JUSTIN TIME

By: centraljersey.com
The Princeton University men’s basketball team will be on its exam break for 17 days before returning to the court.
The pre-season favorites to win the Ivy League will be hitting the books more than the hardwood when the conference opens on Saturday with Harvard playing at Dartmouth. The Tigers won’t start league play until Jan. 28 when they host Brown. The PU women start 6 p.m. Saturday by hosting their travel partner, Penn.
Judging from the non-conference schedule, the men’s Ivy race looks as it was predicted in large part. Harvard is looking like a strong contender. It is 10-3 overall after topping Boston College of the ACC, 78-69, Wednesday. It was an impressive win over an Eagles team that was 11-3 and had won their ACC opener. It was the biggest win of the year for a Harvard team that hasn’t suffered any bad losses, falling to George Mason, Michigan and UConn this year.
Princeton is 11-4 with wins in nine of its last 10 games. Two of its losses came at the hands of Duke and Central Florida, both highly ranked nationally. The other two losses came to James Madison and Presbyterian. James Madison is a team that has lost to Georgia State, and Presbyterian is a squad that lost by 25 to Bucknell though the Blue Hose do also have wins over Auburn of the SEC and Wake Forest of the ACC. Winthrop, Old Dominion and Big South early leader Liberty have also defeated Presbyterian.
Cornell, the three-time defending champions hit hard by graduation, was picked to finish third. They even got one vote to win it all again. The Big Red have begun reloading with a 3-10 start. They are among the worst shooting teams in the country and have won just one of their last 10 games, against Wofford.
Penn was picked to finish fourth. The Quakers, though, lost to the same Marist team that Princeton cruised by on Wednesday. Penn looked good for one half against Kentucky and gave Villanova a good game. At 5-6, their best win came against Davidson in the season opener.
Yale was selected to finish fifth, and the Bulldogs have been up and down this season. They improved to 6-7 with a one-point overtime win over Holy Cross on Wednesday. The Crusaders have only one win this season, but were 30 seconds away from win No. 2 before the Bulldogs rallied to force overtime. Yale has lost to Sacred Heart, but like Harvard, they have defeated Boston College (the Eagles are 1-0 in the ACC, but 0-2 against Ivy teams).
Brown was picked to finish sixth, and the Bears are still looking for a quality win. They did defeat the Sacred Heart squad that beat Yale. The Bears lost to Army, a team that has beaten only one other Ivy squad.
Tabbed to finish seventh, Columbia has actually started 8-5. They are scoring almost 75 points per game, rebounding well and shooting a high percentage, all of which could make them a more dangerous team than the prognosticators expected. They gave Bucknell a good game before falling by five points. American which is 10-5, was a victim of the Lions. Of course, the Lions almost gave up 100 points to Longwood in a loss.
Dartmouth was again picked to finish at the bottom of the Ivies. The Big Green are 4-9 after losing to Army. But the Big Green already beat Army earlier in the year before the Black Knights went on to beat Brown. They also beat Hartford, which just defeated Maine.
Aside from Columbia’s encouraging start and Cornell’s struggles, the league looks a lot like it was expected to. How it all plays out begins Saturday with Harvard and Dartmouth tipping off the Ivy schedule.