Men on the Road Again at Brown, Yale

Friday, February 7

Providence, R.I. / Pizzitola Sports Center

7:00 PM

Dartmouth College

Brown

The starting five at Penn huddle up, Feb. 1, 2020

Dartmouth's usual starting five huddles up.

Photo by: Willis Glassgow

2/6/2020 11:07:00 AM | Men's Basketball

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Big Green searching for first Ivy League win of the season

By: Rick Bender

DARTMOUTH (7-12, 0-4)
at BROWN (9-8, 2-2)
and YALE (16-4, 4-0)
Friday / Saturday, Feb. 7 / 8, 2020 | 7 PM | ESPN+
Pizzitola Sports Center (2,800) / John J. Lee Amphitheater (2,532) | Providence, R.I. / New Haven, Conn.

• Willie Nelson fans may be happy about Dartmouth being on the road again, but this weekend's trip to Brown and Yale make it five of the first six Ivy League games on the road for the Big Green.
• Dartmouth is looking to end a seven-game losing streak when it plays the Bears on Friday as well as a 12-game skid in conference play, not to mention an 18-game slide in road league games dating back to 2017.
• Last weekend, the Big Green suffered a sweep at the hands of Princeton (66-44) and Penn (54-46), their lowest-scoring conference weekend in 10 years (also against those two, but in Hanover).
• Dartmouth was held under 40 percent shooting in both contests and currently are last in league play at 36.9 percent from the floor.
• Chris Knight, the team's leading scorer, led the Green with 12 points at Penn on Saturday, all coming in the final 11 minutes as Dartmouth frantically tried to claw its way back from an 18-point deficit.
• Trevon Ary-Turner, who missed both Harvard games with an injury, returned to the floor and scored in double figures both nights (11 at Princeton, 10 more at Penn) on 9-of-13 shooting.
• The Big Green are looking for some more help … well, helpers to be more exact. When they dish out 12 or more assists, they are 7-2 this season.

Series vs. Brown
• Dartmouth holds an 81-78 lead in the all-time series against the Bears, dating back to their first game 117 years ago in 1902 (which the Big Green won, 70-14).
• Over the last seven meetings, six have been decided by three points or fewer, and the other by five with Brown winning five of the seven games.
• The Bears swept the series last year, defeating Dartmouth in Hanover, 60-58, then taking a 68-65 decision in Providence.
• Chris Knight had 15 points while Ian Sistare recorded the lone double-double of his career in the first game, but Guilien Smith could not get a game-winning 3-pointer to fall at the buzzer. James Foye tallied a career-high 25 points with seven triples in the return game.
• At the Pizzitola Sports Center, Dartmouth has an 11-19 record but just two wins in the last 14 years.
• Head coach David McLaughlin has a 2-4 mark against the Bears in his tenure at Dartmouth.

Scouting the Bears
• Brown is coming off a weekend sweep of Cornell (74-63) and Columbia (72-66).
• The Bears started the new year off right with an upset win over Rhode Island, 85-75.
• As a team, Brown is shooting a league-low 41.0 percent and its 38.2 percent showing in league play ranks seventh ahead of only Dartmouth (.369).
• Brandon Anderson is third among Ivy players at 18.0 ppg and is tied for the team lead in assists (58) and steals (23) with Tamenang Choh.
• Choh does just about everything for the Bears with 13.5 ppg and a team-best 8.2 rpg.
• Zach Hunsaker and Anderson are the most prolific 3-point threats with a combined 64 triples, but Perry Cowan is the most accurate (.372 on 16 treys).
• Mike Martin (Brown '04) is in his eighth season at the helm with a 102-120 record, posting 20 wins a year ago with the last victory coming in the College Basketball Invitational. He spent six years on the staff at Penn before returning to the team he led to three second-place finishes as a player.

Series vs. Yale
• Dartmouth has played the Bulldogs 214 times with Yale holding the advantage over the Green, 116-98.
• Last year, the Bulldogs swept the Green, winning 89-68 in Hanover and 77-59 in New Haven.
• Chris Knight scored 20 points in the first contest before Brendan Barry and James Foye combined for 32 in the second game.
• The Bulldogs have won the last eight meetings — six by double figures — since Dartmouth denied Yale the outright Ivy League title in the final game of the 2014-15 season.
• The Bulldogs have won 12 of the past 14 games with 10 of those wins by double figures.
• Dartmouth is 28-57 all-time against Yale at Lee Amphitheater. The Green also played an Ivy playoff game here in 1959, beating Princeton, 69-68.
• Yale has won 32 of the 40 meetings this millennium and not lost consecutive games since 1999.

