News and Notes: Thursday Edition

Below, news and notes for Thursday...

• On Steve Donahue as a potential Penn coach, the Philly Inquirer writes:

There will be a caucus that backs Steve Donahue, as Inquirer columnist Mike Jensen does, and for very valid reasons. Donahue’s bona fides as a bench tactician are beyond reproach. his deep roots in the Philadelphia region.
But he’ll have to overcome questions about how much the Ivy League has changed since his glory days at Cornell and Penn.
And his backers among Penn alumni will have to overcome questions about what their true motive is. Do they truly believe he can win an Ivy League title, given how high Harvard has raised the bar? Do they see a Donahue hire as making good to their guy for his having been passed over in 2006, when Steve Bilsky hired Glen Miller?

• The Worcester Telegram lists Donahue as a candidate for Holy Cross, but Jersey Guy thinks he is a no brainer for Penn.

• The Auburn Citizen writes, "Well, you could root for another team and I have one in mind. As all of you know, Syracuse isn't the only Division I men's basketball team in upstate New York. Cornell, Colgate, SUNY Binghamton, SUNY Buffalo, Niagara, St. Bonaventure, Canisius, Siena and Marist also play but sadly, their seasons didn't result in a NCAA tournament bid."

• The Tuscon Sun writes:

Cornell grad Tarwater benefitting Bears

Partly because it's pretty tough to get into one of Cal's postgraduate programs, the Bears had never had one of those increasingly common grad transfers join their program. Until Tarwater did this season, having brought in some significant academic cred as a graduate of Cornell.
Especially after sophomore Kameron Rooks went down with a knee injury last summer, the Bears needed help up front. And Tarwater said he wanted to play at the highest level of college basketball for his final season of eligibility when he graduated last spring.
"It worked out great," Tarwater said. "It's been an amazing opportunity."
Tarwater said he is planning to finish a two-year master's degree in Public Health next year.

• The Chicago Tribune writes of Highland Park High School,  "This year's seniors became just the second Highland Park senior class to register back-to-back 20-win seasons after former Cornell guard Chris Wroblewski led the class of 2008 to the same feat seven years ago."

• Anchor of Gold mentions Nolan Cressler.

• The Ivy League named Shonn Miller First Team All Ivy League and writes of him:

...Cornell senior forward Shonn Miller (Euclid, Ohio) came back from a season-long injury a year ago to earn his second first-team All-Ivy honor. He became the fifth Big Red player to earn first-team All-Ivy honors at least twice, joining Bob DeLuca (1965-66), John Bajusz (1985-86-87), Louis Dale (2008-09-10) and Ryan Wittman (2008-09-10). Miller ranked second in the Ivy League in scoring (16.8 ppg.), rebounding (8.5 rpg.) and free-throw percentage (.834) and among the top 10 in blocks (fourth, 1.8) and steals (eighth, 1.3)...

PLAYER OF THE YEAR
Justin Sears, Yale (Jr., F - Plainfield, N.J.)

ROOKIE OF THE YEAR
Miles Wright, Dartmouth (Fr., G - Boston)

DEFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE YEAR
Steve Moundou-Missi, Harvard (Sr., F - Yaounde, Cameroon)

COACH OF THE YEAR
James Jones, Yale

FIRST TEAM ALL-IVY
*Maodo Lo, Columbia (Jr., G - Berlin)
*Shonn Miller, Cornell (Sr., F - Euclid, Ohio)
*Wesley Saunders, Harvard (Sr., G/F - Los Angeles)
*Javier Duren, Yale (Sr., G - St. Louis)
*Justin Sears, Yale (Jr., F - Plainfield, N.J.)

SECOND TEAM ALL-IVY^
Cedric Kuakumensah, Brown (Jr., F - Worcester, Mass.)
Gabas Maldunas, Dartmouth (Sr., C - Panevezys, Lithuania)
Alex Mitola, Dartmouth (Jr., G - Florham Park, N.J.)
Siyani Chambers, Harvard (Jr., G - Golden Valley, Minn.)
Steve Moundou-Missi, Harvard (Sr., F - Yaounde, Cameroon)
Steve Cook, Princeton (So., F - Winnetka, Ill.)
Spencer Weisz, Princeton (So., F - Florham Park, N.J.)

HONORABLE MENTION ALL-IVY
Rafael Maia, Brown (Sr., F - Sao Paulo)
Tony Hicks, Penn (Jr., G - South Holland, Ill.)

*Unanimous Selection
^Second team expanded from five players due to ties in voting

• Cornell Athletics adds on Miller:

ITHACA, N.Y. – The ballots for the 2014-15 All-Ivy League team looked nearly exactly the same, and each listed senior Shonn Miller as a first-team pick. The Cornell electric forward became the fifth player in school history to earn first-team All-Ivy honors at least twice in a career when the league announced the results of the vote by the conference's eight head coaches.

All five first-team selections were unanimous, with Miller joined by Yale Javier Duren and Justin Sears, Wesley Saunders of Harvard and Maodo Lo of Columbia. Sears was named Player of the Year, Harvard's Steve Moundou-Missi was the Defensive Player of the Year and Dartmouth's Miles Wright captured Rookie of the Year. After guiding Yale to a share of the Ancient Eight title, James Jones earned Coach of the Year accolades.

After missing the 2013-14 season due to injury, Miller regained his spot on the all-Ivy League first team that he also was selected to in 2012-13. In doing so, he became the fifth player in school history to earn first-team All-Ivy honors at least twice. He joins a list that includes Bob DeLuca (1965-66), John Bajusz (1985-86-87), Louis Dale (2008-09-10) and Ryan Wittman (2008-09-10).

Miller ranked second in the Ivy League in scoring (16.8 ppg.), rebounding (8.5 rpg.) and free-throw percentage (.834) and among the top 10 in blocks (fourth, 1.8) and steals (eighth, 1.3). The conference's leader in defensive rebounds, he ranks sixth nationally (7.53 per game). Overall, he ranks in the top 100 nationally in 11 different categories.

A two-time Ivy League Player of the Week, Miller recorded 11 double-doubles on the season and matched a school record with 18 in his three-year career. Miller became the school's seventh player to reach 500 points in a season with his 505 as a season. He became the first player to score 500 points and register 250 rebounds in a season, and also became the first Cornellian and fifth Ivy player to record 1,000 points, 600 rebounds, 100 blocks and 100 steals in a career.

Miller closed his Cornell career with a flourish, scoring at least 23 points in four of his final five games and averaging 22.0 points and 9.8 rebounds per game over that span. He had three different games of at least 15 rebounds and 12 games with at least 20 points.

In just three seasons, Miller did his best making his mark on the school's record book. He sits in the top 20 all-time in scoring (19th, 1,065), rebounding (14th, 608), steals (11th, 126), blocked shots (fourth, 154), free throws made (13th, 266) and free-throw percentage (18th. .785).

With Miller back in the lineup, Cornell became one of the nation's most improved team. The Big Red improved by a school record 11 wins, improving from two wins to a 13-17 finish that included fifth place in the conference after being picked to place last in the preseason.

News and Notes: Tuesday Edition

Below, news and notes for Tuesday...

• The Ivy League named Shonn Miller to its weekly Honor Roll and notes:

Shonn Miller, Cornell (Sr., F - Euclid, Ohio)
25 points, 8 rebounds at Princeton
23 points, 8 rebounds, 2 blocks, 2 steals at Penn

PLAYER OF THE WEEK

Week 1, 11/17/14-Shonn Miller, Cornell
Week 2, 11/24/14-Justin Sears, Yale
Week 3, 12/1/14-Wes Saunders, Harvard
Week 4, 12/8/14-Javier Duren, Yale
Week 5, 12/15/14-Cedric Kuakumensah, Brown*
Week 6, 12/22/14-Maodo Lo, Columbia
Week 7,12/29/14-Shonn Miller, Cornell
Week 8, 1/5/15-Javier Duren, Yale
Week 9, 1/12/15-Henry Caruso, Princeton
Week 10, 1/19/15-Javier Duren, Yale
Week 11, 1/26/15-Justin Sears, Yale/Alex Mitola, Dartmouth
Week 12, 2/2/15-Justin Sears, Yale
Week 13, 2/9/15-Wes Saunders, Harvard
Week 14, 2/16/15-Justin Sears, Yale
Week 15, 2/23/15-Maodo Lo, Columbia/Wes Saunders, Harvard
Week 16, 3/2/15-Justin Sears, Yale/Malik Gill, Dartmouth
Week 17, 3/9/15-Maodo Lo, Columbia

ROOKIE OF THE WEEK

Week 1, 11/17/14-Antonio Woods, Penn
Week 2, 11/24/14-Mike Auger, Penn
Week 3, 12/1/14-Amir Bell, Princeton
Week 4, 12/8/14-Darnell Foreman, Penn
Week 5, 12/15/14-Sam Jones, Penn*
Week 6, 12/22/14-Kyle Castlin, Columbia
Week 7, 12/30/14-Aaron Young, Princeton
Week 8, 1/5/15-Kyle Castlin, Columbia
Week 9, 1/12/15-Makai Mason, Yale
Week 10, 1/19/15-Antonio Woods, Penn
Week 11, 1/26/15-Aaron Young, Princeton
Week 12, 2/2/15-Kyle Castlin, Columbia
Week 13, 2/9/15-Miles Wright, Dartmouth
Week 14, 2/16/15-Miles Wright, Dartmouth
Week 15, 2/23/15-Antonio Woods, Penn
Week 16, 3/2/15-Antonio Woods, Penn
Week 17, 3/9/15-Antonio Woods, Penn

* = Cornell idle

• Cornell is now the only Ivy League team to not have participated in the postseason since the 2010-2011 season.  See the Valley News on Dartmouth's invite to the CIT.  Other low points for Cornell in the last five seasons include the following:
• Last year, Cornell (2-26 in 2013-2014) suffered its worst season in program history, dating back to 1898;
• Cornell has suffered five consecutive seasons under .500 overall;
• Cornell has suffered five consecutive seasons in the "lower division" of the Ivy League;
• Cornell has suffered five consecutive overall losing seasons;
• Cornell has suffered four of its last five seasons under .500 in Ivy League play.

• On the NCAA Tournament, The Wichita Eagle writes, "The difference between a No. 4 and No. 5 is significant. In the past five seasons (ignoring First Four games), No. 13 seeds are 6-20 in the tournament with two schools (LaSalle, Ohio) in the Sweet 16. No. 12 seeds are 13-20 with three Sweet 16s (Oregon, Richmond, Cornell)."
  
  Read more here: http://www.kansas.com/sports/college/wichita-state/shockwaves/article13097525.html#storylink=cp"

• The Daily Pennsylvanian analyzes Penn's coaching candidates and two of them have Cornell connections:

Steve Donahue

Current Position: ESPN college basketball announcer
Coaching Record: 146-138, 78-62 Ivy in 10 seasons at Cornell; 54-76 in four seasons at Boston College.
Resume: Of any candidate for Penn’s head coaching position, Donahue has the most Ivy League success on his resume. Donahue served as a long-time assistant at Penn from 1990-2000 under former head coach Fran Dunphy. The Quakers won five Ivy titles during that span, including three straight titles from 1993-95 with Allen as the star player. Donahue moved from an assistant at Penn to the head coaching position at Cornell, where he served for 10 years. His tenure started out slowly but his Big Red squads finished above .500 in Ivy play during each of his last six years.
From 2008-10, Donahue’s Cornell teams won three straight Ivy titles while making the Sweet 16 in 2010. It was the first time in Ivy history that a school other than Penn or Princeton won three consecutive titles, a mark that has since been achieved by Tommy Amaker and Harvard. Following the 2010 season, Donahue moved on to Boston College to become the head coach. The Eagles did not make the NCAA Tournament during Donahue’s four years at BC and he was fired after the 2013-14 season.
Why he should be hired: There are plenty of positives for Donahue, who ESPN’s Jeff Goodman reported will be a serious candidate for the position. He has a clear familiarity with Penn and the Ivy League from the first 20 years of his time as a Division I coach. He brings an analytical approach to the game (just watch one of his ESPN broadcasts) that could be an interesting change of pace for Penn. Furthermore, Donahue’s top assistant is already on staff for Penn as Nat Graham moved to Penn after Donahue’s ouster at BC. While any potential coach could choose to keep one of the current assistants on staff, that kind of familiarity between Donahue and Graham could prove invaluable.
Question Marks: While Donahue’s success at Cornell is undeniable, the question becomes how Penn will view his exit at Boston College. If Calhoun and company are willing to overlook his losing record in Chestnut Hill, Mass., Donahue’s chances of getting the job become significantly higher.

***

Yanni Hufnagel

Current Position: Assistant coach at California
Coaching Record: No Division I head coaching experience
Resume: The 32-year-old assistant may be one of the hottest coaching commodities out there with a sterling reputation as a top-notch recruiter. Hufnagel graduated from Cornell in 2006 and moved to a graduate assistant role at Oklahoma while current Los Angeles Clippers star Blake Griffin was there. After working in Norman from 2007-09, he found his way to Amaker’s staff at Harvard, where he flourished. The Crimson went 90-30 with Hufnagel on the sidelines while the young assistant had a large hand in getting some strong recruits to Cambridge. He also played a significant role in developing Harvard’s backcourt, including players like Jeremy Lin, Wesley Saunders and Siyani Chambers.
After four seasons at Harvard, Hufnagel moved to Vanderbilt last season to serve as an assistant for Kevin Stallings. He was Vanderbilt’s recruiting coordinator and helped land a strong freshman class for Commodores. Hufnagel joined Cal's new head coach, Cuonzo Martin, prior to this season, working as an assistant for the Golden Bears.
Why he should be hired: Hufnagel is a coach on the rise and will be highly sought after when he looks for his first head coaching position. His ability to recruit should have athletic directors around the nation drooling since he can turn around a program with quality players. His upbeat and positive personality is a plus as well. Hufnagel has also worked within the Ivy League recently and played a significant role into turning Harvard into the mini-dynasty the Crimson have become. Penn would likely be one of the jobs in the Ancient Eight that would entice Hufnagel despite his status as an assistant at a Power Five conference school.
Question Marks: The only question here is whether Penn is willing to overlook his lack of Division I head coaching experience. Hufnagel has proven himself within the Ivy League and is likely to be well on his way to become a head coach somewhere, but the fact remains that he does not possess the type of head coaching experience that Donahue and Toole (to name a few) do. Will that be held against him? Only time will tell.

News and Notes: Friday Edition

Below, news and notes...

• The Boston Globe writes:

"As startling as the news was when Harvard fell to Cornell a week ago creating a tie atop the Ivy, [Yale coach, James] Jones had the final meeting with Harvard pinpointed as the game that would decide the league.  “I told the guys that it was always going to come down to this weekend,” Jones said. “I felt that in my heart. I didn’t think either team was going to be good enough to separate itself from the other enough where this weekend wouldn’t matter.”

