Sacred Heart University Department of Athletics
Harvard
Men's Hoop Gets Past Harvard, 75-66
12/22/2007 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Dec. 22, 2007
FAIRFIELD, CT - Senior guard Drew Shubik (Stoystown, PA) scored a game-high 20 points, including converting 13 of 14 from the free throw line, to help the men's basketball team defeat Harvard University 75-66 on Saturday afternoon. The win was the 450th in the career of head coach Dave Bike.
Five Pioneers finished the game in double figures for the Pioneers, who moved to 4-7. In addition to Shubik's performance, junior Ryon Howard (Bronx, NY) and senior Brice Brooks (Silverdale, WA) scored 11 points apiece. Howard also had a game-high 12 rebounds. Senior Luke Granato (Rocky Hill, CT) and sophomore Chauncey Hardy (Middletown, CT) each finished with ten points.
Harvard scored the first four points of the game, but by the first media timeout the Pioneers had taken a 10-9 lead after a Granato three. A layup off a Harvard turnover by sophomore Ryan Litke (Windsor, CT) gave the Pioneers a 19-11 lead midway through the half.
A 10-2 Harvard run, capped by a Jeremy Lin layup, tied the game at 21-21 with 5:06 left in the half. Tied at 29-29 with the period winding down, Granato grabbed a Harvard miss in the final ten seconds and Litke buried a 35-foot trey at the buzzer to send SHU to the intermission with a three-point lead.
Sacred Heart held on to its precarious lead for the first part of the second half, until a Drew Housman bucket with 11:22 left tied the game at 46-46. In fact, a three-point play by Lin with 6:47 to go gave Harvard its biggest lead of the game at 55-50.
It was all Pioneers from that point on and a 21-5 run over the next six minutes gave SHU a 71-60 lead and put the Crimson on ice. The shot that clinched the win came from Brooks, a three-pointer as the shot clock wound down with 1:28 left that made it 65-58.
"I tell everyone how good of a shooter I am and no one wants to believe it. I had to go out there and show them," Brooks laughed. "But there were a lot of big things before that. This was a big one for all of us."
The Pioneers won the game at the free throw line, converting 25 of 28 chances, while Harvard was just 11 of 19.
"We're fortunate because this game could've been a lot different," said Bike. "We worked too hard with the ball and had 12 turnovers in the first half - too much. Brice had that big three at the end, and he's 1-for-3 on the season. He's shooting 33.3 percent, and he picked a good time to hit it."
