6-7 in the Ivy League, the Big Green is set to finish fifth in League play, its lowest finish under Chris Wielgus since round-robin play began in 1980-81 and just the second time since then finishing below fourth. Since that year, Wielgus has never had a losing Ivy season and has only had two losing Ivy seasons ever (her first two years, 1976-78).
Dartmouth has finished third or better in 19 of Wielgus' last 22 seasons at the helm (since 1979-80), and second or better in 14 of those. The Big Green's 11 wins overall to date are the fewest since the 2001-02 season, and 11 is the lowest win total in Wielgus' second tenure at Dartmouth (since 1993-94). Since her return, Wielgus has led the Big Green to 13 winning seasons.

DOMINANCE OVER THE BEARS
Dartmouth turned in a dominant defensive effort in its 51-29 win at Brown on Feb. 27. The effort included holding Brown to 19.4 percent shooting for the game and just 10.7 percent shooting in the first half, in which the Bears scored just eight points. The last time the Big Green held an opponent under 30 points was also against Brown, a 58-27 victory last season (Feb. 6, 2009). Dartmouth bettered its halftime effort this year, up 35-8, after holding a 25-10 lead at the break last season.

UNDER 50 IS USUALLY A WIN
Heading into the Penn game, the Big Green was 6-0 this season when holding its opponent to 50 points or less. The Quakers scored only 44, but held the Big Green to 31 points to make that record 6-1. Dartmouth is also 3-0 keeping teams below 40 points, which has happened twice in Ivy play, holding Penn to 37 points and Brown to 29. Last season, the Big Green held four opponents under 40 points and 11 under 50.

D IS FOR DEFLECTION
As a team, Dartmouth has amassed 715 deflections this season. A deflection is an imperfect hustle stat, but is recorded whenever a Big Green player alters the path of the ball, including tipped passes, altered shots, steals or blocks. Dartmouth tallied a season-high 39 deflections at Yale, playing hard despite the loss. Brittney Smith had 12 in that game and leads the team with 173 while Faziah Steen ranks second with 132 and Margaret Smith third with 112.

FIRST TO 300
With its victory at Cornell on Feb. 20, 2010, Dartmouth became the first Ivy League women's basketball program to reach 300 conference wins. The Big Green is 301-126 all-time against Ivy opponents. Dartmouth beat Ivy rival Harvard to the mark by just seven games (Harvard has 295).

IVY LEAGUE ELITE
Dartmouth has won 17 of a possible 33 Ivy League Championships since 1976-77. The Big Green owns at least a share of four of the last five Ivy Championships including the last two, with an outright title last season in 2009. Dartmouth leads its all-time series against every Ivy team except Harvard, who holds a 35-31 edge. Only one other Ivy team, Penn, has more than 20 wins against the Green with 21.

LEADING THE LEAGUE AT THE LINE
As evidenced by her performance at Cornell, Ivy opponents would do best to keep senior Margaret Smith off the free throw line. In conference play, she leads the league in free throw percentage at 90.2 percent, converting on 37-of-41attempts. She ranks second in the overall rankings at 82.4 percent. Though she and younger sister Brittney Smith bear a striking resemblance to one another, Margaret has the leg up on the 2009 Player of the Year Brittney at the line. The younger Smith shoots just 61.8 percent at the line.

OVERTIME'S NOT OUR TIME THIS YEAR
In program history, Dartmouth has only played to overtime 15 times against Ivy opponents, with four of those coming in the last two seasons. This season, on Feb. 13, the Big Green played just its third ever double-overtime Ivy game, a 70-66 loss to Yale. It was the first double-overtime Ivy game since a March 2, 1996 win over Brown (61-52) and Dartmouth's first double-overtime loss. Last weekend, on Feb. 19, Dartmouth played its second straight overtime game, losing 66-59 at Columbia. It marked just the third time in program history that Dartmouth has played consecutive overtime games. Last season (2008-09), Dartmouth played a program-record four overtime games, including back-to-back contests against Michigan State (one OT) and Vermont (three OT).