• The Yale Daily News writes of tonight's Harvard-Yale game, "As the loss against Cornell emphasized, [Harvard's Wes] Saunders cannot be the only scoring option if the team expects to come out on top...If the Yale defense can follow Cornell’s example and step up and limit the efficiency of Saunders and his supporting cast, the Bulldogs can be on the other end of a gritty game this time around."

• Cornell Athletics' Game Notes for the weekend state in part, "With a .500 season or better, the Big Red will have an opportunity to earn a spot in a postseason tournament."  Cornell must win both of its games this weekend to do so.

• The Ivy League's weekly notes state in part:

MEN'S MATCHUPS FOR MARCH 6

Cornell (13-15, 5-7, Ivy) at Princeton (13-14, 6-5 Ivy)
Date: Friday, March 6 – 7 p.m.
Location: Jadwin Gymnasium • Princeton, N.J.
Live Broadcast: The Ivy League Digital Network
Cornell-Princeton Series: Princeton leads, 141-80
Last Meeting: Cornell 68, Princeton 60 • 2/7/15 • Ithaca, N.Y.
Live Stats | Cornell Game Notes | Princeton Game Notes

***

MEN'S MATCHUPS FOR MARCH 7

Cornell at Penn
Date: Saturday, March 7 – 7 p.m.
Location: The Palestra • Philadelphia
Live Broadcast: The Ivy League Digital Network
Cornell-Penn Series: Penn leads, 149-74
Last Meeting: Penn 71, Cornell 69 • 2/6/15 • Ithaca, N.Y.
Live Stats | Cornell Game Notes | Penn Game Notes

• Previewing Penn's weekend, the Daily Pennsylvanian writes, "The Red and Blue's last win came against their opponent on Saturday night, the Big Red. Though Cornell (13-15, 5-7) has dropped four of its last five, the Big Red shocked Harvard at home behind 24 points and 15 rebounds from forward Shonn Miller.  Miller also had a monster game against Penn in the Quakers' win on Feb. 6, posting 20 points and 10 rebounds to pace the Big Red. However, the Euclid, Ohio, native was outdone by Red and Blue junior captain Tony Hicks, who scored 25 points and hit a game-winning floater with four seconds left in overtime."

• The Ivy League named Shonn Miller to its weekly Honor Roll and notes:

Shonn Miller, Cornell (Sr., F - Euclid, Ohio)
24 points, 15 rebounds, 3 blocks vs. Harvard
11 points, 10 rebounds vs. Dartmouth

PLAYER OF THE WEEK

Week 1, 11/17/14-Shonn Miller, Cornell
Week 2, 11/24/14-Justin Sears, Yale
Week 3, 12/1/14-Wes Saunders, Harvard
Week 4, 12/8/14-Javier Duren, Yale
Week 5, 12/15/14-Cedric Kuakumensah, Brown*
Week 6, 12/22/14-Maodo Lo, Columbia
Week 7,12/29/14-Shonn Miller, Cornell
Week 8, 1/5/15-Javier Duren, Yale
Week 9, 1/12/15-Henry Caruso, Princeton
Week 10, 1/19/15-Javier Duren, Yale
Week 11, 1/26/15-Justin Sears, Yale/Alex Mitola, Dartmouth
Week 12, 2/2/15-Justin Sears, Yale
Week 13, 2/9/15-Wes Saunders, Harvard
Week 14, 2/16/15-Justin Sears, Yale
Week 15, 2/23/15-Maodo Lo, Columbia/Wes Saunders, Harvard
Week 16, 3/2/15-Justin Sears, Yale/Malik Gill, Dartmouth

ROOKIE OF THE WEEK

Week 1, 11/17/14-Antonio Woods, Penn
Week 2, 11/24/14-Mike Auger, Penn
Week 3, 12/1/14-Amir Bell, Princeton
Week 4, 12/8/14-Darnell Foreman, Penn
Week 5, 12/15/14-Sam Jones, Penn*
Week 6, 12/22/14-Kyle Castlin, Columbia
Week 7, 12/30/14-Aaron Young, Princeton
Week 8, 1/5/15-Kyle Castlin, Columbia
Week 9, 1/12/15-Makai Mason, Yale
Week 10, 1/19/15-Antonio Woods, Penn
Week 11, 1/26/15-Aaron Young, Princeton
Week 12, 2/2/15-Kyle Castlin, Columbia
Week 13, 2/9/15-Miles Wright, Dartmouth
Week 14, 2/16/15-Miles Wright, Dartmouth
Week 15, 2/23/15-Antonio Woods, Penn
Week 16, 3/2/15-Antonio Woods, Penn

* = Cornell idle

• The Big Red Sports Network interviewed Shonn Miller:

BRSN: Shonn, thanks for taking the time out to speak with us. After defeating Harvard on Friday, you moved the Crimson from the outright first place spot in the Ivy League into a tie with Yale. How did it feel for you, and as a team, to knock off Harvard, especially in front of Newman Nation on senior weekend?
SM: For myself and the rest of the seniors, it was a great feeling because it was the first time we had beaten them in our entire career. That may have been added motivation going into that game as well. We all knew that it was one of our last chances to play in front of our home fans and we wanted to make memories and go out with a bang.
BRSN: You eclipsed the 1,000 career point mark on Friday, and stand as one of only 25 Cornell players to do so. What does this accomplishment mean to you, as you further etch your name into the program record books?
SM: Reaching that milestone was very special to me. Although it is an individual accolade, I feel as though it is a team accomplishment. Of the three different teams that I’ve played on, each person on those teams provided help to put me in a position to be able to put the ball in the basket, so the credit really goes to those guys.
BRSN: Coming into senior weekend, what was the atmosphere like around the team and the locker room? What was the mentality of yourself and the rest of the team going into Friday and Saturday?
SM: I’d say the atmosphere was electric and exciting because all of the underclassmen wanted to send the seniors out on a good note. We were focused all week in practice and wanted to come out and execute our game plan. 
BRSN: After missing your whole junior season due to the shoulder surgery, can you talk briefly about returning to have such an outstanding senior campaign?
SM: Sitting out last year allowed me to view the game from a different perspective and gave me a new appreciation for basketball. Sitting on the sidelines and feeling that there is so much you could do to help your team, but physically not being able to go out and do it is a feeling that I’ll never forget. Coming into this year, I just wanted to fully take advantage of the opportunity in front of me and put my best foot forward.
BRSN: Looking back on the beginning of the year, how do you think the team has changed and improved over the course of the season?
SM: I think that we’ve definitely grown a lot since our first game down at George Mason. The underclassmen have matured a lot and as a team, we’ve learned how to better deal with adversity. 
BRSN: What is one thing that most people don’t know about you that you would like to share with fans of Cornell and, more specifically, Big Red basketball?
SM: A lot of people see me and think that I’m a really quiet and reserved person, and for the most part I am, but when I get on the court I’m a completely different person. Whether that’s getting on guys when they make certain mistakes or motivating people to get them at their best. I’m a lot more vocal than people would think.
BRSN: While wrapping up a terrific career for the Big Red, what are some of your most memorable experiences or highlights of your time on the hill?
SM: Some of my most memorable highlights boil down to being around my teammates and hanging out and having fun. From the trip to Vegas to hanging out in Ithaca on New Year’s when no one else is around, I definitely think that being around the people who I’m going to be friends with for the rest of my life is the thing I’ve enjoyed the most.

• The New York Times published a feature on Shonn Miller and writes:

Ivy Player Has Eligibility Remaining, but Not in Ivy League
Shonn Miller Will Have to Leave Cornell Because of Rule on Graduate Students

ITHACA, N.Y. — After one of his final basketball practices at Cornell, Shonn Miller sat in the bleachers at Newman Arena, his eyes fixed on teammates who were still shooting jumpers.

Miller, a senior, laughed when asked if he would rather be with them on the floor than talking about his playing career, in which he established himself as one of the most accomplished players in program history and a candidate for Ivy League player of the year this season.

Miller, who missed last season after shoulder surgery, is in the curious position of having a year of eligibility left but not being able to use it at Cornell. An Ivy League rule forbids the participation of graduate students, so Miller will essentially be a free agent come his graduation in May.

His plans include contributing to another college team next season, most likely one with N.C.A.A. tournament hopes, but that is low among his current priorities. With two regular-season games to go at Cornell, he is trying to lead the Big Red to their own postseason appearance.

“He’s not going to worry about that until he’s done playing at Cornell,” Coach Bill Courtney said about his star player’s decision about where to play next. “These are his guys. He wants to win for them.”

Miller, who was Courtney’s first recruit at Cornell, would not be the only Big Red player to use his final season of eligibility at another Division I program. Errick Peck averaged 4.6 points a game for Purdue last season after earning a bachelor’s degree in communications from Cornell. Dwight Tarwater is averaging 3.7 points a game at Cal this season after graduating from Cornell in 2014. So-called graduate transfers can play right away.

“Unfortunately, that’s the way it plays out,” Galal Cancer, a Cornell senior, said about parting with some of his teammates because of the rule.

In November, Alex Rosenberg, a Columbia student, fractured his foot before the season. He took the unusual step of withdrawing, allowing him to return to the university and the team as a senior next season.

Miller was the Ivy League rookie of the year in 2011-12. As a sophomore, he was having an All-Ivy season and had Cornell close to postseason eligibility when he injured a shoulder in a game at Princeton. The Big Red lost their final four games without him, finishing 13-18. Shoulder surgery sidelined him for his junior year, and the Big Red were 2-26.

“I kind of let us down in a way,” Miller said of his injury. “For me, it was one of the worst feelings basketball-wise that I’ve felt, ever.”

But he began to see the game differently while on the sideline, envisioning spots where he could have helped on defense or in executing an offensive plan.

“It was huge for him to learn the game from sitting on the bench,” Courtney said. “He was able to see it as a coach. He matured a little bit. He wasn’t a leader before. He came back a leader because he understood what we’re trying to accomplish.”

Miller has played in all 28 games for Cornell this season, spurring one of the nation’s best turnarounds. He is averaging 16.3 points a game, third in the Ivy League, and 8.5 rebounds, which is first.

Although Cornell (13-15 over all, 5-7 Ivy League) will not be playing in the N.C.A.A. tournament, it may be invited to the CollegeInsider.com tournament, the College Basketball Invitational or the National Invitation Tournament if it can defeat Princeton and Pennsylvania this weekend and finish 15-15.

But for Miller, playing in any postseason tournament is more important now than what may lie ahead. Next season, Miller could play for a program where an N.C.A.A. tournament berth is expected or a national championship might be possible.

He does not like discussing his post-Cornell playing career. Courtney met with Miller and his mother, Stephanie Williams, before the season and agreed that Miller should focus on completing his senior year at Cornell.

“Right now, it’s about Cornell,” Williams said. “If he thinks about going somewhere else, it would be difficult to give his all to his basketball teammates, his studies. Teams that want him are going to wait for him, and if they can’t wait, they don’t really need him.”

Coaches who call Courtney, Williams or Miller’s high school coaches at St. Ignatius in Cleveland receive the same message.

“I politely tell them, thank you for your interest,” Williams said. “When the season is over — sometime after, not the day after the season is over — I will definitely get in contact with you, and we will schedule something. It will be after he has some time to digest.”

Courtney called Miller, who is 6 feet 7 inches and has the ability to play both ends of the floor from the perimeter and the interior, the most talented player he has coached in his five years at Cornell.

Miller’s appeal was evident Friday night in an upset of Harvard (20-6, 10-2), which is tied with Yale for first in the Ivy League. Miller had 24 points and 15 rebounds in a 57-49 victory, highlighted by a reverse dunk off an alley-oop pass.

After the game, Harvard Coach Tommy Amaker said he thought Miller, who is third in the Ivy League in blocks and second in free-throw percentage at 83.4 percent, could have an impact at a major Division I program next season.

Despite often being the best player on the floor this season, Miller rarely calls for the ball or shows emotion after game-changing plays.

Early in the second half against Harvard, Miller, whose shooting beyond the arc has been one of his few weaknesses (27 for 96, or 28.1 percent), hit a 3-pointer that gave Cornell a 34-23 lead. As the Cornell student body came to life, the Crimson called a timeout, and Miller quietly walked to the sideline. Three minutes later, he hit another for a 40-28 lead as his teammates began jumping off the bench.

With Cornell in control late, Miller sealed the victory with 1 minute 16 seconds remaining, hitting a pull-up jumper to put the Big Red ahead, 50-41. He then turned toward Cornell’s student section, yelling while pounding his chest.

“It was just like, a lot built up until that point,” Miller said.

Two years after he watched his team’s postseason chances dissipate, Miller helped Cornell defeat Harvard for the first time in his career and ensured Cornell would remain in the hunt for a postseason berth.

Courtney said Miller’s commitment to the program had been unparalleled.

“People look at him and think he’s not into the game or think he’s floating,” Courtney said. “But he’s the most intense competitor I’ve ever coached.”

He added: “You look at him tonight: There’s no place in the country he can’t play.”

• Bloomberg notes that The Basketball Tournament is back with an even more significant cash prize and writes, "The tournament brought former college teams together, including a number of recent Princeton graduates, and a large core of the 2010 Cornell team that advanced to the round of 16 in the NCAA tournament."

• One Bid Wonders interviewed Binghamton's Marlon Beck and writes in part:

“A few Ivy League schools were looking at me like Cornell and Princeton,” Beck says. Beck was very interested in playing for Cornell, but after the Big Red signed several other guards, he didn’t see much opportunity to ever see the floor for Cornell. “The communication lacked, so I backed away,” he says, adding “I had to open my options.”

• Ivy Hoops Online summarized last Friday's win over Harvard as, "Well, then. The Big Red raced to a 22-21 halftime lead and out-Crimsoned the Crimson in the second half, pulling away with stout defense and efficient shooting. Shonn Miller fired on all cylinders to the tune of 24 points, 15 boards and three blocks. In a season in which Miller has consistently struggled beyond the arc, a pair of Miller treys midway through the second stanza signaled this wasn’t Harvard’s night. The Big Red’s win snaps their nine-game losing streak against Harvard as well as the Crimson’s 12-game win streak in Ivy road games, dropping Harvard to 4-7 at home this season. Most importantly, the loss drops the Crimson to 9-2 in Ivy play."   

• The Crimson also broke down Cornell's win over Harvard last Friday.

