CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- Harvard and Cornell spent all night throwing mighty shots at each other, but the preseason Ivy favorite Crimson regained its spot atop the conference standings with a 98-88 double overtime victory over the Big Red on Friday evening at Lavietes Pavillion. Harvard (16-12, 11-2 Ivy) moved into a first-place tie with Penn thanks to the victory, while the Big Red (11-15, 5-8 Ivy) remained in a tie for fourth place in the race for the final playoff spot at next weekend's Ivy League Tournament.

Junior Matt Morgan tied his career high with 34 points and classmates Stone Gettings (23 points, six rebounds, four assists) and Steven Julian (10 points, 12 rebounds, three assists) all made huge contributions as the Big Red remained in the fight despite shooting under 40 percent from the floor (.394), being outrebounds 41-32 and allowing the Crimson to shoot 53 percent overall and hit 12 3-pointers. Jack Gordon had eight points and four assists off the bench and Joel Davis netted seven points. In all, the junior class combined for 82 of the team's 88 points on the night.

Chris Lewis scored 29 points to lead four Crimson players with at least 18 points. Christian Juzang had a double-double with 20 points and 11 rebounds, Seth Towns scored 20 and Justin Bassey recorded 18 along with seven rebounds and five assists. Harvard was hurt by 19 turnovers and allowed the Big Red to get to the free-throw line 29 times.

Cornell will enter its final game of the regular season at Dartmouth with two paths to earning the fourth and final bid to the 2018 Ivy League Men's Basketball Tournament. The Big Red will advance with a win at Dartmouth along with losses by Columbia (at Harvard) and Princeton (at Yale), or with losses to all three teams and a Brown win (at home vs. Penn). The second scenario would create a four-way tie that would advance the Big Red.

Cornell trailed by double figures with under seven minutes to play and by seven with under four remaining, but came all the way back to send it to an extra session. Morgan's conventional three-point play knotted the game at 77-77 with 4.8 seconds to play, and Harvard's Justin Bassey's wild layup attempt at the buzzer fell off the rim.

The Big Red led the first overtime after a Joel Davis layup on a great feed from Terrance McBride with 27 seconds left, but the Crimson tied it up after Seth Towns hit the second on two charity shots. Morgan had a long 3-point attempt to win it, but the shot rimmed out to send Cornell to its second multi-session overtime games in the span of two weeks.

Harvard's Towns blocked a shot and hit a jumper on the other end, and a possession later Lewis caught the ball on the baseline, was fouled and threw down a dunk anyway for a three-point play and a four-point Crimson lead they would never surrender. Cornell missed its next two shots sandwiched around a turnover, and that spelled doom for the visitors.

Cornell had plenty of fight in it during the first half, forcing 11 turnovers and drawing 12 fouls against a big, athletic Crimson team, but connected on just 32 percent of its shots from the floor and 2-of-9 (22 percent) from beyond the arc. The Big Red fell behind by as many as 10 points, but scrapped back to within 35-33 at the break.

NOTES TO KNOW
• Junior Matt Morgan's 34 points not only tied a career high, but gives him 595 on the season, one point shy of matching Ryan Wittman's single-season school record of 596 points during the 2009-10 season, which was done in 34 games.
• He also reached double figures for the 49th consecutive game, extending his own school record.
• Morgan became the third player in school history to reach the 1,600-point plateau and ended the night with 1,611 - 52 points shy of John Bajusz for second at Cornell.
• Steven Julian recorded a career-high 12 rebounds and collected his second double-double for the Big Red.
• Cornell is now 41-51 all-time in overtime games and 7-10 in games that run multiple extra sessions.

NEXT UP
• The Big Red closes out the regular season at Dartmouth (Saturday, March 3 at 7 p.m.) as the #RoadToIvyMadness concludes.
• Cornell will be out for the season sweep after taking an 86-85 victory on Feb. 2 at Newman Arena.