Here's official word from the Ivy League on the various possibilities that could happen this week(end) in the sprint to the 2009 Ivy League championship. In the unlikely chance of a playoff/playoffs, we now know where it will all take place! - JS
PRINCETON, N.J. — Heading into the final full travel weekend, the Cornell men still sit in the driver's seat, but Princeton, Dartmouth and Yale all have a mathematical chance for a share of the regular season title.
In the event of any two-or-three-way tie at the conclusion of the regular season on Tuesday, the tied teams will be co-champions and a playoff will determine the League's automatic bid to the NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Championships (the League has had seven men's playoffs, including one three-team playoff in 2002).
Here are the possible scenarios:
Cornell (9-3 Ivy) can win the Ivy title outright by beating Princeton (7-4) on Saturday night in its final game of the season, or by beating Penn on Friday night if Princeton loses at Columbia that night or to Penn in their regular-season finale on Tuesday, March 10.
Princeton can win the title outright if it sweeps all of its final three games and Cornell loses both of its final two games.
Cornell and Princeton would share the regular season title at 10-4, and meet in a one-game playoff, if:
- Cornell beats Penn on Friday night and loses to Princeton on Saturday, AND
- Princeton wins its final three games, at Columbia on Friday night, at Cornell on Saturday night and at Penn on Tuesday.
Cornell and either Dartmouth (7-5) OR Yale (7-5) would share the regular season title at 9-5, and meet in a one-game playoff, if:
- Cornell loses its final two games, AND
- The winner of Friday night’s Dartmouth-at-Yale game also wins on Saturday night (against Brown and Harvard, respectively), AND
- Princeton loses its games at Columbia on Friday night and Penn on Tuesday night.
Cornell, Princeton and either Dartmouth (7-5) OR Yale (7-5) all would share the regular season title (at 9-5), forcing a two-game playoff, if:
- Cornell loses to both Penn and Princeton this weekend AND
- Princeton beats Cornell on Saturday night, and loses to either Columbia on Friday night or Penn on Tuesday, AND
- Yale OR Dartmouth sweep their respective games this weekend.
The men’s playoff games will take place at Columbia's Levien Gymnasium in New York City.
A one-game playoff would be Saturday, March 14. A three-way, two-game playoff would take place Thursday, March 12 and Saturday, March 14, with the higher seed (best combined record vs. two other teams) receiving the bye to meet the winner of the first playoff game.
Not sure why this only showed up on-line now, two months after the fact, but here's the lehighsports.com postgame report after the Tigers defeated the Engineers at Jadwin on January 7th.
Tigers head coach Sydney Johnson and princetonbasketball.com editor Jon Solomon met on Thursday morning at Jadwin Gym to discuss Princeton's wins over Brown and Yale in detail. The two also previewed 2008-09's final three regular season games, as the Tigers travel to Columbia, Cornell and Penn this week. The interview is 13:00+ in length.
The Wall Street Journal article discussed in the interview can be read here.
Interviews with Coach Johnson appear on this site every week during the season.
Oregon State vs. UCLA - 10:30 pm ET - FSN Prime Ticket
Princeton stands between Cornell and the NCAA tournament.
Sparked by some unexpected faces off the bench, Northwestern (17-11) won at #19 Purdue. The Wildcats have tied the school record for most regular-season victories.
Denver (15-15) advanced to the Sun Belt Tournament quarterfinals in Hot Springs with a nine point win over Louisiana-Monroe.
Oregon State visits #17 UCLA. Beavers coach Craig Robinson is already fielding questions about how long he will stay in Corvallis.
After Princeton's disappointing home loss to Dartmouth, in which the Tigers did not grab a single offensive rebound, I was desperate to know when the last time was that the orange and black went an entire game without a second chance on the glass.
After some thorough legwork and the help of Robbie Allen at StatSheet, I have the answer!
Postgame audio - Coach John Thompson III, Greg Monroe & Chris Wright:
A moribund St. John's team, who had gone over 13 minutes without a field goal to start the second half, had missed 14 straight shots and had fallen behind Georgetown by 14 points was somehow able to pull even with the Hoyas at the end of regulation and smash Georgetown's postseason chances in overtime.
It was the first overtime game in the 91 meetings between the two Big East rivals.
Two free throws by St. John's Rob Thomas with two seconds left sent the game to the extra frame.