• The SF Chronicle profiled Dwight Tarwater ('14) before his senior day at Cal:

Dwight Tarwater has gone through the sappy routine before. In the minutes leading up to Cal’s meeting with Oregon State on Sunday, Tarwater will walk to midcourt and be honored with Cal teammates David Kravish and Christian Behrens for Senior Day. It will be his second senior ceremony in two years. “I’ve got a lot of practice walking to midcourt as a senior,” Tarwater said. After four years and 79 games — including Senior Day — with Cornell’s program, Tarwater came to Cal as a graduate transfer with a year of eligibility. Although the plan was to get his master’s degree in public health while trying to compete at college basketball’s highest level, he wound up a starter. “I figured I had a little more in the tank,” Tarwater said. His connection to Cal head coach Cuonzo Martin runs through Knoxville, Tenn., which is Tarwater’s hometown. Martin spent three years coaching at Tennessee and had a next-door neighbor who worked with Tarwater’s father. Tarwater worked out at Tennessee during his offseasons. Still, he says the close proximity wasn’t a major factor in choosing Cal. “I can only imagine where we’d be without him,” Martin said. Although Tarwater is listed at 6-foot-6, Martin said he’s actually closer to 6-foot-4. However, he’s broad and strong, so he starts at power forward and guards bigger opponents. He’s not a major factor offensively, but he doesn’t make mistakes and provides a measure of consistency on an otherwise inconsistent team. Simply, he’s filled the role Martin asked of him. “He’s done an admirable job,” Martin said. “His intelligence, his awareness, his understanding. … He’s a guy that’s playing for California. He’s playing to win basketball games.”

•  Recapping last weekend, the Cornell Daily Sun writes:

Shonn Miller thumped his chest as he ran across the court, emphatically nodding at the crowd. Shon Miller, who normally keeps his emotions in check while on the floor, had reason to celebrate. He had just hit a shot that put Harvard away for good. Ivy League leader Harvard. Three time defending champion Harvard. “I normally look mad or I don’t show emotion at all, but I just felt, when I hit that shot, ‘yes,’ it feels good, the crowd’s into it, we’re heading towards a win,” the 6’7” senior said. “We finally beat them for the first time in my career. It was just a lot built up to that point.” The victory was the first for the Red against Harvard in five years and was head coach Bill Courtney’s first career victory over the Crimson (20-6, 10-2 Ivy). The game snapped a three-game losing skid for the Red (13-15, 5-7) and kept playoff hopes alive. But it almost did not happen. In the Red’s previous game this year against Harvard, Cornell took a three-point lead into halftime, but was unable to maintain the lead as the Crimson went on a 24-2 run that silenced any hopes of an upset. Friday’s game could have very easily followed the same script. But, unlike last game in which the Red wilted in the second half, Cornell came out strong by making shots, forcing turnovers and playing suffocating defense. As the Red got going, the crowd’s excitement began to grow. “When we go small and apply our full court pressure, that really gets the crowd excited. I think we really fuel off that energy,” said senior guard Galal Cancer. “When the crowd is into it, it really propels us.” Cornell took a 12-point lead off of a Shon Miller 3-pointer with 10:48 to go. Harvard immediately responded with a 3-pointer of its own as the shot clock expired on the next possession. More hot shooting from the Crimson narrowed the lead to three with 5:27 left. The crowd, which had been deafening only moments earlier, was quieted and it seemed like all the momentum had swung back to Harvard. With under two minutes on the clock, the Red had brought the lead back up to seven, but the game was far from over. Harvard guard Corbin Miller, one of the best free throw shooters in the league, was fouled on a 3-pointer attempt. With the crowd screaming, he missed all three shots. “That will probably never happen again in his career,” said Harvard guard Wesley Saunders about the missed free throws. “He can make free throws with his eyes closed.” Saunders, the reigning Ivy League Player of the Year, scored a team-high 19 points but needed 21 shots to get there. In a battle of two top candidates for Player of the Year, it was Shonn Miller who shined the brightest, totaling 24 points and 15 rebounds. And it was Shonn Miller, not Saunders, who made clutch baskets down the stretch to give his team the lead. Following Corbin Miller’s missed free throws, Shonn Miller got the ball and effortlessly knocked down a jump-shot to put the Red up by nine with a little over a minute remaining, effectively ending the game. Harvard started fouling and Cornell, the best free throw shooting team in the league, connected on all but one free throw to end the game and complete the upset. “[Shon Miller] was aggressive right from the beginning. No hesitation, whether it was driving to the basket, or from three point range,” Courtney said. “That’s the guy we thought he could be at the beginning of the year. He’s shown flashes of that but i don’t think he’s put together a complete game like that all year.” With 21 total offensive boards, Harvard out-rebounded Cornell, 43-33. Courtney acknowledged that his team is often outsized in the paint, but says his players’ hustle is what allows them to overcome size differences. “If you look at any game of ours, when we’ve been successful, it’s because we’ve been the more scrappy team, the more aggressive team,” he said. “I think that at the end of the day, our grit and hustle really helped us win.” Harvard, who entered the contest with just one Ivy League loss, was nationally ranked to start the season. Coming off three consecutive NCAA tournament appearances, the Crimson seemed to be on the path towards a fourth. The Red may have derailed that. Courtney joked after the game that Yale’s head coach may send him a thank you note for allowing the Bulldogs back into Ivy contention. After the weekend, Harvard and Yale are tied for first place, with two games to play. Harvard’s first in-conference loss came against Dartmouth (12-14, 5-7 Ivy), who the Red hosted on Saturday night for Senior Night. A ceremony before the game honored the six seniors on the team. In a rematch of Cornell’s overtime win several weeks ago, the Red looked to capitalize on its momentum from Friday’s big upset. Cornell was within one with five minutes to play in the first half, but a red-hot shooting streak from the Green allowed Dartmouth to furiously go up by 12 at the end of the half. The Green extended the lead to 20 with seven minutes to play and the game seemed out of reach. But Cornell did not cede the game just yet. A couple of quick shots and Dartmouth turnovers and the Red found itself down by just eight with a little under five minutes to play. Sophomore guard Robert Hatter, who struggled to shoot against Harvard, was the brawn behind this run, getting to the rim and drawing contact. He scored the Red’s first eight points of the game and finished with 23. “Hatter’s always aggressive. Whether [or not] he’s missed his first seven shots, he’s going to continue to shoot. He drives me nuts sometimes as a coach, but you gotta live with that because he continues to fight,” Courtney said. Following a steal on an inbounds pass, sophomore guard JoJo Fallas turned the ball over and Dartmouth scored on the other end, pushing the lead back to double digits. The Red kept up the pressure, but there just wasn’t enough time on the clock. Dartmouth won, 56-45. Cornell shot 54 percent in the first matchup against Dartmouth this season. On Saturday, the Red managed to shoot just 35 percent. “We didn’t make the shots and that’s kind of been the story of this group. Especially at the beginning of the game, we got some open looks, but we missed the shots,” Courtney said. “I felt like we started to force a little bit, trying to make plays instead of going to the open guy.” With 42 seconds left in the game, Courtney took his seniors off the court. The crowd responded with a standing ovation, thanking the seniors for their years of work. “We’re like brothers, we’ve lived together all four years,” Cancer said of his fellow seniors. “We really thought we could something special. Those are some talented guys. I’m proud to have had these guys as my teammates. It was just a great experience overall.”

News and Notes: Friday Edition

Below, news and notes...

• Game Notes to this weekend's games can be found at Cornell Athletics, Harvard Athletics and Dartmouth Athletics.

• Vote for Shonn Miller as Mid Major Player of the Year on College Court Report.

• The Ivy League named Galal Cancer to its weekly Honor Roll and notes:

Galal Cancer, Cornell (Sr., G - Albany, N.Y.)
19 points, 3 rebounds at Yale
13 points, 1 rebound, 2 assists at Brown

PLAYER OF THE WEEK

Week 1, 11/17/14-Shonn Miller, Cornell
Week 2, 11/24/14-Justin Sears, Yale
Week 3, 12/1/14-Wes Saunders, Harvard
Week 4, 12/8/14-Javier Duren, Yale
Week 5, 12/15/14-Cedric Kuakumensah, Brown*
Week 6, 12/22/14-Maodo Lo, Columbia
Week 7,12/29/14-Shonn Miller, Cornell
Week 8, 1/5/15-Javier Duren, Yale
Week 9, 1/12/15-Henry Caruso, Princeton
Week 10, 1/19/15-Javier Duren, Yale
Week 11, 1/26/15-Justin Sears, Yale/Alex Mitola, Dartmouth
Week 12, 2/2/15-Justin Sears, Yale
Week 13, 2/9/15-Wes Saunders, Harvard
Week 14, 2/16/15-Justin Sears, Yale
Week 15, 2/23/15-Maodo Lo, Columbia/Wes Saunders, Harvard

ROOKIE OF THE WEEK

Week 1, 11/17/14-Antonio Woods, Penn
Week 2, 11/24/14-Mike Auger, Penn
Week 3, 12/1/14-Amir Bell, Princeton
Week 4, 12/8/14-Darnell Foreman, Penn
Week 5, 12/15/14-Sam Jones, Penn*
Week 6, 12/22/14-Kyle Castlin, Columbia
Week 7, 12/30/14-Aaron Young, Princeton
Week 8, 1/5/15-Kyle Castlin, Columbia
Week 9, 1/12/15-Makai Mason, Yale
Week 10, 1/19/15-Antonio Woods, Penn
Week 11, 1/26/15-Aaron Young, Princeton
Week 12, 2/2/15-Kyle Castlin, Columbia
Week 13, 2/9/15-Miles Wright, Dartmouth
Week 14, 2/16/15-Miles Wright, Dartmouth
Week 15, 2/23/15-Antonio Woods, Penn

* = Cornell idle

•  The Ithaca Journal previews Cornell's Senior Weekend:

"Newman Nation" will bid farewell to six seniors this weekend as the Cornell men's basketball team plays its final home games of the regular season against Harvard and Dartmouth.
The Big Red (12-14 overall, 4-6 Ivy League) hosts the first-place Crimson (19-5, 9-1) at 6:30 p.m. on Friday in a game to be shown on the CBS Sports Network (Time Warner channel 315). Then on Saturday, Cornell welcomes Dartmouth (10-14, 3-7) to Newman Arena for a 6 p.m. tip-off.
This weekend will be the final home games for Cornell's six upperclassmen -- forwards Shonn Miller, Deion Giddens and Ned Tomic, center Dave LaMore and guards Galal Cancer and Devin Cherry. The group will be honored in a ceremony prior to tip-off on Saturday.
Miller and Cancer have keyed the Big Red's turnaround from last year's 2-26 campaign, which both players missed, Miller due to a shoulder injury and Cancer for personal reasons. Miller, a strong Ivy Player of the Year candidate, is second in the league in both scoring (16.2 ppg.) and rebounding (8.2 ppg.), third in blocked shots (1.9 per game) and fifth in free-throw percentage (83.5, 116-for-139).
Cancer is fourth on the team in scoring (9.9 ppg.), behind sophomore guard Robert Hatter (11.5 ppg.) and Cherry (10.4 ppg.)
Defense has been another big reason for the 10-game improvement thus far — Cornell is holding opponents to 38.4 percent shooting from the floor and 31.6 percent from beyond the arc.
Harvard, the preseason favorite in the league, has won eight in a row since being upset at home by Dartmouth, 70-61, on Jan. 24. The Crimson is led by All-Ivy senior swingman Wesley Saunders (16.2 ppg.) and junior guard Siyani Chambers (9.7 ppg., 4.1 apg.). The Crimson has been winning with defense; it ranks 11th in the nation at 56.6 points per game allowed.
The Crimson stormed past the Red, 61-40, in their first meeting on Feb. 14 in Cambridge, Mass.
Dartmouth, which takes on Columbia Friday night in New York, has won two of its last three after dropping an 81-72 overtime decision to Cornell two weeks ago in Hanover, N.H. Alex Mitola (12.7 ppg.) and Gabas Maldunas (11.2 ppg.) lead the club offensively.
***
Cornell basketball
MEN
Friday: Harvard (19-5 overall, 9-1 Ivies) at Cornell (12-14, 4-6), 6:30 p.m., Newman Arena
Saturday: Dartmouth (10-14, 3-7; at Columbia Friday) at Cornell, 6 p.m., Newman Arena

• Black Shoe Diaries referred to Penn State's win over Cornell in November as a "miracle finish."

• Previewing the weekend, the Harvard Crimson writes in part:

The penultimate weekend of Ivy League play is upon us, dear reader. The allure of spring break, shining like The Strip in the far distance, is obscured by the impending cloud of midterms and blocking group drama. Housing day teasers have begun to usurp trite Buzzfeed articles on the author’s ever-prescient Facebook Timeline. As muddy ice piles grow, the Brown school newspaper’s blog has debuted a “Lana del Foreplay” column to keep spirits high amongst yet another Derrick Rose injury.
Indeed, it can only be spring.
Last weekend brought some more clarity to the Ivy League title picture. The Gentleman’s C’s continued their up and down play; a week after losing to Dartmouth, Columbia swept Brown and Yale to knock the Elis a full game back of leader Harvard. Cornell looked dispirited in consecutive losses, with its offense dropping to 307th in Ken Pomeroy’s standings.
Harvard completed a four-game home sweep with a now-characteristic dismantling of Penn and comeback victory against Princeton. It was the fourth consecutive sweep of the artists formerly known as the Killer P’s; afterwards Harvard coach Tommy Amaker praised the grit of his squad, which has won eight straight games and controlled the entire second half on Saturday.
The race has shaped up much like this year’s football one, where an unexpected Elis loss put Harvard in first and set up a climactic late-season tilt for the title. Unlike in previous years, Yale hardly wet the bed (or, as it is wont, defecate in its laundry) in the big game. A week out, a similarly titanic tilt feels inevitable. Both teams cannot—and will not—look past weekend foes and top-four Ancient Eight squads Princeton (at Yale Friday) and Columbia (vs. Harvard Saturday).
Before moving on to the games, however, I’d like to take a moment to honor the seniors. While Harvard’s senior day is not until next week, this weekend will feature the final home contest for half the league’s eldest members. From All-Ivy talents like Cornell’s Shonn Miller to key rotation players like Columbia’s Steve Frankoski, Senior Day will be a rightful celebration of the sacrifices made and careers had by the league’s greatest talents.
Frankoski in particular is emblematic of the classic archetype that has shaped the Ancient Eight race all season—the gritty veteran role player doing his job. These set doesn' include senior Miller, Dartmouth's Gabas Maldunas, or Harvard's Wesley Saunders-each unquestionably one of their team's brightest stars and the focal point of nearly each offensive set.
On Columbia, it is Cory Ostekowski—a smart, instinctive center who made six clutch free throws in the victory against Yale. Cornell has Galal Cancer, a savvy guard with good range whose 17 points were instrumental in the squad’s win over Princeton, its best victory over the season. Penn’s Greg Louis is his team’s second best shooter, a reserve who ranks second on the team in rebounding.
Harvard’s Jonah Travis is the quintessential example of this stereotype. Sidelined at the beginning of the season with injuries, Travis has been the Crimson’s first big man off the bench during its eight-game run and its most savvy inside player. An expert in drawing contact at the rim, Travis uses excellent footwork and sneaky pump fakes to draw defenders in the air—going around them for easy layups or into them to draw fouls. The team rallies around him; if junior co-captain Siyani Chambers is its heart, Travis is its motor.
Travis, Ostekowski, Princeton’s Ben Hazel, and Yale’s Armani Cotton—forgive the trite saying—will not draw the headlines. Yet, all will feature heavily into how the league shakes out. Don’t sleep on these guys.
Without further delay, onto the games.
***
HARVARD AT CORNELL
One of the most startling facts of the Crimson’s four-year run is the 22-4 road record the team has posted over the stretch. Harvard coach Tommy Amaker, not getting the buzz he should for Ivy League Coach of the Year, is a master of motivation, preaching that the team be “tough and together” on the road. Against a Cornell team boasting a 308th-ranked offense, Harvard should be turning its focus to Columbia 10 minutes into the second half.
Pick: Harvard
DARTMOUTH AT CORNELL
The elven mavens of Hanover have flailed since an early season win over Harvard that looks more and more flukish with each passing weekend. Lead guard Alex Mitola is down to 40-percent shooting on the year, and only one rotation player is shooting better than 50 percent. However, Cornell police may have discovered the next Walter White—arresting a twenty-something holding 250 bags of heroin this week.
Better Call Saul, as the kids say.
Pick: Dartmouth

