having lifted allgame’s heart with their stout play versus princeton and penn, the lions squandered our good will in two sloppy saturday losses at levien, first to harvard and then to brown. they followed those half-hearted defenses of home court with a similarly shoddy loss to yale in new haven. the raveled sleeve of our patience becomes ever more difficult to conceal. this young team continues to manifest the less charming characteristics of youth. they are careless, undisciplined, uncommunicative and provocatively spendthrift of opportunity. in both those saturday encounters, the light blue literally threw the games away racking up first 16 turnovers versus harvard and then 22 give aways against brown. here are two thumbnails to nash one’s teeth over: against the cantabs, cameron shockley-okeke scored 19 points and grabbed 11 rebounds but turned the ball over five times, giving back half of his offensive contribution; ike nweke tallied 16 against brown while collecting 9 rebounds but committed six turnovers. talk about giving with one hand and taking away with the other!
as if that slovenliness is not enough to empower their foes, they simultaneously hurl bricks at the backboard from the free throw line. they have repeatedly left themselves with little room for tough losses much less close wins. the harvard game, a nine point loss, did not ultimately hinge on the blown free throws, but the nine point margin would have been smaller had columbia converted all their opportunities. those missing points affect every aspect of the closing minutes of a game, from player rotation to the plays the lion choose to run. the nineteen point whacking from brown should have been a single digit loss with the visitors sweating the result rather than playing a quintet of players who rarely feel the court beneath their sneakers. the lions chose to coddle their opponent via 13 unmade foul shots.
the defense, though true, that this is a young squad has lost its pertinacity for us. the lions are young, but they are not inexperienced at this point in the season. the game should be slowing down for them – they should be better anticipating the close of passing lanes, have a better sense of when to kick the ball out to the perimeter rather than attack the rim and, most appropriately regarding the failure in new haven, when to switch on defense. the loss to james jones’s crew was determined in the first seven minutes of play when yale sped off to a 20 – 2 lead. you read that right. much of that damage was inflicted by azar swain, the yale guard who has regularly tormented columbia during his career and hung 37 points on them this tuesday past. his 6 – 8 performance from the three point line should alert the light blue to the necessity of more rigorously defending their perimeter.
all the more necessary as dartmouth rolls into levien this saturday afternoon. the big green returned from the cancelled season with the ivy league’s most experienced squad. brendan barry, a historically good three point shooter who spent a year away playing for temple, leads the hanoverians with 14.6 points nightly and a still fine 40.6% from the three point line. the fifth year grad student is abetted by senior aaryn rai who tosses in 11.8 points while grabbing 7.3 rebounds per contest. seniors taurus samuels and garrison wade along with first year ryan cornish constitute the balance of the starting five contributing 9.5, 7.1 and 8.3 ppg, respectively. though they have managed but a single league win (over brown), the big green has battled princeton right to the buzzer and even had a three point attempt with under fifteen seconds to play that would have beaten the tigers had it fallen. that hard fought four point fail to the league’s leader is testament to dartmouth’s quality. similarly, they dropped a 60 – 59 heartbreaker to harvard. as the desperate must clutch at straws, columbia can perhaps take heart from the big green’s loss to penn – columbia’s only league victim to date. reaching spiritually further, hear us o divinities of roundball and hardwood! aid our heroes tomorrow! shall a group of new hampshire hillbillies humble a harlem adjacent five? it cannot be! let us pray that a half week of practice has clarified the lions’ recognition of their personal responsibilities as well as those they owe the rest of the pride.
peace out, d up
paulie b