Thomas' offensive rebound and two-handed dunk with one on the shot clock gave the Red Storm a three point lead with 15 seconds left in OT and DaJuan Summers' deep, open three point shot for Georgetown at the buzzer was long off the iron.
Greg Monroe scored a game-high 18 for the Hoyas, but chose to pass the ball on several occasions close to the rim where he should have been less selfish.
Thomas finished with a career-high 16 points and seven boards off the bench.
St. John's outrebounded Georgetown 46-25.
Starting forward Austin Freeman was unable to play the Hoyas. Freeman tried to go through warmups at Madison Square Garden despite an injured hip but could not get his body to respond.
Richmond vs. Charlotte - 7:00 pm ET - CBS College Sports
Georgetown vs. St. John's - 7:30 pm ET - MASN
Douglas Davis was named Ivy League Rookie of the Week for the third time this season. Dan Mavraides also had a spot on the Honor Roll of the latest Ivy Weekly Basketball Awards.
Another long, oddly edited, but ultimately rewarding video package by WZBN, with footage from the Carril Court halftime ceremony and the Dartmouth/Princeton game that bookended it.
Nikita Mescheriakov and Georgetown visit St. John's tonight. princetonbasketball.com will also be courtside covering the action.
princetonbasketball.com was founded on April 28th, 1998 in an attempt to provide fans of the Princeton Tigers and Ivy League basketball with the best on-line source for up-to-date news and information. We have since expanded to launch a companion site, Georgetown Basketball News.
As these sites have continued to grow we have increased our coverage to include additional teams with Princeton connections - the Richmond Spiders, Denver Pioneers, Oregon State Beavers, Fairfield Stags and Mercer County Community College Vikings - plus former Tigers playing professional baseball and basketball all over the world. This site is not directly affiliated with the Friends of Princeton Basketball, Princeton University or the Princeton athletic department.
Sun. 11/10 vs. Florida A&M
Sat. 11/16 at Butler
Wed. 11/20 vs. Lafayette
Sat. 11/23 at Rice
Tue. 11/26 vs. George Mason
Sat. 11/30 at Bucknell
Sat. 12/7 vs. FDU
Wed. 12/11 at Rutgers
Sat. 12/14 at Penn State
Fri. 12/20 vs. Portland*
Sat. 12/21 vs. Pacific*
Tue. 12/31 vs. Kent State
Sat. 1/4 at Liberty
Sat. 1/11 at Penn
Sun. 1/26 vs. Kean
Fri. 1/31 at Harvard
Sat. 2/1 at Dartmouth
Fri. 2/7 vs. Columbia
Sat. 2/8 vs. Cornell
Fri. 2/14 at Brown
Sat. 2/15 at Yale
Fri. 2/21 vs. Dartmouth
Sat. 2/22 vs. Harvard
Fri. 2/28 vs. Yale
Sat. 3/1 vs. Brown
Fri. 3/7 at Cornell
Sat. 3/8 at Columbia
Tue. 3/11 vs. Penn
2,503 - B. Bradley, 1962-65
1,625 - I. Hummer, 2009-13
1,550 - D. Davis, 2008-12
1,546 - K. Mueller, 1987-91
1,451 - P. Campbell, 1959-62
1,441 - C. Robinson, 1979-83
1,428 - B. Earl, 1995-99
1,365 - B. Scrabis, 1985-89
1,321 - G. Petrie, 1967-70
1,292 - H. Haabestad, 1952-55
1,277 - G. Lewullis, 1995-99
1,239 - B. Taylor, 1970-72
1,207 - S. Goodrich 1994-98
1,133 - F. Sowinski, 1975-78
1,130 - R. Hielscher, 1991-95
1,122 - C. Thomforde, 1966-69
1,099 - T. Manakas, 1970-73
1,090 - J. Wallace, 2001-05
1,088 - C. Belz, 1956-59
1,079 - B. Hauptfuhrer, 1973-76
1,076 - B. Roma, 1976-79
1,071 - C. Mooney, 1990-94
1,064 - A. Hyland, Jr., 1960-63
1,062 - L. Brangan, 1957-60
1,057 - A. Hill, 1973-76
1,054 - D. Mavraides, 2007-11
1,044 - S. Johnson, 1993-1997
1,031 - J. Hummer, 1967-70
1,010 - W. Venable, 2001-05