• The Crimson also previews Harvard's weekend and writes:

Just four weeks ago, the Harvard men’s basketball team (19-5, 9-1 Ivy) walked out of Lavietes Pavilion, its home court, and into an air of doubt. For a team that had been placed by the Associated Press in the preseason Top 25—the first time an Ivy League team garnered the honor since the 1974-1975 season—losing in Cambridge to Dartmouth was an upset, to say the least.
Fast-forward one month. The Crimson has rattled off eight straight wins, swept Penn and Princeton, and now sits alone atop the Ancient Eight.
Though Harvard has already beaten both Columbia (13-11, 5-5) and Cornell (12-14, 4-6), penciling in another perfect weekend for the Crimson would be ill-advised.
Two weeks ago, Harvard handled the Big Red. Dominating on the glass and in the paint, the Crimson turned a one-possession deficit at the half into a 21-point blowout win.
Stifling Cornell to just 23.9 percent shooting from the floor, Harvard held senior Shonn Miller to just 10 points, an off-night for a forward that drops 16 a game.
“It’s a tough matchup because he plays on the base line yet has perimeter skills,” Crimson coach Tommy Amaker said of Miller on Wednesday. “He shoots the ball from three, and we will do the best we can.”
Miller will enter Friday’s contest hot off of a 27-point performance against Brown last weekend. As a result, if Harvard is able to once again contain Miller, scoring may once again be scarce for Cornell.
While Friday’s matchup may not appear so daunting, it is the game that will take place 24 hours later that could really test Amaker’s squad. The last time the Crimson traveled to New York City, it took two overtimes, 22 points from junior captain Siyani Chambers and captain Steve Moundou-Missi, and 19 points from Wesley Saunders in order to get the win.
“Our league is hard,” Amaker admonished. “And that second night is brutal.”
Facing statistically the best defensive team in the league, an already sold-out crowd at Levien Gymnasium, and a team hungry for revenge, Harvard cannot afford to fall behind early to the Lions.
Preventing that from happening will fall on the shoulders of junior swingman Wesley Saunders. Saunders is coming off a weekend in which he averaged 19 points, four assists, and seven rebounds, earning him his third Ivy League Player of the Week honor this year.
This season, the Crimson has gone how Saunders, its reigning Ivy League Player of the Year, has gone. While slow starts have plagued Harvard all year long, Saunders has emerged as a Superman figure with big second half performances to save the day.
“We have a couple of games where we haven’t played very well on the offensive end in the first half,” Amaker said. “We need some help and a spark, and our kids have dug in a lot deeper.”
Though Saunders has continually come to the rescue, it has been senior forward Jonah Travis that has sparked the Crimson off of the bench. After starting a couple of games at the beginning of the season, Travis has become a vital asset to Amaker off of the bench.
During Harvard’s current win streak, Travis is averaging nearly 8.75 points and 4.25 rebounds per game, all in the role of reserve. When the Crimson nearly squandered a 17-point lead against Columbia in their matchup earlier this season, the eight points from Travis off the bench in the second half alone proved to be vital.
“It always helps to have guys come in like that; the rest of us can feed off that energy,” sophomore shooting guard Corbin Miller said of Travis after a game against Boston College this year. “It is important that we have a player that can come in and do it for us. The rest of us definitely feed off that.”
Defensively, the key to stopping Columbia will be shutting down junior guard Maodo Lo. Lo dropped 22 points against Harvard the last time out, and the Berlin-native just posted a 53-point weekend over his last two matchups.
Amaker’s go-to for stopping high-scorers like Lo this season has been a combination of looks, including Saunders, Chambers, and Junior Agunwa Okolie.
With just four contests left in the season-long tournament that is the Ivy League, Amaker is not taking anything for granted.
“It’s a long horse race,” he said, “and it still is.”

• The Yale Daily News writes in part:

This season, the Yale men’s basketball team has become known for its prolific offense, which scores an Ivy League-best 68.8 points per game. In particular, the team’s success lies in its ability to rebound the ball and grab offensive boards.
The Bulldogs boast the best rebounding margin in the conference at +5.6 and notch a league-leading 11.7 offensive rebounds per game. The Elis have two of the top 10 rebounders in the league in forward Justin Sears ’16 and guard Armani Cotton ’15, who average 7.4 and 5.5 boards per game, respectively.
“We really push ourselves in practice, chase after the ball, and it’s really just about effort, regardless of your size, just how much determination you have to get the ball,” Cotton said following the team’s Feb. 20 win against Cornell. “It’s the culture of our team at this point, regardless of what size we have … At this point it’s second nature. You just have to go get it.”
The emphasis that the Elis put on rebounding the ball is clear in practice and has translated onto the court. Against Cornell on Friday night, the Bulldogs outrebounded the Big Red 46–26, and Cornell head coach Bill Courtney could only admire the effort with which the Elis attacked the glass, saying that the Elis treat every rebound “like it’s the last possession of [the game].”

• The Cornell Daily Sun recapped last weekend's games on Wednesday and writes:

The Cornell men’s basketball team had a tough trip to New England over the weekend. The Red dropped games to both Yale and Brown, leaving the squad standing with a 4-6 record in Ivy play and putting the Red in fifth place with just four more league games remaining.

The Red took on Yale in a primetime matchup Friday evening. The game featured two strong forwards and candidates for the All-Ivy team in Cornell’s senior Shonn Miller and Yale’s Justin Sears. Miller scored nine points on 4/10 shooting while Sears racked up 12 points on 4/8 shooting. The star front court players fought hard, but ultimately left both teams at an offensive draw, giving way for the guards to dominate the offensive side of the ball. Cornell had two players in double figures with seniors guard Devin Cherry’s 17 points and senior guard Galal Cancer’s 19, and Yale saw guard Javier Duren lead the scoring with 13 points. The Bulldogs took a seven-point lead going into halftime and ultimately pushed that lead to 11, winning, 62-51.

“We weren’t able to score from many angles. They did a good job of shutting down our game plan. We didn’t execute,” said head coach Bill Courtney.

The Red was unable to establish much of a rhythm in the game, something that the squad had been doing well with in recent weeks. Going into Saturday’s game against Brown, it was evident that the coaching staff wanted to make a point of controlling the pace of the game.

“We wanted to keep playing our game. We want to play how we practice,” Courtney said.

The Red did just that and came out strong against the Bears, taking an 11-point lead into halftime. That lead got as big as 17 points before the Bears began a comeback. Early on, the Red was able to control the game’s pace and get into a solid offensive flow, hitting 46 percent of its shots in the first half. That went down to 31 percent in the second half, while Brown had the opposite happen to them. The Bears shot 34 percent in the first half and 46 percent in the second.

The game came down to the wire in the final few minutes, with Miller coming up big for the Red. He hit a huge 3-pointer with under four minutes to play, and followed that up by drawing a charge with just under a minute to go. The Red was up, 56-55, when Brown forward Cedric Kuakumensah hit a runner to give the Bears the lead with 1.8 seconds remaining. Shonn Miller’s last chance shot fell short.

“It was a disappointing loss. We played well for a lot of the time, but they came up when they had to,” Courtney said.

The loss was heartbreaking. Not just from the short-term perspective, but as a result of this loss, the Red haw been eliminated from competing for the Ivy League title and the NCAA tournament spot that comes with it. However, the squad still has a chance of making a separate post-season tournament. The Red will play host to Harvard and Dartmouth this weekend in its final two home games of the regular season.

•  The Brown Daily Herald writes:

Brown 57, Cornell 56

For the first 23 minutes of play Saturday night, the Cornell (12-14, 4-6) game looked much like the Columbia game. The Big Red jumped to an early lead, the Bruno defense continued to struggle and the opponent’s best player — this time forward Shonn Miller — was lighting up the scoreboard. Miller had 16 points at the intermission, and his team led by 11.

Martin said they remained optimistic at half, but when play resumed, Cornell scored the first three baskets of the second half. Martin called another timeout; the nearly empty Pizzitola Center was silent. It was as close to rock bottom as the team had been all year. But the players believed they could overcome the deficit.

“When we were down 17, we came together after one of the timeouts and we were just like, ‘We’re fine. We’re going to win this game,’” said Tavon Blackmon ’17.

His words proved to be prophetic. With 16:44 remaining, Steven Spieth ’17 was fouled on a reverse layup for an and-one to spark the run. In the next four minutes, Blackmon and Spieth each had four, Maia hit a free throw and, suddenly, the down-and-out Bears were within five points.

While Spieth, Blackmon and Kuakumensah led an offensive surge, the comeback was really a product of defense. Thanks to Bruno’s increased ball pressure and energy, Cornell shot 5-of-21 in the game’s final 17 minutes.

“We were so good defensively,” Martin said. “We were focused on one stop at a time.”

But the game was not yet won, and Miller hit a long three with 3:46 to play that silenced the crowd and pushed the lead to six.

A minute later, Maia ran down a loose ball and flipped it to J.R. Hobbie ’17, who hit the second-biggest shot of the game: a trey from the corner to cut the lead to 56-55.

The score stood for two minutes when Cornell’s Darryl Smith grabbed a wide-open offensive rebound under the basket with 19 seconds remaining. He seemed destined either to extend the lead with a put-back or to try to run out the remaining seconds. He chose the former, but it backfired when Kuakumensah came flying across the lane to reject the attempt, pull down the rebound and set up the final play.

“He doesn’t usually block shots,” Martin joked after the game about Kuakumensah, who became the Ivy League’s second all-time leader in blocks with five against the Big Red, giving him 230 for his career. “It was a huge play.”

Martin called a timeout with nine seconds left to draw up a play. Two inbound options — Hobbie and Spieth — were both covered, so Blackmon entered the ball to Kuakumensah at the top of the key, who was supposed to get the ball back to Blackmon.

“We were trying to get Tavon the ball, but they denied him,” Kuakumensah said. “I just tried to get to the hoop, and luckily it fell.”

The broken play led to a tightly contested, off-balance floater from Kuakumensah. It was not the shot the Bears wanted, but it proved to be exactly what they needed.

News and Notes: Friday Edition

Below, news and notes for Friday...

• The San Francisco Chronicle called the Penn-Princeton series the 8th best rivalry in college basketball, but notes, "Losing ground because first Cornell, then Harvard took over the Ivy League."

• The Ivy League named Shonn Miller to its weekly Honor Roll and notes:

Shonn Miller, Cornell (Sr., F - Euclid, Ohio)
17 points, 15 rebounds at Dartmouth
10 points, 8 rebounds, 3 blocks at Harvard

PLAYER OF THE WEEK

Week 1, 11/17/14-Shonn Miller, Cornell
Week 2, 11/24/14-Justin Sears, Yale
Week 3, 12/1/14-Wes Saunders, Harvard
Week 4, 12/8/14-Javier Duren, Yale
Week 5, 12/15/14-Cedric Kuakumensah, Brown*
Week 6, 12/22/14-Maodo Lo, Columbia
Week 7,12/29/14-Shonn Miller, Cornell
Week 8, 1/5/15-Javier Duren, Yale
Week 9, 1/12/15-Henry Caruso, Princeton
Week 10, 1/19/15-Javier Duren, Yale
Week 11, 1/26/15-Justin Sears, Yale/Alex Mitola, Dartmouth
Week 12, 2/2/15-Justin Sears, Yale
Week 13, 2/9/15-Wes Saunders, Harvard
Week 14, 2/16/15-Justin Sears, Yale

ROOKIE OF THE WEEK

Week 1, 11/17/14-Antonio Woods, Penn
Week 2, 11/24/14-Mike Auger, Penn
Week 3, 12/1/14-Amir Bell, Princeton
Week 4, 12/8/14-Darnell Foreman, Penn
Week 5, 12/15/14-Sam Jones, Penn*
Week 6, 12/22/14-Kyle Castlin, Columbia
Week 7, 12/30/14-Aaron Young, Princeton
Week 8, 1/5/15-Kyle Castlin, Columbia
Week 9, 1/12/15-Makai Mason, Yale
Week 10, 1/19/15-Antonio Woods, Penn
Week 11, 1/26/15-Aaron Young, Princeton
Week 12, 2/2/15-Kyle Castlin, Columbia
Week 13, 2/9/15-Miles Wright, Dartmouth
Week 14, 2/16/15-Miles Wright, Dartmouth

* = Cornell idle

• Ivy Hoops Online's Jake Mastbaum writes:

 Shot selection keeps holding the Big Red back

We are a little more than halfway through the Ivy slate and Cornell is just as up as it is down.  12-12 on the season and 4-4 in conference.   Satisfied?  Disappointed?  I don’t think you’ll find a Big Red fan in too much anguish. To suffer over a team bouncing back from its lowest win total in school history and fewest wins in league play since the 1970-71 campaign would be unreasonable, but who said sports fans have to be reasonable?  We’re a fickle group, easily frustrated and often disillusioned.
This is why when a team picked to finish dead last finds itself in the top half of the standings past the midway point of play, we can’t help but ask ourselves, why not more?