BRITTNEY HITS 1,000
Junior forward Brittney Smith became the 15th player in program history to reach the 1,000-point mark during the Feb. 13, 2010 game against Yale. Smith did so during a flurry in which she single-handedly tied the game by scoring seven points in less than three minutes. Of the 15 players to reach the milestone, Smith did so the seventh-fastest, taking just 81 games. Smith is the fourth player since 2005 to reach the mark, the eighth to do so prior to her senior year and just the first post player since Katharine Hanks '03 did so in 2001.

NOT THE ONLY MILESTONE
Smith also reached the 700-rebound plateau against Yale, making her just the sixth player in program history to have recorded 1,000 points and 700 rebounds. She has also passed 125 career assists, 125 career steals and is just five blocks away from 125.

A LITTLE COMPANY AT THE TOP
Dartmouth's 17 conference championships are far and away the most in the league, but this number also puts the Big Green among the nation's leaders for league dominance. Since the Ivy League does not play a postseason tournament, regular season results matter more than in any other league. Only Stanford, with 19 Pac-10 regular season titles is above Dartmouth nationally.
    School           Conference    Titles
    Stanford                Pac-10           19
    Dartmouth             Ivy League     17
    UC-Santa Barbara   Big West        16
    Tennessee Tech      Ohio Valley     15
    Stephen F. Austin    Southland      15
    Tennesee               SEC               15

GETTING TO THE LINE ...
And keeping opponents off it. In 25 games, Dartmouth has taken 494 free throws to its opponents 334. On the season, with 327 made free throws, the Big Green is almost making more than opponents take. The Green could stand to improve on its 66.2 percentage but opponents are also only hitting 64.7 percent. Last season, Dartmouth nearly doubled up its opponents by taking 602 free throws to their 345 attempts.

HOME COOKING ISN'T ALWAYS BEST
After going a perfect 7-0 in Ivy play at home last year, Dartmouth is just 5-8 against Ivy foes at Leede Arena this year. Those games have been well-attended, however, with an average of 932 fans at Ivy games including a season high of 1,619 for the win over Harvard and 1,013 for the Pink Zone game against Yale.

PLAYER OF THE WEEK
Sophomore Sasha Dosenko was named the Ivy League Co-Player of the Week on Feb. 22 for her efforts against Columbia and Cornell. Dosenko continued playing at a torrid pace, averaging 15.5 points and 9.5 rebounds per game in a tough split. After tallying a career-high 19 points and nine rebounds at Columbia, Dosenko finally collected her elusive first career double-double on 12 points and 10 rebounds at Cornell. The 6-3 sophomore shot nearly 50 percent from the floor and added three blocks at Columbia, two at Cornell and two assists per game.

MINUTE WOMEN
In Ivy play, four Dartmouth starters rank in the top 10 for minutes played, led by Brittney Smith with a league-high 37.8 minutes per game. Betsy Williams is third at 35.9 with Margaret Smith ranks eighth at 32.3

FREE THROWS MAKE THE DIFFERENCE
At Columbia and Cornell, Dartmouth proved what a difference free throws can make. In its overtime loss at Columbia, the Big Green hit just 13-of-24 from the line (54.2 percent), a game in which one point would have assured a regulation win. Though it was little consolation, Dartmouth locked in at Cornell to hit 16-of-18 at the line in another close game, this time a win. Margaret Smith led the Big Green by going 8-for-8.

IN THE CLASSROOM AND ON THE COURT
Senior guard Betsy Williams has earned a spot on the CoSIDA Academic All-District I second team. Williams was chosen based on her prowess both in the classroom and on the basketball court. For women's basketball, 10 student-athletes were voted to the two all-district teams out of a pool of nearly 40 nominees. A psychology major with a French minor, Williams maintains an impressive 3.71 grade point average and studied abroad in France during the spring of her sophomore year.

KEEPING IT CLEAN
After committing 18 fouls at Brown and 15 at Yale, Dartmouth currently ranks fifth in the nation in fewest personal fouls committed per game, with an average of just 13.3, but had been first nationally for much of the season. Undefeated UConn ranks first with 12.5 per game. A big part of the Big Green's disciplined defense is not giving up points when the clock is stopped. Dartmouth was whistled for a season-low five fouls against Boston College and had only 10 in the win over Harvard on Jan. 16.

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