Tiger Attack In Women’s Ivy Madness Championship Downs Crimson

ITHACA, N.Y. - The Tigers pounced on the Crimson early and held on through numerous late pushes, as Harvard women’s basketball’s hopes at a return to March Madness were thwarted by No. 23 Princeton in a 63-53 loss in Saturday evening’s Ivy League Tournament Championship.

The Crimson (18-11, 10-4 Ivy) gave the Tigers (26-3, 12-2) a scare late in the game when it erased a twelve-point deficit and tied Princeton at 51-51 with four minutes to go, but the top seed went on an ensuing 11-0 killshot that sealed its sixth title in the last seven Ivy League tournaments.

“We missed some moments to really connect and attack them as a unit,” head coach Carrie Moore said. “We fought, which we always do, and we were able to tie it. But then we unraveled in those next two and a half minutes, and that was probably the difference in the game.”

“It’s just very unfortunate because I thought this was going to go a different way today,” Moore added.

Princeton junior Fadima Tall, the tournament’s Most Valuable Player, dominated the game from the start, collecting 20 points, seven rebounds, and four steals, all game-highs for the Tigers.

The Crimson — who won last year’s edition of Ivy Madness — was unable to find a spark early and faced an uphill climb all night long. Harvard ended the contest with 17 turnovers, enabling Princeton to score 13 points off turnovers and 12 fastbreak points on the night.

The Tigers forced nine turnovers in the first quarter and jumped out to a quick 15-5 lead, taking advantage of a visibly nervous Harvard offensive unit and frequently ripping the ball directly away from Crimson players.

“In the first quarter, it was almost as if they were bullying us,” Moore said. “Just ripping the ball out of our hands. We have got to be stronger. We have got to be tougher. I don’t expect that when you’re playing for a championship.”

In the second quarter, Harvard began to settle into the game and appeared to adjust to the high-stakes moment. The Crimson started to give Princeton trouble with on-ball pressure and punished the Tigers’ intense trap defense with well-timed backdoor cuts that led to open layups for the bigs.

Sophomore guard Nina Emnace drilled a three with seconds remaining in the half, cutting Princeton’s lead to 33-24 entering halftime.

Freshman guard Olivia Jones was a bright spot for Harvard in the first half, as she scored eight first-half points and looked confident on the perimeter and on the glass.

After securing six offensive rebounds on Friday against Columbia, the unanimous Ivy League Rookie of the Year brought down eight total rebounds in the championship.

“Her doing that as a first-year, you don’t see that too often,” Moore said. “And I thought she did everything she could to get us to a place where we could win another championship.”

Jones began the third quarter by continuing her momentum from earlier, drawing a foul on a made layup and converting a three-point play. Harvard started the first half with a 5-0 run that cut Princeton’s lead to 33-29, but Princeton replied with an 8-0 run.

In the midst of Harvard’s cold streak, White picked up her third foul of the game on a frustration play 93 feet away from the basket. Moore decided to quickly get White back into the game, risking a fourth foul, which would have knocked Harvard’s captain out until late in the game.

Moore’s decision paid off.

Immediately after White re-entered the game, Harvard took the lid off the basket with a mid-range jumper at the shot-clock buzzer by sophomore guard Lydia Charita. On the next possession, White scored her first points of the second half on a right-handed hook with two minutes left in the quarter.

Princeton struggled offensively for the remainder of the period, but a late second-chance basket by Krupa capped an 8-2 Harvard run to cut the deficit to 43-37 entering the final ten minutes.

The Crimson maintained its momentum to start the fourth quarter, stretching its run to 20-8 heading into the media timeout.

White asserted herself to start the quarter, scoring eight and assisting on a Krupa pick-and-roll to tally 10 of Harvard’s 12-6 advantage in the quarter, which tied the score at 49.

An exchange of baskets moved the tie to 51, and it was all Tigers from there. The Crimson seemed low on gas after a hard-fought, physical battle against Columbia the day before, and Princeton, which won handily over Brown in the semifinals, took advantage of its tired opponents to launch a 12-2 run to ice the game.

With their win on Saturday, the Tigers clinched a bid to the NCAA Tournament for the fifth straight season. Princeton — who is still nationally ranked — will likely claim an eight or nine seed in the tournament thanks to having just three losses against a fairly difficult schedule.

The Tigers will learn their seed and bracket placement on Sunday at 8:00 p.m. EDT during ESPN’s selection Sunday showcase.

The game marked the Crimson’s ninth loss to Princeton in the two teams’ last 10 meetings. Harvard went 1-4 in games decided by one possession during the regular season.

“It’s a game of inches, and we can’t quite do what you need to do to finish,” Moore said. “I think that’s something that we are probably going to feel for a while.”

“This team has been talking about big finishes all year long, and this is something I feel is going to fuel us for the future,” the coach added.

While the Crimson will lose seniors Krupa and guard Saniyah Glenn-Bello, both of its co-captains and top leading scorers — White and forward Abigail Wright — are juniors, so the future is bright for the Harvard team.

— Staff writer Connor Castañeda can be reached at [email protected].

— Staff writer Samuel S. Rudavsky can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on X at @samrudavsky.