Cornell can be dangerous because of its ability to play a style of defense that isn’t often seen in the Ivy League.  But what is becoming increasingly clear is that defense alone isn’t enough win games.  In its Ivy opener, Cornell held Maodo Lo, the league’s leading scorer, scoreless on just two field-goal attempts.  In the first half of last Saturday’s game at Harvard, Cornell’s suffocating defense blanked Wesley Saunders, arguably the league’s most lethal scoring threat.  These two games have something in common besides Cornell’s defense stifling stars.  In both contests, Cornell held Columbia and Harvard below their season per game scoring average, and lost.  In fact, the Big Red have held opponents at or below its average scoring mark in 17 of 24 games this season, only winning 11 of these contests.  The only game the Red has won in which their opponent eclipsed its season scoring average was an overtime win at Dartmouth.
It is clear defense has taken the Red as far as they can go.  To consistently win, you need to make shots, something Cornell has not done.  In those losses to Columbia and Harvard, Shonn Miller shot a combined 4-for-23.  Even with a stout defense, Cornell isn’t good enough to overcome shooting performances like this from its best player.  These shooting woes can’t be brushed aside as a one-off occurrence nor can they be pinned on one guy.  Cornell’s shooting this season can go toe-to-toe with the worst in school history.
To date, the Red have shot 40 percent from the field.  No Cornell team has shot this poorly since the 2001-02 campaign, a team that shot a meager 38 percent for the season.  My impression is that Cornell’s shooting deficiencies are more a product of shot selection than anything else.  The stats back this up.  The three-point shooting run Cornell is on is historic, and unfortunately, it’s not historic in a good way.
This is the 29^th season that the three-point shot has been part of college basketball.  Only four teams in Cornell history have shot a worse percentage from deep than what we’ve seen from Cornell the past two seasons.  Of course a team can’t excel in every aspect of the game, but what is alarming is this team has shown such a resolve to continue slinging it from deep, turning a blind eye to the results.
This season, more than 36 percent of Cornell’s field goal attempts have been three-pointers.  To put this in perspective, of the top 10 3-point shooting teams in school history (by three-point field goal percentage), only three have shot a higher percentage of three-pointers.

Rank	Season	3-Point FG Percentage	Percent of FGs attempted that were 3-Pointers
-	2014-2015	32.4%	36.7%
1	1989-1990	43.8%	23.3%
2	2009-2010	42.9%	40.0%
3	2008-2009	41.1%	33.8%
4	2007-2008	40.9%	35.7%
5	2006-2007	39.6%	36.5%
6	1988-1989	37.9%	24.1%
	2004-2005	37.9%	35.5%
8	1990-1991	37.4%	29.6%
9	2010-2011	37.3%	42.5%
10	2005-2006	36.4%	37.2%

What the 2009-10, 2010-11, and 2005-06 teams all have in common is at least one player who ranks in the top 10 all time in career three-point field goal percentage in the school’s record book.  This year’s squad doesn’t come close.  Cornell has three players who have attempted at least 75 3-pointers and are on pace to jack up 100 or more (Devin Cherry is on pace to attempt 98 … close enough).  This group’s three-point shooting percentage ranges from 26 to 33 percent.  I don’t know what the Mendoza Line is for three-point field goal percentage, but I can tell you that’s not high enough to go out there and play the “live by the three, die by the three” game.  These numbers scream that Cornell’s offensive system is broken.  This team has arguably the best all-around player in the league, a shoo-in first team All-Ivy selection, and an offense that isn’t designed to get him the ball where he can be most effective.
I will give this team and this coaching staff some credit.  With six games left to play, the Red hold a one-game lead over Columbia for the final spot in the top half of the Ivy League standings.  Cornell has only occupied real estate in the top half of the final Ivy standings six times in last 20 years, something it has never done under Bill Courtney.  With the Ivy League title free from the shackles of its former Penn-Princeton geographical confinement, it’s not enough to hang your hat on a top-half league finish.  But, this season, for this team, it’s something.  Cornell wasn’t going to challenge Yale and Harvard at the very top of the standings— it’s simply not as good.  A top-half finish would be this team approaching, not shattering through, but approaching its ceiling.  Flaws or not, it has been a long time since we’ve seen the Big Red do this.
I just wish we saw more.

• Previewing tonight, the Yale Daily News writes:

The Yale men’s basketball team will host Cornell and Columbia this weekend at the John J. Lee Amphitheater, looking to complete its second two-game sweep in as many weekends.
Both opponents sit at the middle of the Ancient Eight table with six games to play, and both seem epitomize the unpredictable results of Ivy League play so far this season.
The Elis (18–7, 7–1 Ivy) will first face fourth-place Cornell (12–12, 4–4) on Friday, which is coming off a roller-coaster weekend on the road. The Big Red defeated now last-place Dartmouth in an 81–72 overtime thriller, only to be easily handled 61–40 by a strong Harvard team that appears to be hitting its stride at the right time, having won its last six games.
Columbia (11–11, 3–5), which rests one spot behind the Big Red in the standings, had a frustrating pair of games a week ago after taking Harvard to the wire only to lose by four, and falling by 12 to Dartmouth.
The Bulldogs are coming off of a hot-shooting road sweep, blowing out Penn on Friday night by 27 and holding off a ferocious Princeton comeback on Saturday to win by eight.
Standout forwards Justin Sears ’16 and Matt Townsend ’15 credited the bench play for much of the success over the weekend. In particular, Townsend praised the composure of guard Makai Mason ’18 in the second half of the Princeton game.
“Makai hit some big-time shots down the stretch in our second half comeback,” Townsend said of Mason’s 5–5 effort against Princeton, which complemented his 14-point outing the night before against the Quakers.
Mason has seen much more court time as of late, playing at least 20 minutes in six of his last seven games, compared to just two such games before that stretch. He likened his role on the team to a shot of energy off the bench.
Sears also noted Mason’s developing maturity, as well as the growing intensity and invaluable impact of captain Greg Kelley ’15.
“It’s Greg’s last go-around, and you can see that in his sense of urgency,” Sears said.
Regarding preparations for this weekend’s matchups, Townsend said forcing Columbia to take different shots and limit its opportunities from long range will be key.
As for the Big Red, both Townsend and Mason agreed that breaking Cornell’s defensive pressure is paramount on Friday.
“Cornell likes ball pressure. We’ve been working in practice on handling that full court press,” Townsend said.
Mason agreed, commenting on the Cornell players’ length and athleticism. He added that there has been an emphasis in practice on moving the ball around with our motion and getting guys open shots — something that proved to be a struggle in Yale’s lone conference loss against Harvard.
Though it is hard to predict how either competitor will challenge this weekend, one thing is for sure: With Cornell’s away record of 2–5 and Columbia’s at 5–5, the Bulldogs will be sure to try and take advantage of these two teams’ road game woes.
Yale has certainly realized a strong home-court advantage this season — having gone 6–2 in contests at Payne Whitney — especially with the prospects of an Ivy League title and an appearance in the NCAA Tournament at hand. The Elis currently control their own fate in the Ancient Eight and do not need to rely on any upsets or Harvard’s misfortune to get a berth to the Big Dance for the first time in over 50 years.
However, guard Javier Duren ’15 maintains that there has been no change in strategy as a result of this potential title.
“Coach [James Jones] has constantly told us that our focus shouldn’t be an Ivy League title but on the next game,” Duren said. “In that, we’ve been able to remain humble and take it one game at a time.”
The tip off for both Friday and Saturday’s games will be at 7 p.m. in the John J. Lee Amphitheater.

• The Cornell Daily Sun had a late recap of last weekend's games at Harvard and Dartmouth and writes:

The Cornell men’s basketball team spent February Break in snowy New England taking on Dartmouth and Harvard in two pivotal Ivy League games. On Friday, the squad defeated the Green in overtime, 81-72, but dropped its Valentine’s Day showdown with the first place Crimson the following evening, 60-41. The Red now sits in fourth place with a 4-4 record in the conference.
The Red’s matchup with Dartmouth was an odd one. Although the offense did not appear to flow smoothly, four of the squad’s five starters hit double figures, including a 17 point, 15 rebound performance from senior forward Shonn Miller. Despite a fantastic performance from Miller, most of the credit for the victory should be given to the Cornell backcourt. Sophomore guard Robert Hatter stole the show with his game-high 19 point performance, but freshman guard Wil Bathurst had a crucial role in the second half. The Olean, New York native scored seven points, including his own individual 5-0 run to keep the Green from making a run late in the game.
In addition to their offensive production, the Red guards disrupted Dartmouth’s offensive movement with tenacious ball pressure and sound rotations forcing 14 turnovers from the Green. The Red have been using a ball pressure and trap heavy defensive scheme for the majority of the league season and it has proved vital to the squad’s success and ability to stay in games. Head coach Bill Courtney expects the team to maintain these defensive trends as the season winds down.
“We know there are only a few weeks left in the season, and the guys played hard and got a win,” Courtney said. “Every game matters in this conference, and we will keep playing the way we know how coming down the stretch.”
The Red dominated the overtime period, outscoring Dartmouth, 17-8. Cornell made all of their shots from the field during the period and held the Green to only 3 for 7 shooting.
After the win, the squad hit the road for Cambridge to face league leaders Harvard, led by senior standout Wesley Saunders. The Red kept Saunders at bay, holding him to eight points on 27.3 percent shooting from the field and 11 rebounds. Despite the squad’s ability to keep the Crimson star in check, the Red struggled with their own shot, shooting just 24 percent from the field for the game.
Despite struggling from the field, the Red went into halftime leading by three points. However, they were blown away in the second half as Harvard outscored them, 40-16. Additionally, the Red starters failed to convert a field goal attempt in the half, a stat that would doom the best of teams.
“We allowed them to make a run at the start of the second half, and weren’t able to keep up or recover from that,” Courtney said. “We didn’t hit shots later in the game and they did.”
In the end Harvard, the preseason Ivy League favorite, came out victorious and now is in a race with Yale for the top spot in the conference and an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. The Red are not out yet, but the way Harvard and Yale are playing at the moment, it looks as if the only teams who can beat them are each other.
The Red hit the road again this weekend for vital games against Yale and Brown. With just six regular season games left, teams are continuing to fight for their NCAA Tournament lives as well as bids in other postseason tournaments.

• The Dartmouth also recapped last week's action and writes in part:

The men’s basketball team returned home to Leede Arena this past weekend for the first leg of a two-weekend Ivy League homestand. The Big Green (9-13, 2-6 Ivy) showed mixed results over the weekend, taking a heartbreaking loss in overtime to Cornell University (12-12, 4-4 Ivy) 81-72 before stifling Columbia University (11-11, 3-5 Ivy) in a 61-49 victory.

The weekend pitted the top two scorers in the Ivy League — Maodo Lo of Columbia, who averages 16.2 points per game, and Cornell’s Shonn Miller, who follows closely behind with 16.1— against Dartmouth’s stingy defense, which leads the Ivies with 7.6 steals per game.

In the end, restricting those two scorers’ access to the net was the key difference between winning and losing.

Against the Big Red, Dartmouth started strong and opened with an 11-2 lead less than three minutes into the game, and the men maintained a lead over Cornell throughout much of the match. During the run, Miles Wright ’18 chipped in two three-pointers and Connor Boehm ’16 added a three and a jumper to put the visitors at an early disadvantage.

Once again, Wright led the Big Green in scoring for the weekend. After breaking out with an average of 20.5 points per game last weekend and being named Ivy League Rookie of the Week, the freshman finished with 19 points against Cornell and led both teams with 16 against Columbia.

“I’m more comfortable with the offense now,” Wright said. “I know my role, and I know the coaching staff is more comfortable with me and I know my teammates are more comfortable with me taking the shots that I’m taking. When everyone else believes in you, it makes it easy to believe in yourself.”

After Dartmouth’s hot start, Cornell crawled back into the game. With five minutes left in the first half, Cornell’s Robert Hatter sank a three to give the Big Red its first lead of the night with 25-23. The Cornell sophomore finished the night tying Wright’s game-high 19 points.

After a tight first half, the two teams entered the locker room tied at 31-31.

The Big Green pulled away from the gridlock and opened the second period with an 8-4 run on the strength of a Wright jumper and free throws from co-captain Gabas Maldunas ’15 and John Golden ’15.

The second half played out similarly to the first. Dartmouth held a slight margin for most of the period but never led by more than six. Down six with five minutes to play, Cornell’s Hatter converted a four-point play to spark a late rally from the Big Red, leading to a 60-60 tie with four minutes left in the game.

With 1:41 to go, Cornell’s Miller hit a jumper to give Cornell its first lead, 64-62, since the opening seconds of the second half. Dartmouth took a timeout, but it failed to help the team recuperate and they returned to the court with misses by both Golden and Malik Gill ’16. Maldunas managed to come away with the offensive rebound on Gill’s attempt and pulled the score even on an impressive layup with only 27 seconds remaining. On the final possession of regular time, Cornell’s Miller attempted a buzzer-beater, but failed to close the match when the ball bounced off the rim.

Neck and neck at 64 points, the two teams headed to overtime, Dartmouth’s first since edging Northern Illinois University 58-55 on Dec. 19. Cornell lost its only prior overtime game of the season to Saint Peter’s University 59-52 on Dec. 28.

Over the course of the game, Cornell led for only 8:33, compared to Dartmouth’s 31:37 time spent ahead. The Big Red, however, peaked when it mattered most and dominated overtime play. Cornell opened scoring on a layup by senior Devin Cherry and a free throw by Miller. Dartmouth didn’t score its first basket until Alex Mitola ’16 hit a jumper with 3:34 to go, cutting the score to 66-67.

“We collapsed a little bit and we didn’t hit shots when we needed to,” Maldunas said.

After Mitola’s three, Cornell pulled away with a 7-0 run, capped off by a three. Wright hit a three to pull the game within four with just under a minute remaining, but the Big Green wouldn’t find the bottom of the net for the rest of the game. Cornell sealed the affair by hitting 5-for-6 from the line in the final minute.

The game featured strong offensive performances from both teams. Wright led the way for Dartmouth with 11 points in the first half en route to his 19 for the overall game. Maldunas posted a double-double with 14 points and 12 boards, and Boehm and Tommy Carpenter ’16 had 10 points each...

• On this weekend's games, the Brown Daily Herald writes:

The men’s basketball team’s New York road trip — in which the squad lost consecutive games to Cornell and Columbia — was Bruno’s worst weekend of the season, as the team fell to 0-4 in league play. But the Bears (11-14, 2-6 Ivy) welcome the Big Red Friday and the Lions Saturday with the opportunity to serve a double dose of revenge.

“It does provide a lot of extra motivation, especially since we lost two games we thought we were in,” said guard J.R. Hobbie ’17, adding that since the Bears have seen these teams before, they know what to expect.

