Tough Shooting Dooms Dartmouth in Lopsided Loss at Harvard

Saturday, January 15

Cambridge, Mass.

7:00 PM

Dartmouth College

Harvard

Tough Shooting Dooms Dartmouth in Lopsided Loss at Harvard

1/15/2011 9:01:00 PM | Women's Basketball

By: Dartmouth

Boxscore

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - The Dartmouth women's basketball team took one of its worst losses ever to archrival Harvard in the Ivy opener for both teams today, 82-49, in Cambridge.

Dartmouth (4-11, 0-1 Ivy) did have three players in double-figures, led by an inspired 15-point, 10 rebound effort from senior Cassie Cooper (Chelsea, Maine). Rookie Janelle Ross (Inglewood, Calif.) had a great coming out party in her first Ivy League game, tallying 15 points and nine rebounds.

Harvard (8-6, 1-0 Ivy) also had three players in double figures, led by Christine Clark's 18 points, 10 rebounds.

The Big Green shot a woeful 31.3 percent from the floor compared to Harvard's 49.2 percent.

The teams played at a furious pace for the first four minutes, with Harvard holding a 12-10 lead after a Ross bucket at 16:11. There were just two missed shots on each side during the opening stretch and Cooper paced the Big Green with four points early. Ross scored her second straight bucket to tie the game, 12-12, at 14:36, but Dartmouth went stone cold during a costly seven-minute span. Harvard capitalized with a 10-0 run started and ended by Berry to go up 22-12 after a fastbreak layup at 7:37. The Big Green finally stopped the bleeding with a Sasha Dosenko (Kiev, Ukraine) score at 7:18 to make it 22-14.

That lit a spark for the Big Green, which went on a mini 6-3 run thanks to two big buckets from Cooper to make just a 25-20 with 4:30 to play. Unfortunately for Dartmouth, it would be another big Harvard run to end the half as the Crimson outscored Dartmouth, 9-2, with scoring from four different players. Perhaps the biggest sign that it was not the Big Green's day came when Harvard's Victoria Lippert banked in an ugly three off the backboard at the buzzer for a 34-22 halftime lead.

After the fast start, Dartmouth shot just 31.3 percent from the floor to Harvard's 46.4 percent. The Big Green held a 21-17 rebounding advantage, including nine offensive rebounds but struggled to make the Crimson pay, with just four second-chance points.

Harvard took all the momentum from its pre-halftime trey into the second half, opening the period on an 11-0 run to build a 45-22 lead by the 16:11 mark. Faziah Steen (Kalamazoo, Mich.) finally got the Big Green on the board with a jumper at 15:54, down 45-24, but Emma Markley responded with a three-point play to double-up Dartmouth, 48-24, on the next play.

The teams traded buckets during the next few possessions, with Harvard up 52-28 after two free throws by Cooper, but the Crimson got to 55 on their next drive with yet another improbable banked in three, this time by Matera. The Big Green finally got a three to fall after nine tries when Kelsey Byrd (Saratoga, Calif.) hit Dartmouth's first of the game to make it 55-31 at 12:44.

The Crimson kept its foot on the gas and cruised to a 68-35 lead at 9:27 before Dartmouth slowed things down to keep a 6-6 pace for a 74-41 deficit at 6:31. Both teams substituted liberally down the stretch, and Dartmouth did go on a 6-2 run at one point to make it a 76-47 game after a Steen layup at 2:32. Steen finished with 12 points and five rebounds. The Crimson eventually went on to take the 82-49 win after a slow, foul-filled final five minutes.

Dartmouth has a long break before its first back-to-back Ivy weekend, heading to Cornell and Columbia on Jan. 28-29.