Women Cagers Tumble to Third Ivy Loss

Remember last year's Harvard women's basketball team?

Great perimeter shooting, a strong defensive press and balanced shooting translated into a 9-3 Ivy league record and a piece of the league title.

So why--with Friday night's 64-44 defeat by Dartmouth at Alumni Gym in Hanover, N.H.--are the women's cagers off to a 0-3 Ivy start this year?

"The teams are out to prove that last year was a mistake, and they want blood," Harvard Coach Kathy Delaney Smith said.

And blood is exactly what they've been getting.

The 20-point trouncing by the Big Green--last year's co-champion--was just one more example of the sweet revenge Ivy teams have been exacting from last year's surprise Crimson (now 5-9 this year).

"The teams were a little unprepared for us last year," Delaney Smith said. With four league wins in the '83-'84 and '84-'85 seasons combined, the competition didn't expect much out of Harvard last winter. But this season things have changed.

"Teams are looking at us much differently," sophomore Sarah Duncan said. "And the attitude of the teams towards you makes a big difference."

Missing You

With the Crimson's key inside players from last season--Beth Chandler and Anna Collins--missing, the Big Green came on strong against starting guards Barb Keffer and Trisha Brown, and held the pair to a combined 10 points (on five-for-22 shooting).

"Teams know that we have great perimeter shooters and put undue pressure on the perimeter," Delaney Smith said. To offset the loss of strong scoring performances by its guards, Delaney Smith said that Harvard needed to capitalize on its play in the lane, but that the Crimson has yet to prove that its inside game can function without last year's power players Collins and Chandler.

Tentative

"We're tentative in there," Delaney Smith said. "We need to work on our inside so that the defense will have to play our inside game honestly."

One player who has demonstrated the ability to function under the hoop is junior Co-Captain Sharon Hayes. "We have been taking Sharon inside," Delaney Smith said, "but she is really more effective on the perimeter." Hayes doesn't appear to be suffering from the switch--she has scored in double figures in the last eight games, netting a team-high 14 points against the Big Green. Hayes also contributed nine rebounds, as did Duncan (10 points).

Harvard outrebounded Dartmouth, 50-41, and grabbed 22 offensive boards, but even the abundance of second-shot opportunities couldn't help improve the team's miserable 25 percent field goal shooting.

"We just couldn't put the ball in the basket," Brown said. Meanwhile, the Big Green shot 44 percent from the floor, with freshman Sophia Meely chipping in 23 points.

But it didn't look all bad for the women cagers. Dartmouth is "definitely beatable," according to Co-Captain Brown, and the Crimson isn't out of the running for the Ivy title yet.

"I believe the team that wins the Ivy League will have three or four losses," Delaney Smith predicted. Last year co-titlists Harvard and Dartmouth had three defeats apiece. And when Harvard returns to Briggs Athletic Center to face Brown February 6, the Crimson will have completed the bulk of its road schedule, with only two Ivy away games remaining.

Before returning to their homecourt, however, the women cagers have to meet--and beat--Cornell and Columbia to keep their title hopes alive.

"It's tough to win back-to-back road games, but we can't afford any more splits," Delaney Smith said. The Crimson face The Big Red in Ithaca, N.Y., February 1, and then travel to New York to complete a 14-game road streak with a match-up with the Lions the following night.