***

Cornell (12-12, 4-4)

Cornell has been the surprise of the Ivy League this year, though some predicted its bounce-back season because of the return of dynamic forward Shonn Miller. Miller trails only Lo on the Ivy scoring leaderboard and is tied with Maia for the league’s top rebounder. Thanks in large part to Miller, the Big Red has won four conference games, including an upset over Princeton (11-12, 4-3) Feb. 7. Rejuvenated Cornell is a comparable team to Brown, as evidenced by their Jan. 30 meeting, which was tied with 1:18 left before Cornell pulled it out 57-49.

The first meeting was a war of attrition: neither defense yielded much and neither offense took control. Brown’s defense was stingy behind Maia. The center denied Miller all game, allowing him to score just eight points and grab only three rebounds. If Maia can repeat his performance Saturday, Bruno will be in the game.

Devin Cherry and Galal Cancer stepped up to lead the Big Red in the last meeting, with the latter scoring seven consecutive points for Cornell as it overtook Brown in the last minute.

“We focused a lot on guarding our individual matchups,” Hobbie said, noting the impact that Miller can make and the importance of Maia and the rest of the defense containing him.

Only four Cornell players score more than three points per game. But the Bears can only exploit their opponent’s lack of depth if they can score themselves, which they failed to do against the Big Red last time around. Only one Bear, Blackmon, scored in double digits, and he needed 14 attempts from the field and six attempts from the line to get there. Hobbie is unlikely to have any more luck finding shots against Cornell, which holds opponents to the lowest three-point percentage of any team in the conference.

“Columbia and Cornell key on guarding the three-point line, so it should open up a lot for guys on the interior and guys driving,” Hobbie said. “I’ll just have to step up and make the shots I get.”

Cornell’s defense relies on forcing turnovers and contesting three-point attempts. Though a nonfactor offensively, Big Red center David Onuorah blocked seven shots and grabbed eight rebounds in a stout defensive performance against Brown earlier this season.

The Big Red has sent four of its last five opponents to the line for 23 or more free throws. This trend favors Blackmon and Steven Spieth ’17, who can draw fouls and are instrumental from the line.

With Harvard and Yale pulling away from the rest of the Ivy League, this weekend’s games at the Pizzitola Center may not feature any team in serious contention for an Ivy title. But Bruno’s disastrous start to league play could be a distant memory if the Bears climb to fourth in the conference with two wins. Tipoff is at 7 p.m.

• Cornell Athletics' Game Notes for this weekend is as follows:

Ivy Stretch Run Begins For Men's Hoops At Yale, Brown

Cornell Athletics

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Roster I Schedule & Results I Statistics I History

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GAME INFORMATION
Game #25: Cornell at Yale
Tip off: Friday, Feb. 20, at 7:00 p.m.
Site: John J. Lee Amphitheater (2,532), New Haven, Conn.
2014-15 Records: Cornell (12-12, 4-4 Ivy); Yale (18-7, 7-1 Ivy)
Series Record: Cornell leads the series 110-107
Last Meeting: Yale won 65-57, Jan. 31, 2015 in Ithaca, N.Y.
Radio: 98.7 FM The Buzzer (Barry Leonard)
TV: None

Game #26: Cornell at Brown
Tip off: Saturday, Feb. 21, at 6:00 p.m.
Site: Pizzitola Sports Center (2,800), Providence, R.I..
2014-15 Records: Cornell (12-12, 4-4 Ivy); Harvard (15-5, 5-1 Ivy)
Series Record: Cornell leads 74-48
Last Meeting: Cornell won 57-49, Jan. 30, 2015 in Ithaca, N.Y.
Radio: 98.7 FM The Buzzer (Barry Leonard)
TV: None

HEAD COACH BILL COURTNEY
Cornell head coach Bill Courtney is in his fifth season at Cornell (49-90, .353; 23-41 Ivy, .359) ... Courtney became the fifth Robert E. Gallagher '44 Coach of Men's Basketball at Cornell on April 23, 2010.

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STORY LINES:
The Cornell men's basketball team begins the stretch run with its eyes on potential postseason play when the Big Red visits first-place Yale on Friday, Feb. 20 at 7 p.m., then looks for a season sweep of Brown on Saturday, Feb. 21 at 6 p.m. Barry Leonard will provide coverage on 98.7 FM The Buzzer, with live video of both contests available on the Ivy League Digital Network.

Picked to finish eighth in the Ivy League preseason media poll, head coach Bill Courtney's Big Red team is one of the most improved in the country. Cornell is 12-12 a year removed from a 2-26 campaign. The Big Red has the looks of a team on the rebound, playing suffocating defense (.382 field goal percentage defense, .321 3-point percentage defense, 61.2 ppg. allowed, 5.0 blocked shots per game) in its 24 contests. The Big Red has limited foes to below 40 percent shooting in 15 of its 24 games. Six of its 12 losses this season have come by five points or less or in overtime.

The biggest difference from last year is the return of first-team All-Ivy selection Shonn Miller, who missed the 2013-14 season with a shoulder injury. The two-time Ivy League Player of the Week paces the conference in rebounding (8.3 rpg.), ranks second in scoring (16.1 ppg.), and in the top 10 in free-throw percentage (fifth, .835) blocks (third, 1.9 bpg.) and steals (seventh, 1.3 spg.) to make him an early contender for top Ivy League honors.

Other big differences in Cornell's quick turnaround include the return of senior Galal Cancer (9.4 ppg., 3.8 rpg., 3.2 apg., 1.1 spg.) after a year away from basketball, the move of senior Devin Cherry to point guard (10.4 ppg., 4.2 rpg., 3.5 apg., 0.8 spg.) and the maturation of sophomores Robert Hatter (11.5 ppg., 2.8 rpg., 1.3 spg.) and David Onuorah (2.2 ppg., 3.7 rpg., 1.5 bpg.). A number of other players have added key minutes as reserves over the first 24 contests. Among them are guards JoJo Fallas (3.2 ppg., 21 3-pointers, .368 3-point percentage), Pat Smith (2.7 ppg.) and Darryl Smith (2.9 pg., 1.9 rpg.). Together with the starting trio, the six make for one of the most talented and deepest backcourts in the Ancient Eight. The senior big man trio of Deion Giddens, Dave LaMore and Ned Tomic are combining to average 4.5 ppg. and 5.3 rpg. and have provided leadership on and off the court.

A WIN OVER YALE WOULD:
• make the Big Red 13-12 overall and 5-4 in Ivy League play.
• give Cornell a 7-4 record in its last 11 games.
• give head coach Bill Courtney his 50th career victory at Cornell.
• improve the Big Red to 3-1 on the road in Ivy play this season.
• give the Big Red a 111-107 lead in the all-time series between the programs.
• be the 1,224th in program history (1,223-1,364 in 116 seasons, .473).

ABOUT YALE:
• At 18-7 overall and 5-1 in Ivy play, Yale enters the week tied atop the Ivy League standings with Harvard.
• The Bulldogs are 6-2 on the road this season and also own a 10-5 mark away from home, including a victory over defending national champion Connecticut earlier this season.
• Justin Sears (14.6 ppg., 7.3 rpg., 2.6 bpg.) and Javier Duren (13.5 ppg., 5.3 rpg., 4.2 apg.) both average double figures this season.
• Five other players average between 5.0 and 9.6 points each night, including Jack Montague (9.6 ppg.), who hit the game-winning 3-pointer at the buzzer earlier this season against the Huskies.
• Yale limits opponents to 42 percent shooting and outrebounds opponents by more than five per game (38.2-32.9).
• James Jones, in his 16th season on the Yale sidelines, is the winningest coach in school history. The dean of Ivy coaches has won an Ivy League title and has helped the Bulldogs to three postseason appearances, including last year's CollegeInsider.com Tournament (CIT).

THE CORNELL-YALE SERIES:
• Cornell leads 110-107 overall in a series that dates back to the 1898-99 campaign.
• Cornell has had the best of the series recently, winning 11 of the last 19 meetings.
• Yale has won five of the last six meetings between the teams and three of the last four in New Haven, Conn.

LAST TIME VS. YALE:
• Cornell took a brief lead midway through the second half, but Javier Duren's 3-pointer on the ensuing possession triggered an 8-0 Yale run and the Big Red never recovered in a 65-57 loss to Yale on Jan. 31, 2015 at Newman Arena.
• The Big Red shot just 33 percent for the game and 19 percent from 3-point range, but stayed in the contest with its defense.
• The Bulldogs turned the ball over 16 times and shot under 40 percent from the field and 30 percent from the arc, but its clear advantages on the glass (46-31) and at the free throw line (22-13) were too much to overcome in a grind-it-out type game.
• Shonn Miller had 15 points, 11 rebounds and two steals, but like his teammates, struggled from the floor with 6-of-20 shooting. '
• Devin Cherry added 14 points and five assists and Galal Cancer had 12 points and two steals in the loss.
• Cornell had nine steals that led to an 18-7 Big Red advantage off turnovers and turned the ball over themselves just eight times, allowing them to stay within shouting distance until the final five minutes.
• Justin Sears had a game-high 19 points and Javier Duren notched 16 points, 11 rebounds and three assists.
• Matt Townsend rounded out the double figure scorers with 13 points.
• Armani Cotton had a solid all-around floor game, scoring seven points, grabbing 13 rebounds and dishing out three assists.

ABOUT BROWN:
• At 11-14 on the season, the Bears have won two of their last three contests prior to Friday's matchup with Columbia.
• Three Brown players are averaging double figures, led by Tavon Blackman (10.8 ppg., 4.2 apg.).
• Both Cedric Kuakumensah (10.6 ppg., 7.3 rpg., 2.6 bpg.) and Steven Spieth (10.2 ppg., 4.8 rpg., 2.2 apg.) are also averaging double figures for the Bears, while Rafael Maia (9.3 ppg., 8.3 rpg.) and JR Hobbie (8.1 ppg.) aren't far behind.
• Brown outrebounds its opponents by nearly two per game (37.0-35.2).
• Brown is turning the ball over 15.2 times per game, but is hitting 42 percent of its field goals on the offensive end.
• Third-year head coach Mike Martin sports a 39-43 record with the Bears and led them to a CollegeInsider.com Tournament (CIT) last year.

THE CORNELL-BROWN SERIES:
• Cornell leads the series 74-48, dating back to the first meeting between the teams in the 1949-50 season.
• The Big Red is 17-4 in the last 21 contests against the Bears.
• Brown ended Cornell's 13-game win streak in the series in March of 2014, then won three straight before the Big Red won the first game in the series this season.

LAST TIME VS. BROWN:
• Up six points with under 20 seconds to play, Big Red sophomore David Onuorah blocked Tavon Blackman's drive into the lane. It was that kind of night for Cornell's defense in a 57-49 win over Brown on Jan. 30, 2015 at Newman Arena.
• Onuorah's career-best seventh block was the 11th of the night for the home team. Both marks rank third in a single game in school history.
• Even more than that, the intimidation factor played a huge role in limiting the Bears to 30 percent shooting in capturing its second Ivy win of the season, surpassing last season's total.
• The 6-9 center added eight rebounds and two steals, but it was senior Galal Cancer's key late plays that pushed the home team over the top. Cancer ended the night with 11 points, six rebounds, four assists and two steals without a turnover.
• Backcourt mate Devin Cherry had 11 points, five rebounds and three assists with only one miscue.
• Overall, Cornell turned the ball over just five times in the victory.
• Cornell held the Bears scoreless for the final 3:30 after Brown's Cedric Kuakumensah hit a free throw to give the visitors a 49-47 lead. They wouldn't score again.

CORNELL EIGHTH IN IVY PRESEASON POLL:
• The Cornell men's basketball team was picked to finish eighth when the 2014-15 Ivy League preseason media poll was announced during the annual conference call with the league's eight head coaches.
• Harvard, last year's league champion, was the unanimous preseason favorite, picking up all 17 first-place votes and 136 points total.
• Yale was chosen second (108 points), while Columbia (94 points) and Princeton (88 points) weren't far behind in third and fourth.
• Brown was chosen fifth (75 points), while Dartmouth was sixth with 47 points. Rounding out the field was Penn in seventh with 39 points and Cornell in eighth with 25 points.
• Two media members from each school and one national representative voted in the poll.

DEFENSIVE TURNAROUND:
• Cornell's defense has spearheaded the Big Red's turnaround, as its points per game allowed, field goal percentage defense overall and from 3-point range are significantly down, while its steals and blocked shots are way up over last season.
• The Big Red is limiting opponents to .382 shooting over its first 24 games. In all, Cornell recorded a .495 field goal percentage defense mark in 2013-14
• Cornell has allowed opponents to shoot 50 percent or better 15 times in 28 games a season ago, while this year it has held 15 of its first 24 opponents under 40 percent shooting and just one opponent has hit 50 percent of its shots.

