Three M. Hoops teams unbeaten in Ivies

This Ivy League season was supposed to go much like the last one. Yale, Penn and Princeton would once again field the best teams and likely battle down to the wire as they did in last season's historic three-way tie. The rest of the league just would not measure up. So who forgot to tell Brown? The Bears are off to their best Ivy start in the history of the program at 4-0 behind senior guard Earl Hunt. Overall Brown is 9-9 but on a six-game win streak. Brown is not simply feasting on the weak of the Ivy League either, as two of their four league wins came against Yale and each was by double figures. However, one of the victories, on Jan. 18, was the day after a tragic car accident in which four Yale students were killed. Hunt is the catalyst behind Brown's fast start. The senior guard is the Ivy's leading scorer with 19.4 points per game and recently passed Penn's Ernie Beck as the league's sixth leading scorer of all-time. Brown sophomore guard Jason Forte is playing very well in the shadow of his much heralded backcourt mate, averaging 11.8 points per game. Forte is used to playing in others' shadows, as he is the younger brother of former North Carolina star and current Boston Celtic Joseph Forte. While still not at the level of Penn and Princeton in terms of respect from outside the league, with two wins over Yale, Brown has certainly moved into the number three spot. The three squads are the only teams unbeaten in Ivy League play. Princeton (8-7, 2-0 Ivy League) opened 2-0 with wins against visiting Harvard and Dartmouth last weekend. The Tigers struggled their way through the sweep, winning 67-61 over Harvard and 57-52 against Dartmouth. The Quakers beat the aforementioned schools by a combined 39 points over the weekend. However the Tigers showed clutch ability down the stretch in each of the two games in holding off comeback attempts. Princeton is led by junior Spencer Gloger. The forward took a sojourn from basketball and from Princeton -- attending UCLA for one year -- after his stellar freshman campaign in 1999-2000, when he was an honorable mention All-Ivy selection. Gloger is averaging 16.3 points per game. Yale (8-9, 2-2) is off to a slow start after pushing the traditional Ivy elite to the brink last season. The key to last year's run was the Elis' sensational rookie backcourt of Edwin Draughin and Ivy League Rookie of the Year Alex Gamboa. However only Draughin has followed up on his previous success, averaging a team-high 12.2 points per game. Gamboa has struggled, especially since he had surgery to remove his appendix on Jan. 11. He missed the following three games and has come off the bench since. Currently the sophomore is slumping to the tune of 5.4 points per game. Yale will likely need both halves of its backcourt to play up to capacity to repeat last season's magic.

Harvard (10-7, 2-2) got off to the best start of any of the teams in the Ancient Eight, going 10-5 and sweeping Dartmouth. However, Harvard's early success might have been more of a mirage than a sign of things to come, as their record was boosted by wins over weaker squads such as Rider and Lehigh, while they lost to better teams -- Boston College and Richmond -- by wide margins. The Crimson were swept on last weekend's trip by Penn and Princeton and fell back into the Ivy League pack. Cornell (7-10, 2-2) has received a boost from freshman forward Lenny Collins, who has won Ivy League Rookie of the Week five times this season. Cornell swept traveling partner Columbia but lost by double-figures at home to both Brown and Yale demonstrating that the Big Red are most likely going to be stuck in the bottom third of the league. Columbia and Dartmouth are both off to 0-4 starts in league play, having been swept by their respective traveling partners -- Cornell and Harvard. While neither will probably win the Ivy League championship, Columbia did beat Penn at the Palestra, 54-53, a year ago, showing that the bottom of the Ivy League can shake up the top.

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