After this weekend, critics will no longer be able to dismiss the men's basketball team's hot start by citing weak competition. The Tigers may be ranked 316th out of the 336 Division I hoops programs in terms of strength of schedule, but tonight and tomorrow they will do battle with a pair of undefeateds.
For Columbia (9-5 overall, 0-0 Ivy League) and Cornell (7-7, 0-0) — Princeton's hosts this road weekend — the first set of numbers within the parentheses belies their perfection. In the seven-week postseason dash known as the Ivy League regular season, all that matters is that second record — the blank slate, which the Tigers (9-4, 0-0) share as well.
Though Princeton posted the best non-conference record among Ivy schools and loosened Penn's hold on the title of league frontrunner, coming away from this weekend with a pair of wins will remain a challenge.
The Tigers will tip off their Ivy season Friday night at Columbia's Levien Gymnasium, the site of their narrowest loss of 2005-06. With 11 seconds remaining in the teams' Feb. 18 matchup last season, Justin Armstrong nailed a fade-away baseline jumper to put the Lions on top to stay, 65-64. That was the second nail-biter for the two teams last year, as the Lions had pushed the Tigers into overtime in their previous meeting before falling, 68-64.
While Armstrong — who at the end of last season appeared poised to emerge as one of the league's elite players — has been slowed by injuries and limited to a reserve role, the rest of Columbia's solid core of young players now boasts an extra year's experience and continues to improve.
Leading the way for the Lions once again is power forward John Baumann, an All-Ivy second-team selection as a sophomore last year who ranks among the top-10 in the conference in scoring, rebounding and field-goal percentage. Also a six-foot, eight-inch starting pitcher for Columbia's baseball team, Baumann is a poor man's version of former Princeton two-sport star and current San Diego Padre Chris Young '02 — which is saying something.
Baumann is joined in the frontcourt by center "Big" Ben Nwachukwu, an imposing presence in the paint on both sides of the floor. Nwachukwu made a name for himself last season with a shocking, last-second tip-in against Penn that put the Lions up 59-57 and handed the eventual Ivy League champion its first loss of the season.
Because both Baumann and Nwachukwu are more comfortable as interior defenders, it would seemingly behoove the Tigers to be able to spread the floor with their own big men, forcing the Columbia stars to step outside. This could mean extended minutes for sophomore center/forward Michael Strittmatter, who leads the Ivy League in three-point field-goal percentage at a scorching 54 percent clip.
Long-range shooting figures to play an even larger role in Princeton's Saturday night matchup with Cornell — a comic-book-style showdown between an immovable object and an unstoppable force.
The Big Red takes on the latter role, as they have combined to shoot over 41 percent as a team from outside the three-point arc, tops in the Ivy League. It figures that if you can connect at such a high rate from downtown, you might as well go there often, and Cornell has, hitting 113 threes, which also leads the league.
To someone who watched the Big Red play last season, such impressive shooting numbers would suggest that Adam Gore must really be lighting it up. The tough-as-nails guard won Ivy League Rookie of the Year honors and was named to the All-Ivy second team last year after pacing the league with 83 three-pointers, a Cornell single-season record. Gore, however, is out for the season with a torn right ACL.
Rather than crumbling from the loss of Gore, the Big Red have seen two freshman guards step up and fill the same role Gore filled as a rookie last year. First-year players Ryan Wittman and Louis Dale rank fifth and eighth, respectively, among Ivy scoring leaders. The two have combined to average more than 29 points per game and have knocked down 70 three-pointers, distancing themselves from the field in the race to inherit Gore's Ivy League Rookie of the Year title.
Giving the Tigers hope in their efforts to contain Wittman and Dale is their own remarkable three-point defense. Princeton's opponents have combined to shoot barely 29 percent from long distance this season, tops in the conference.
The start of a new Ivy League season is all about the fresh set of zeroes in the standings, but both Tiger contests this weekend could come down to who puts the most threes up on the board.
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