           Scoring Def.   FG% Def.      3pt FG Def.     Steals       Blocks
2013-14    78.4 (331)     .495 (341)    .409 (345)      4.2 (338)    3.5 (267)
2014-15    61.2 (54)      .382 (20)     .321 (88)       6.6 (138)    5.0 (31)

NOTES TO KNOW:
• With the Big Red's next win, Bill Courtney will get his 50th career victory as head coach at Cornell.
• Cornell has already won 10 more games than the entire 2013-14 campaign when it went 2-26. Only 21 teams in the country have won at least five more games this season than last year (as of Feb. 16), topped by Cornell's +10, a mark shared by UC Davis, New Hampshire and Temple. Five schools have won eight more games than a season ago.
• Cornell's 17 points in the overtime win over Dartmouth is tied for the third-highest OT scoring period in school history and the most since the Big Red scored a school-record 21 points at Bucknell is a 73-65 win on Jan. 2, 1993.
• Senior Shonn Miller has recorded 16 career double-doubles, a mark that ranks third all-time at Cornell. Bernard Jackson '91 and Mike Davis '80 each had 18 career games with double figures in scoring and rebounding.
• The Big Red's has limited opponents to .382 shooting. Cornell hasn't held opponents under 40 percent shooting in a season since the 1963-64 campaign.
• Miller had 15 rebounds in the second half and overtime of the win at Dartmouth. His 11 rebounds in the second half alone was the most by a Big Red player in a half under head coach Bill Courtney.
• Last weekend, both Galal Cancer and Devin Cherry jumped into the school's top 20 career assist list. Cancer is 17th with 227 assists, while Cherry is 20th with his 221.
• The Big Red has blocked 121 shots entering the weekend and needs six more to match the single season school record.
• Seniors Galal Cancer (557 points, 232 rebounds, 227 assists) and Devin Cherry (800 points, 300 rebounds, 221 assists) are just the 17th and 18th players in school history to register 500 points, 200 rebounds and 200 assists in a career.
• Senior Shonn Miller is approaching becoming the 22nd player in school history to score 1,000 points. He needs 54 in his last six regular season contests (9.0 ppg.).
• Over the team's last 12 games, Cornell is shooting an outstanding .787 from the free-throw line (248-of-315).
• In its last 10 contests, the Big Red has 110 assists and just 96 turnovers.
• Cornell's 78-point margin of victory against Alfred State (107-29) was the largest in school history, bettering a 71-point win over Rome Air Force Base in 1943.
• The team's 107 points against Alfred State made for the seventh-highest total in school history and the most in 22 years.
• Cornell allowed just 29 points against the Pioneers, the fewest surrendered in a contest since Sampson Naval Hospital scored 29 in a 68-29 Big Red victory on Dec. 1, 1945.
• The Big Red has posted three of the top 20 free-throw shooting percentage efforts in school history over the first 16 games. Cornell tied a school record with a 13-for-13 effort (one of eight perfect nights with at least 10 attempts) against UMass Lowell and had the best day with a miss in going 21-of-22 for .955 against Penn State. Cornell hit 26-of-28 free throws (.929) in the win over Howard.
• Cornell's 14-point margin of victory over Binghamton (68-54) was its largest in a road game under head coach Bill Courtney and the most by any Cornell team since a 79-59 victory at Yale on March 6, 2010. That mark didn't last long, as the Big Red dropped Siena by 17 (75-58) in Albany 23 days later.
• The rally from a 17-point deficit against Colgate was the largest overcome by a Big Red team this century. It is the largest overcome by a Bill Courtney-coached team, besting the 14-point first half deficit it rallied from in an 85-84 win over Yale on Feb. 10, 2012.
• When Cornell knocked off George Mason, the Big Red defeated its 35th program that has advanced to an NCAA Final Four. The Patriots reached the national semifinals in 2006.
• The Big Red hit 14 3-pointers in the win over Alfred State, the most in a game since hitting 16 in an 83-70 loss at Western Michigan on Nov. 29, 2013.
• Senior Shonn Miller leads the Ivy League in rebounding (8.3 rpg.) and is second in scoring (16.1 ppg.). He is attempting to become the seventh Ivy player to lead the circuit in both since 1961-62, but the third in the last five years.
• Miller blocked a pair of shots against George Mason to surpass the 100 career block milestone. He became the fifth player in Cornell history to reach that plateau and now has 146 to his name.
• Miller had three steals at Radford, pushing his career total to 101. He became the first player in Cornell history to post 100 career steals and 100 career blocks.
• Second-year assistant coach Jon Jaques was a starter and senior captain on the 2009-10 Cornell team that advanced to the NCAA Sweet 16.
• Cornell will play 10 games against teams coming off 20-win seasons and 11 against teams who competed in postseason last year (three vs. NCAA teams, five vs. CIT teams, four vs. CBI teams).
• Dwight Tarwater '14 graduated from Cornell last spring with a degree in Applied Economics and Management and is playing an extra year at California-Berkeley.  Through 26 games (16-10), Tarwater is averaging 3.7 points and 2.8 rebounds while playing 18.8 minutes per game as a key reserve and spot starter. He has made eight starts for the Bears. He hit a game-winning 3-pointer with 20 seconds to play to lift Cal over UCLA on Feb. 7,
• It is the second straight year a Big Red men's basketball player has used his fifth and final year of eligibility at a BCS school, as Errick Peck '13 spent the 2013-14 campaign at Purdue. He served as a captain and part-time starter for the Boilermakers while averaging 4.6 points and 4.4 rebounds and shooting 48 percent from the floor in 32 contests (10 starts).
• Members of the Cornell basketball team represent 13 states and one Canadian province.
• Cornell has played in 46 different states, as well as in Cuba, Puerto Rico, Australia and France. The only states the Big Red has not played in are Alaska, North Dakota, Mississippi and Wyoming.

CORNELL BEYOND THE ARC — 700 AND COUNTING:
• Cornell hit four 3-pointers at Harvard on Feb. 14, 2015 its 738th straight game with at least one made 3-point field goal.
• With six 3-pointers against Oberlin on Jan. 11, 2014, Cornell extended its streak of games with at least one 3-pointer to 700.
• The last time Cornell did not hit a 3-pointer was against Denison in the 1988-89 season opener (0-for-2).
• Since the 3-point shot came into effect in NCAA play during the 1986-87 season, Cornell has hit at least one shot behind the arc in 784 of 788 games, connecting on 4,960 treys, an average of 6.3 per game.

NEXT UP:
• Cornell closes out its home season against Harvard on Friday, Feb. 27 and Dartmouth on Saturday, Feb. 28.
• The Big Red will look for the season split with the Crimson on CBS Sports Network at 6:30 p.m. at Newman Arena.
• Cornell will honor its six seniors (Galal Cancer, Devin Cherry, Deion Giddens, Dave LaMore, Shonn Miller, Ned Tomic) prior to Saturday's 6 p.m. matchup with the Big Red.

• Yale Athletics' Game Notes for the weekend is as follows:

 First-Place Bulldogs Host Cornell, Columbia

Yale Seeks Best Ivy Start Since 2001-02

Yale Athletics

Yale Game Notes  |  Cornell Game Notes |  Columbia Game Notes
Ivy League Digital Network Video  |  WYBC Audio
Yale-Cornell Live Stats | Yale-Columbia Live Stats
Yale Basketball On Twitter  |  Yale Basketball On Facebook

NEW HAVEN, Conn.  – The Bulldogs begin the second go-round of Ivy League play by hosting Cornell on Friday and Columbia on Saturday. Tip off on both nights is slated for 7 p.m. at the John J. Lee Amphitheater.

Yale (18-7, 7-1 Ivy) enters the weekend in a first-place tie with Harvard. Princeton (4-3) sits in third place. With a victory Friday, the Bulldogs would match last year's 8-1 Ivy start, and wins in both games would mark the best league start since the 2001-02 team won nine of its first 10 Ivy games. Yale also could get to 20 overall wins for the first time since 2001-02 and only the sixth time in school history with a sweep.

The Bulldogs, No. 9 in this week's collegeinsider.com mid major poll and No. 61 in the NCAA RPI through games on Wednesday, are coming off an impressive road sweep of Penn and Princeton. Yale was particularly sharp on the offensive end, shooting 56.1 percent (55-of-98) from the field and 51.4 percent (18-of-35) from three-point range in the two games. Justin Sears, who averaged 16 points, six rebounds and blocked seven shots, was named the Ivy League Player of the Week for his performance. Sears, though, had plenty of support. Freshman Makai Mason (14.0 ppg.) was 10-of-12 from the field, including 5-of-6 from beyond the arc. Javier Duren (12.5 ppg.), Jack Montague (11.5 ppg.) and Matt Townsend (10.5 ppg.) also averaged double figures.

Montague, who was 6-of-10 from three-point range, continues to lead the league in three-point field goal percentage at .480. Over his last four games, Montague is shooting 63.6 percent (14-of-22) from beyond the arc.

Yale leads the league in a number of categories, including scoring offense (69.8 ppg.), scoring margin (+7.5), three-point field goal percentage (.382), rebounding margin (+5.6), assists (14.4 per game) and offensive rebounds (11.7).

KEYS FOR YALE

Run Offense – The Bulldogs will be facing two of the top defensive teams in the league. Cornell limits its opponents to 38.2 percent shooting from the field, while Columbia yields just 60.2 points per game.

Bench Play – Yale's bench only contributed 13 points in the two games against Cornell and Columbia three weeks ago.

Don't Foul – Cornell (74.1 percent) and Columbia (71.2 percent) are two of the top foul shooting teams in the league so the Bulldogs will want to keep them off the line.

HISTORY LESSONS

The Bulldogs have won the last four meetings with Cornell, including a 65-57 victory in Ithaca three weeks ago. Justin Sears scored 19 points, Javier Duren added 16 and Matt Townsend had 13 to lead the way. The Bulldogs have won three of the last four games against the Big Red in Lee Amphitheater. Cornell leads the all-time series 110-107. The teams first played in 1899, a 49-7 Yale victory. It was the Bulldogs' first game against an Ivy League opponent.

Yale is 11-2 in its last 13 games with Columbia and has won six in a row at Lee Amphitheater. In the first meeting this year, Sears scored 28 points, grabbed eight rebounds and blocked three shots, including one in the final seconds to help the Bulldogs to a 63-59 win at Levien Gym. Yale and Columbia have met at least once every year since 1902, which ties the series with Yale-Princeton as the oldest continuous series in Division I. The Lions lead the all-time series 124-104.

Yale has swept the Cornell-Columbia home weekend in three of the last four years.

SCOUTING CORNELL

Cornell (12-12, 4-4 Ivy) is led by Shonn Miller, who is second in the Ivy League in scoring (16.1 ppg.) and tied for the league lead in rebounding (8.3 rpg.). The Big Red is stingy on defense, allowing opponents to shoot just 38.2 percent. The Big Red has limited foes to below 40 percent shooting in 15 of its 24 games. Six of its 12 losses this season have come by five points or less or in overtime. Cornell is one of the most improved teams in the country. The Big Red was 2-26 overall last year.

SCOUTING COLUMBIA

The Lions (11-11, 3-5 Ivy) play at Brown on Friday. They feature the Ivy League's leading scorer in Maodo Lo (16.2 ppg.). Lo recently became the 27th player in school history to score at least 1,000 career points. Columbia is second in the league in scoring defense, allowing 60.2 ppg. The Lions have made 10 or more shots from three-point range eight times this season and Columbia's 8.8 triples per game ranks 18th in the nation.
#TEAMSOBER EVENT SATURDAY
Yale is holding an event at Saturday's game against Columbia to raise awareness for #TeamSober, an organization co-founded by Javier Duren to provide an alternative to the harmful drinking culture on the Yale campus. Based on a twitter hashtag, #TeamSober seeks to provide a community of individuals who enjoy having fun at social functions but are comfortable and confident with themselves to not feel as if they have to consume alcohol in order to be accepted by their peers. Each member is held accountable by a pledge which they must sign at the beginning of each school year stating they will abstain from the consumption of alcohol if they are under 21 but allows drinking in moderation for those over 21 years of age.

• Brown Athletics' weekend Game Notes is as follows:

 Brown Launches Four Game Homestand Against Columbia and Cornell

 Brown Athletics

Game Notes
Providence, R.I. -  Brown's men's basketball team returns to the Pizzitola Sports Center for a four-game homestand, starting with Columbia on Friday, February 20 at 8pm, and Cornell on Saturday, February 21 at 6pm. Friday's match-up with the Lions will be televised live on the American Sports Network and picked-up locally on NESN-Plus. Both games this weekend will also be available on the Ivy League Digital Network.

Bears-Lions On American Sports Network:  Friday's game between Brown and Columbia will be televised live on the American Sports Network, starting at 8 pm.  MSG's Carl Reuter will call the play and Ben Braun will provide the analysis. The game will be aired on NESN-Plus locally, and on the following nationwide affiliates: https://ivyleague.prestosports.com/x/0igir

Brown's Record: Brown (11-14, 2-6 Ivy) split games on the road with Princeton and Penn last week, falling to Princeton, 75-64, and beating Penn, 71-55 behind JR Hobbie's '17 career-high 21 points. 

Did You Know?: Forward Rafael Maia '15, who had 16 rebounds vs. Princeton, is averaging nearly a double-double in Ivy games with 11.0 points and 9.8 rebounds per game. Overall, Maia leads the Ivy League with 8.3 rebounds per game and is second in the league in field goal percentage (.542)… Brown's offense is directed by point guard Tavon Blackmon '17, who ranks fourth in the Ivy League with 4.2 assists per game.  He has scored in double figures in six of Brown's last seven games, including a career high 25 points vs. Harvard…Guard Steven Spieth '17 scored 19 points vs. Penn, connecting on 10-of-11 free throws. He ranks second in the Ivy League in free throw percentage (.845)…Guard JR Hobbie '17 scored a career high 21 points vs. Penn after connecting on 5-of-7 treys.
The Brown vs. Columbia Series Record: Brown and Columbia have met 134 times, dating back to 1900-1901, with the Lions holding a 70-64 series advantage. Columbia earned an 86-65 win over the Bears earlier this season in New York City, despite Brown getting 13 points and 11 rebounds from Cedric Kuakumensah '16. The two teams split games last year. Brown earned a 64-56 decision on 2/1/14 in Providence behind Rafael Maia's '15 18 points and 12 rebounds, while Columbia rallied for a 70-68 decision in New York City on 2/21/14.

The Brown vs. Cornell Series Record: Brown and Cornell will be meeting for the 125th time, dating back to 1949-1950, with the Big Red holding a 75-49 series advantage. Brown had won the last three games with the Big Red, before falling, 57-49 to the Big Red earlier this year. The Bears swept Cornell last year, 78-66 in Providence behind 18 points each by Steven Spieth '17 and JR Hobbie '17, and 81-75 in Ithaca, behind Cedric Kukumensah's 30 points and seven blocks.

Maia Named To Capital One Academic All-District Team: Brown senior forward Rafael Maia (Sao Paulo, Brazil) has been named to the Capital One Academic All-District Men's Basketball Team for the second straight year as selected by the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA).  His name will be placed on the national ballot for Academic All-American consideration. 

Blackmon Leads Brown's Scoring Attack: Sophomore point guard Tavon Blackmon (Upper Marlboro, MD) exploded for a career high 25 points and a career-best nine assists in Brown's overtime loss to Harvard. He leads the Brown team in scoring with 10.8 points per game after scoring in double figures in six of Brown's last seven games. He ranks fourth in the Ivy League in both assists with 4.2 per game and seventh in free throw percentage (.820). Blackmon netted 15 points vs. Princeton and 14 points vs. Penn last week. He scored a team-high 14 points vs. Cornell and had 13 points and seven assists vs. Columbia. Blackmon had a complete game vs. Yale with 15 points, five assists and four rebounds. He tossed in 11 points and handed out five assists vs. Lyndon State after scoring 10 points, handing out four assists and grabbing four rebounds vs. New Hampshire. Blackmon scored 13 points, dished out a career-best eight assists and made a career-best three steals in Brown's win over Sacred Heart, while connecting on 7-of-8 free throws. He came back vs. Rhode Island with 13 points and seven assists. Blackmon scored 16 points vs. Central Connecticut on 4-of-6 shooting from the field and 7-of-8 shooting from the free throw line. He played the most complete game of his career vs. Providence, scoring 11 points, and handing out seven assists, while turning the ball over just two times against the Friars pressure in 40 minutes of play.  He connected on 4-of-4 free throws in the last 52-seconds and also forced PC's high-scoring guard Kris Dunn into six turnovers. Blackmon tossed in 11 points and pulled down four rebounds in Brown's win over Bryant. He registered 18 points in Brown's season-opening win over St. Peter's, connecting on 8-of-8 free throws down the stretch. His 3.5 assists per game last year ranked fifth in the Ivy League, including a season-high seven assists against Harvard, Yale and Longwood.

