Friday, November 20, 2009

BULLDOGS STRUGGLE IN SECOND HALF, FALL TO HARVARD, 77-51, FRIDAY NIGHT

Boxscore

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - A strong start against a tough Harvard side allowed the Bryant men's basketball team to take just an eight-point deficit into halftime, but the Bulldogs would struggle in the closing 20 minutes, eventually falling to the Crimson, 77-51, Friday night at Lavietes Pavilion.

Bryant (0-4) and Harvard (3-0) played back-and-forth ball for the first 10 minutes of the contest, trading leads twice with a trio of ties through the game's first four minutes.

A three-point Crimson advantage was cut to just one less than five minutes in, when rookie Vlad Kondratyev (Nikolayev, Ukraine) pulled down the rebound off a Cecil Gresham (Bloomfield, Conn.) shot and banked it in for an easy layup, moving the score to 9-8 in the home side's favor.

The Bulldogs started to slip midway through the frame, falling behind by as many as seven points, 17-10, with 12:46 to play before the break. But riding six-straight points over the following 1:06, Bryant closed the gap to just one and would keep it close until the waning minutes of the half.

With 2:29 to play, a Jeremy Lin 3-pointer re-upped Harvard's lead to eight, and while Gresham cut it back down to five after converting his first trey in four tries, Lin would hit from downtown with the last shot of the frame to send the Crimson into the intermission with an eight-point advantage, 35-27.

The Bulldogs shot a shade under 40 percent in the opening half, but couldn't contain Harvard's offense as well as they did against Bucknell, allowing the Crimson to convert 41.4 percent of shots from the floor. Success from long range against Bryant continued as well, as the home side went 4-for-9 (44.4 percent) from beyond the arc in the opening 20.

But when the Bulldogs needed a quick start to the second half to bring the game back to even, they couldn't get it, nearly doubling their deficit in the first 4:13 as Harvard outscored Bryant, 10-3, to run the score to 45-30.

Gresham would cut the Crimson lead to 13 with the Bulldogs' next shot, but Bryant wouldn't again bring the game within single digits, falling by a 77-51 final.

Turnovers plagued the Black and Gold, who gave the ball away 17 times, allowing the Crimson 18 points off giveaways. On the glass, the teams were even at the break, 18-18, but Harvard pulled away in the second frame, outrebounding the Bulldogs, 42-33, on the night.

The Crimson shot lights out after halftime, hitting 53.3 percent of shots from the floor to the Bulldogs' 28.6 percent shooting, but cooled off from 3-point range, converting just 1-of-7 chances in the final 20 minutes. They were led by 12 points from Lin and Christian Webster.

The Bulldogs were led by Gresham's 11 points and game-high eight rebounds and shot 33.9 percent as a team. Senior Chris Birrell (Scituate, R.I.) and freshman Raphael Jordan (Bel Air, Md.) each handed out a team-best three assists, while sophomore Papa Lo (Thies, Senegal) posted the side's only block.

The Bulldogs will play once more before taking a five-day Thanksgiving hiatus, welcoming intrastate rival Brown to the Chace Athletic Center for the 2009-10 home opener on Wednesday, Nov. 25 at 4 p.m.