Scouting the Bulldogs
• Yale is tied atop the league standings at 4-0, owns a 16-4 overall record with six straight wins and received a vote in the AP poll this week.
• The Bulldogs lead the league in just about every team statistical category — scoring offense and defense, field goal percentage, 3-point percentage, free throw percentage … you get the idea.
• Forward Paul Atkinson leads a trio of players scoring in double figures at 17.1 ppg while shooting an efficient 63.6 percent from the floor.
• Five players have at least 20 3-pointers led by Azar Swain who leads the league with 52 triples while hitting a respectable 35.6 percent.
• Jordan Bruner is a well-rounded player with 12.2 ppg, a league-high 9.5 rpg, 71 assists and 38 blocks.
• Head coach James Jones (Albany '86), the longest tenured Ivy League coach in his 21st year, enters this game with an overall record of 326-277. Four years ago he led the Bulldogs to 23 wins, a league title and their first victory in the NCAA Tournament ever, then took them back to the Big Dance last year with 22 wins and his fourth Ivy crown.

Senior CLASS Candidate
Initially chosen as one of 30 candidates for the Senior CLASS Award, James Foye was selected as one of the 10 finalists for the honor this past Wednesday. An economics major with a 3.97 GPA, Foye was a second-team Academic All-American last year and is one of the best 3-point shooters in the Ivy League and the country at 46.1 percent this season. He has also volunteered for the Upper Valley Haven After School program as well as the Children's Hospital at Dartmouth (CHaD). The award, given to a senior with notable achievements in four areas — community, classroom, character and competition — relies on a fan vote. So head to seniorCLASSaward.com and vote for Foye as many times as you like (it's legal!).

Homesick
You can't blame the Big Green for being a little homesick. Dartmouth has played just six home games thus far, and only five against Division I opponents. By the time the Green shower the home fans with love again (on Valentine's Day no less), only one D-I team will have played fewer games on its home court — Alabama State. And only three teams will have played the same amount of games — Maryland Eastern Shore, Prairie View A&M and Harvard.

Another Tough Princeton-Penn Trip
The trek to Princeton and Penn has historically been a nightmare for Dartmouth. In the first 63 seasons, the Big Green had been swept 52 times, and they unfortunately added to that ignominious total this year. First, Dartmouth played Princeton tight in the first half only to be doubled up in the second half (34-17) in a 66-44 defeat. The next night, it was the first half that posed problems as the Big Green had just five field goals and were doubled up once again, 28-14. Although Dartmouth outscored the Quakers in the second half by six points, it was not enough in the 54-46 loss.

Seven-Game Slide
Dartmouth enters the weekend having lost its last seven contests, but when it dropped a 70-66 contest to Harvard on Jan. 25, the Big Green achieved the ignominious distinction of losing five straight (or more) in each of the last 23 consecutive seasons. The last team to not suffer through a five-game skid was the 1996-97 squad that was 18-8 overall and 10-4 in the Ivy League to tie for second.

Ary-Turner? More Like Re-Turner
Sophomore Trevon Ary-Turner missed both of the first two conference games with an injury, but returned to make solid contributions to the Big Green efforts at Princeton and Penn. The transfer from Weber State hit 9-of-13 field goals (.692) with a pair of triples and scored in double figures in both games, averaging 10.5 ppg. That matched his number of games with 10-plus points all season. His performance off the bench earned him a spot on the weekly Ivy League Honor Roll.

Offense Turned Off in League Play
Entering the start of Ivy League games, Dartmouth was averaging over 67 points a game while shooting 44.4 percent from the floor. But in the four games of conference play, those number have dropped precipitously to 54.5 ppg and 36.9 percent on field goals. The one area to improve has been free throws (75.0 percent against Ivy teams, 63.9 percent versus other opponents). Granted, three of those four Ivy games have been against two of the top three defenses, with another to come against the best (Yale) this weekend.

Get Carter
Two of Ian Carter's best games have come since the start of Ivy play. On Jan. 18, he was called upon to provide plenty of minutes for the Big Green with Chris Knight on the bench with foul trouble. The senior came through with a season-high 10 points on 3-of-6 from the floor and a perfect 4-of-4 at the foul line, plus grabbed five rebounds and dished out an assist without a turnover during his 20 minutes on the court. Then at Penn on Feb. 1, Carter pitched in eight points on 3-of-5 shooting while hauling in a career-high six rebounds.