More Bear Facts: Freshman guard Jason Massey (Cooper City, FL) scored seven points and grabbed two rebounds in the Bears' win over Dartmouth. He scored nine points vs. Prairie View, and earned starts vs. Johnson & Wales and American… Freshman guard Patrick Triplett (St. Louis, MO) scored a career-best 11 points vs. Lyndon State…Senior forward Longji Yiljep earned a starting role vs. Prairie View.  He had two points and two rebounds vs. Lyndon State…Senior forward Jon Schmidt (Baltimore, MD) had four rebounds and two points vs. Lyndon State.
Spieth Among Ivy Leaders: Sophomore guard Steven Spieth (Dallas, TX) is Brown's third leading scorer with 10.2 points per game, and ranks second in the Ivy League in free throw percentage (.845). Spieth tossed in 19 points vs. Penn on 10-of-11 shooting from the free throw line. He scored 12 points and grabbed five rebounds in the Bears' overtime loss to Harvard. Spieth scored 11 points vs. Columbia, hitting 4-of-4 free throws, and scored 17 points vs. Yale on 13-of-14 shooting from the free throw line, while grabbing eight rebounds. Spieth played a major role in Brown's win over Providence with 15 points on 9-of-9 shooting from the free throw line, while grabbing six rebounds and handing out three assists. He paced the Bears with 19 points and 10 rebounds in Brown's win over Central Connecticut. Spieth scored 12 points vs. Bryant, hitting 8-of-8 free throws, but played a huge role defensively, holding Bryant's high-scoring Dyami Starks to just 5-of-18 shooting overall. He connected on 11-of-13 free throws in scoring 15 points vs. Johnson & Wales, and scored 16 points on 6-of-7 shooting from the field vs. Prairie View in the final game of the Las Vegas Invitational. Spieth tossed in a career-high 21 points and grabbed seven rebounds against Illinois in the Las Vegas Invitational in Champaign, Ill., connecting on 7-of-10 field goals and 6-of-8 free throws. Spieth distributed a career-high seven assists against Indiana State. Last year, Spieth started all 29 games and was a three-time Ivy Rookie of the Week. He ranked second in the Ivy League in free throw percentage (.860).  Spieth registered a double-double in a win over Penn with 19 points and 12 rebounds, and scored a then career-high 20 points vs. Dartmouth, hitting 11-of-13 free throws.

Rafael Maia – Tops Ivy League In Rebounding: Senior forward Rafael Maia (Sao Paulo, Brazil), a two-year captain for the Bears, led the Ivy League in rebounding in each of the last two seasons, averaging 8.1 rebounds per game a year ago. He pulled down a career high 16 rebounds while scoring 16 points on the road against Princeton and is the Ivy League leader in rebounding with 8.3 per game. He ranks second in the league in field goal percentage, connecting on 77-of-142 field goal attempts (.545).  Maia registered a double-double with 10 points and 13 rebounds in Brown's win over Dartmouth.  He grabbed nine rebounds vs. Cornell and scored 11 points vs. Columbia. Maia scored a season high 18 points on the road at Yale on 5-of-6 shooting from the field, while grabbing nine rebounds. He posted a double-double vs. Yale at home with 16 points on 7-of-11 shooting, and 12 rebounds. Maia pulled down 10 rebounds in Brown's win over Central Connecticut. He scored a team high 15 points vs. New Hampshire and grabbed 12 rebounds, while scoring nine points vs. Lyndon State. He stepped up vs. Sacred Heart with 13 points and nine rebounds, and came back vs. URI with nine points and six rebounds. Maia netted 12 points and grabbed a career-high 16 rebounds vs. Johnson & Wales. He scored 11 points vs. Prairie View at the Las Vegas Invitational after missing the previous game (Austin Peay) due to illness. He scored nine of his 13 points in the opening half against Illinois, while grabbing six rebounds. Maia opened the season by scoring 13 points and pulling down seven rebounds against St. Peter's. He came back with 12 points and a team-high eight rebounds against Northwestern. Maia was named the Ivy League's best rebounder by Lindy's Sports Annuals.   A CoSIDA Academic All-District selection, Maia started 22 games last season, missing seven due to injury. He had nine games with double-figure rebounding, including a season-high 14 rebounds vs. UMass Lowell. An Academic All-Ivy honoree, he also led Brown and ranked seventh in the Ivy League in field goal percentage (.478). The rugged Brazilian played for Brazil in the World University Games in Russia in the summer of 2013.

Where are they now?  Former two-time first team All-Ivy guard Sean McGonagill '14, Brown's third all-time leading scorer, is playing for the Giants Dusseldorf in Germany.
Bears Stun Providence:  Brown defeated defending Big East Champion Providence College for the second time in the last three years, 77-67, with tenacious defense and 12-of-13 shooting from the free throw line down the stretch at the Dunkin Donuts Center in the 121st meeting between the two Providence schools. Junior forward Cedric Kuakumensah earned Ivy League Player of the Week honors after scoring 15 points and grabbing seven rebounds. Sophomore guard Steven Spieth threw in 15 points on 9-of-9 shooting from the free throw line, while pulling down six rebounds. 

Kuakumensah – Records 200^th Career Blocked Shot: Junior forward Cedric Kuakumensah (Worcester, MA), the Ivy League leader with 2.6 blocked shots per game, is the premier defensive player in the Ivy League, having been named the Ivy League Defensive Player of the Year for two straight years. He holds the Brown school record for blocked shots in a career with 222, and became the fourth player in Ivy basketball history to block 200 or more shots. Kuakumensah's 63 blocked shots in 2014-15 are third in the Brown record book. His 10.6 points per game are second on the Brown team, while grabbing 7.3 rebounds per game, fifth in the Ivy League. Last week, he had 12 points and eight rebounds vs. Princeton, and nine points and nine rebounds vs. Penn. Kuakumensah had 15 points vs. Harvard and 11 rebounds vs. Dartmouth. He registered a double-double vs. Columbia with 13 points and 11 rebounds. Kuakumensah posted a double-double vs. New Hampshire with 13 points and 10 rebounds, while adding three blocked shots. He scored 21 points, grabbed five rebounds and blocked three shots vs. Rhode Island, followed by a 14 rebound, six blocked shot performance against UMass Lowell. Kuakumensah turned in a strong performance in Brown's win over Central Connecticut with 13 points, nine rebounds and five blocked shots. He was named the Ivy League Player of the Week after his dominating performance in a win over Providence with 15 points, seven rebounds and two blocked shots against the defending Big East Champions. Kuakumensah exploded for 20 points vs. Bryant and completed the double-double with 15 rebounds, while blocking four shots. He also netted a team high 17 points vs. American. Kuakumensah blocked four shots, scored 15 points and grabbed five rebounds vs. Austin Peay at the Las Vegas Invitational. Kuakumensah opened the season by scoring 15 points on 7-of-9 shooting from the field, while grabbing seven rebounds and blocking three shots vs. St. Peter's. Last year, Kuakumensah established a new Ivy League single-season record with 93 blocked shots, and ranked sixth nationally with 3.2 blocked shots per game. He scored a career-high 30 points against Cornell last year on 12-of-19 shooting from the field, while grabbing a career-best 14 rebounds and blocking seven shots against the Big Red. He has blocked seven shots four times in his career, a Brown single-game record. Kuakumensah, who played at the St. Andrew's School in Barrington, RI, averaged 7.2 rebounds per game last year, third best in the Ivy League.

Ivy League Career Blocked Shots – Top 5
1.         252 ... Brian Gilpin (Dartmouth, 1993-97)
2.         225 ... Walter Palmer (Dartmouth, 1986-90)
3.         222…Cedric Kuakumensah (Brown, 2012-present)
4.         213 ... Greg Mangano (Yale, 2009-12)
5.         195 ... Geoff Owens (Penn, 1997-01)

Brown: Individual Single Season Blocked Shots
1.            93*…Cedric Kuakumensah (2013-14)            * Ivy League record 
2.            66…Cedric Kuakumensah (2012-13)
3.           63…Cedric Kuakumensah (2014-15)
4.            59…Matt Mullery (2008-09)
Hobbie From Three:  Sharpshooting sophomore JR Hobbie (Spring Lake, NJ), who has started Brown's last six games, exploded for a career-high 21 points vs. Penn on 5-of-7 shooting from beyond the three-point arc. Hobbie, who ranks fifth in the Ivy League in treys made per game (2.2) and seventh in three-point FG percentage (.391), connected on 5-of-8 treys in scoring 17 points in Brown's win over Dartmouth. He scored 12 points in a starting role vs. Columbia, scored seven points vs. Yale, and led the Bears with 12 points in a win over UMass Lowell. Hobbie netted 12 points with four treys vs. Lyndon State.  He scored 13 points in Brown's win over Providence, connecting on 4-of-7 treys and converting a four-point play. Hobbie scored 13 points in Brown's win over Johnson & Wales and eight points vs. Bryant.  He played a big role in Brown's win over Prairie View with 12 points on 4-of-6 shooting from beyond the three-point arc. He stepped up against Northwestern with 12 points, after scoring eight points in Brown's season opening win over St. Peter's, connecting on 2-of-3 treys. He netted six points vs. Holy Cross on 2-of-4 shooting from beyond the three-point arc. Last year, Hobbie was a three-time Ivy League Rookie of the Week, who ranked fifth in the Ivy League in three-point field goal percentage and seventh in treys made (1.7 per game). He scored a career-high 20 points vs. Daniel Webster, connecting on 6-of-13 treys, and netted 18 points vs. Cornell on 6-of-9 shooting from beyond the three-point arc.

Williams Contributes In The Backcourt:  Freshman Tyler Williams (West Chester, OH) scored a career-high eight points in three straight games: eight points vs. Rhode Island on 3-of-4 shooting from the field, including 2-of-2 from behind the three-point arc; eight points again, this time vs. UMass Lowell; and eight points vs. New Hampshire. Williams earned the starting point guard role in Brown games against Holy Cross, Indiana State and Yale. He netted four points and handed out three assists vs. Indiana State, and earned his first career starting role vs. Holy Cross, scoring four points.  Williams tossed in five points and pulled down two rebounds against St. Peter's in Brown's season opener.

Head Coach Mike Martin: Former Brown basketball standout Mike Martin '04, the 31st head men's basketball coach in the program's 109-year history, has changed the direction and culture of the program in two years as head coach of the Bears, with the building blocks in place to develop an Ivy Championship team. Martin took over the reins of the program in 2012-13 and was named a finalist for the Joe B. Hall Award as the nation's outstanding first-year head coach after leading the Bears to a turnaround season with a 13-15 overall record, including a fourth-place finish in the Ivy standings with a 7-7 mark after winning four of its last five games. Martin's 2013-14 team posted a 15-14 overall record and hosted Brown's first-ever home postseason game, playing Holy Cross in the CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament at the Pizzitola Sports Center.  In addition, Cedric Kuakumensah '16 was named the Ivy League's Defensive Player of the Year for the second straight season. Martin's first recruiting class proved to be one of the most honored in Brown basketball history, with three different freshmen being named the Ivy League Rookie of the Week a school record 10 times. A four-year starter at Brown, Martin was part of the winningest class in Bears' basketball history, posting a 63-45 four-year record from 2000-04. He also helped the Class of 2004 to a school-record 39-17 Ivy League mark during that period - the best by an Ivy League team, other than Penn and Princeton, since 1970. An Agawam, Mass., native, Martin launched his coaching career at Brown as an assistant coach in 2005-06 and was an assistant coach at Penn from 2006-12.

Walker – Impact In The Middle: Senior forward Dockery Walker (Magnolia, DE), who has started 45 career games for the Bears, netted seven points and grabbed three rebounds vs. Dartmouth. He scored six points and grabbed six rebounds in Brown's first meeting with Yale. Walker grabbed seven rebounds in back-to-back games vs. Cornell and Columbia. He pulled down 11 rebounds and scored seven points vs. Lyndon State, and scored seven points and pulled down three rebounds in Brown's win over Sacred Heart. Walker also had six points and four rebounds in the Bears' win over UMass Lowell and added seven points and three rebounds vs. New Hampshire. Last year, Walker earned two starts in 29 games played, and scored 17 points against UMass Lowell and Daniel Webster.  Walker pulled down a season-high nine rebounds in wins over Daniel Webster and UMass Lowell, and scored in double figures seven times. He missed all of the 2012-13 season due to injury.  As a sophomore in 2011-12, he scored in double figures 13 times, including a career-high 23 points against Cornell, connecting on 10-of-11 field goals, while completing the double-double with 17 rebounds against the Big Red.  Walker, who started 19 games as a sophomore, was Brown's second-leading rebounder with 4.6 rpg.

Bears On The Air:  Brown's entire 31-game schedule is being broadcast on WPRV-AM 790 with Scott Cordischi, the voice of Brown basketball and football, calling all the action. Former Brown basketball star Russ Tyler '71 (1,133 career points) provides the color analysis. Brown fans can also listen to the broadcast on BrownBears.com.

Watch Live Video of The Bears On BrownBears.TV: Brown fans can watch a multi-camera HD broadcast of all Brown home games and away Ivy League contests on BrownBears.TV as part of the Ivy League Digital Network. Powered by NeuLion, the Brown Channel is a part of the Ivy League's completely redesigned, nine-channel digital network that includes an easy-to-navigate interface, a League-wide network schedule and new interactive features, such as simultaneous four-game viewing, full DVR controls and social media integration. These new features enhance the viewing experience for the expanded range of events and other content offerings, all of which are available on computer, mobile and tablet devices without the use of an app. Packages for BrownBears.TV are $89.95 for 12 months, $39.95 for four months, $10.95 for one month and $9.95 for a single day and include multi-camera HD coverage of all available home and Ivy away games in football, and men's and women's basketball.

Next Game:  Brown completes its Pizzitola Sports Center home schedule next week, hosting Penn on Friday, February 27 at 7pm, and Princeton on Saturday, February 28 at 6pm. Saturday's game against the Tigers is Senior Night, with seniors Rafael Maia, Jon Schmidt, Dockery Walker and Longji Yiljep being honored in ceremonies prior to the game.

Purchase Brown Tickets:  Tickets for all Brown men's basketball home games can be purchased online at brownbears.com, calling the Brown Athletics Ticket Office at (401) 863-2773, or walking up to the Box Office located in the Pizzitola Sports Center, open Monday-Friday, 9 a.m. - 4 p.m.