Harvard looked like anything but a team destined for the NCAA women?s basketball tournament in late January.
The Crimson started the year 3-12 after losing at Ivy League rival Yale, 61-53, on Jan. 26. But after that game, the young squad with five sophomores and two seniors grew up in a hurry.
The teams won its last 12 games, clinched the Ivy League regular-season title with a 13-1 record (there is no postseason tournament in the conference) and secured the school?s fifth NCAA tournament berth and first since 2003.
Harvard?s reward for turning its season around is a 15th seed in the NCAA tournament and a first-round game against defending national champion Maryland (27-5) at 2:30 p.m. Sunday at the Hartford Civic Center in Hartford, Conn.
Despite the two schools only playing each other once ? Maryland won, 81-61, in 1997 ? the Crimson are very familiar with Maryland, having watched them at last year?s Final Four in Boston and on television during the season this year.
“Maryland is an amazing team and an offense that will be tough to stop,” Harvard junior guard Lindsey Hallion said. “We have a lot of respect for them, and we know we have to work very hard if we want to have a chance to beat them.”
Hallion is one of three Harvard players who average double figures in scoring. She is second on the team in that category (12.1 ppg) and was second in the Ivy League in field-goal (52 percent) and free-throw (84 percent) accuracy.
Despite the obvious disadvantages, Hallion said she is confident the Crimson will go into the game prepared, thanks to the leadership of longtime coach Kathy Delaney-Smith, who has coached Harvard for 25 years and was at the helm when the Crimson, as a 16th seed, knocked off No. 1 Stanford in the first round of the 1998 tournament.
“Coach is an amazing coach and person,” Hallion said. “She is so knowledgeable about the game and is one of the truly great people in women?s college basketball today.”
