CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- In an instant classic that featured 10 lead changes and five ties in the second half alone, Princeton made the plays in the final 60 seconds and Cornell rimmed out the game-tying bucket late as the top-seeded Tigers clawed past the Big Red, 77-73, on Saturday afternoon at Harvard's Lavietes Pavilion. Cornell fell to 15-11, while Princeton advances to Sunday's noon championship game against the winner of the Penn/Yale game.
Tied 73-73 entering the final minute, Princeton collected three of its four offensive rebounds of the night, winning the game on Ivy League Player of the Year Tosan Evboumwan's driving layup with 36 seconds to play. The Big Red's had a chance to tie, but All-Ivy guard
Dean Noll's pull-up jumper in the lane rolled out with nine ticks left. Princeton's Ryan Langborg went to the line and connected on two free throws to ice the contest and send Princeton to the final.
Seniors
Sarju Patel and
Dean Noll each had 13 points, freshman
Nazir Williams had 12 and
Kobe Dickson scored 10 with six rebounds, two assists and two blocked shots to lead the Big Red.
Greg Dolan added an efficient seven points with four assists, three rebounds and a steal. Both
Sean Hansen and
Jordan Jones scored five apiece, with Jones adding four rebounds. The Big Red shot 49 percent from the floor, outrebounded the Tigers 36-31 and committed just seven turnovers.
Evboumwan scored 21 points with six rebounds and six assists, while Jaelin Llewellyn had a game-high 23 with four rebounds, two assists and two steals. Ethan Wright was also posted double figures with 12 points and six boards.
It didn't look like the classic it would become early on. The Tigers led by as many as 17 in the first half (35-18) and shot the lights out until Cornell was able to get the pace more to its liking. Once it did, starting at the six minute mark of the first half, the game was on.
Princeton led 40-35 at the half, and a 7-0 Big Red run to begin the second stanza gave the fourth-seeded Big Red its first lead of the night at 42-40 when
Sarju Patel canned a 3-pointer. The teams traded big shot after big shot, but it was Evboumwan's 16 points in the final 20 minutes, all came at opportune times, that made the difference. All eight of eight second half field goals came with the game tied, to give Princeton the lead or in a one possession game.
Cornell had an answer to each bucket. A backdoor layup by Dolan. A runner by Noll. Consecutive tough buckets underneath by Dickson. But Princeton three offensive rebounds in the final 70 seconds, two by a crashing Ethan Wright, allowed Evboumwan to set up the game winning shot.
Gallery: (3-12-2022) Men's Basketball vs Princeton, 03.12.22
First Half
• Princeton came out possessed to open the game, scoring the first eight points, hitting 4-of-5 3-pointers and running out to a 14-2 edge before Cornell found its footing.
• Consecutive driving baskets by Noll allowed the Big Red to catch its breath, but the Tigers again extended the lead.
• It was 35-18 with 8:28 left when Wright connected on a 3-pointer to finish off a 12-2 run.
• The Big Red closed it out on a 13-3 run of its own to cut the deficit to five at the break.
• Llewellyn scored 17 of his points on 7-of-10 shooting as Princeton shot 6-of-11 from beyond the arc in the half and 59 percent overall from the floor.
•
Nazir Williams scored eight points and
Dean Noll scored seven as the Big Red committed just three turnovers over the first 20 minutes.
Second Half
• Cornell scored the first seven points in a span of 1:33, punctuated by
Sarju Patel's 3-pointer to make it 42-40.
• After the teams traded treys, Princeton marched back out to a five-point advantage (50-45) with 14:47 remaining, the last time the teams were separated by more than a possession until the final seconds.
• Two 3-pointers by Patel inside of a minute, including one falling away from the corner as the shot clock expired, turned a two-point deficit into a three-point lead (63-60) with 8:36 to play.
• Both teams had a three-minute scoring drought with the Big Red up 67-66, broken when
Dean Noll hit a jumper in the lane.
• Llewellyn's 3-pointer in front of his bench with under three minutes remaining flipped the lead back to the Tigers, and though the Big Red tied twice more on Dickson buckets, it would never regain the lead.
• Tied 73-73, Cornell forced Evboumwan into a miss, but Wright rebounded.
• A Princeton timeout set up a 3-point attempt for Wright that also was off, but Llewellyn came down with the rebound.
• A third miss, again by Evboumwan, was rebounded by Wright.
• A lengthy delay of more than two minutes checked to see if the shot clock should be reset. It wasn't.
• With six seconds left, Princeton's Mitch Henderson handed the ball to Evboumwan, who finished at the rim to give the Tigers a 75-73 edge.
• Cornell got a great shot by Noll that rimmed out and went out of bounds off a crashing Big Red player.
• Langborg was fouled on the inbounds and made both free throws, essentially sealing the win with six seconds remaining.
