Bryant stumbles against physical Harvard side in 80-45 loss Wednesday night

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – The Bryant University men's basketball team shot less than 30 percent from the floor and never found its rhythm against a physical Harvard side, falling to the Crimson, 80-45, Wednesday night at Lavietes Pavilion.

Harvard (2-3) dominated on the glass, 42-28, and saw three players finish in double figures while shooting 54.9 percent (28-51) as a team and connecting on 10-of-20 3-pointers in the contest. Bryant (2-3) rookie Marcel Pettway (North Providence, R.I.) posted a pair of career highs with 10 points and a side-best eight rebounds, while sophomore guards Hunter Ware (Powder Springs, Ga.) (3 blocks) and Bosko Kostur (Melbourne, Australia) each also added 10 points apiece to lead the Bulldogs, who mustered only 26.7 percent shooting on the night.

The Bulldogs turned the ball over 17 times, allowing the Crimson 19 points off giveaways, while the hosts posted 21 second-chance points in the win. Tommy McCarthy scored 16 points with eight assists to pace Harvard in the victory, while Zena Edosomwan added 14 more.

After a slow start that saw Harvard rush out to a 7-0 lead in the opening 90 seconds, the Bulldogs started to find a rhythm, cutting the margin to 14-9 off a Kostur 3-pointer four minutes in.

Harvard would re-up a 10-point advantage, 19-9, and the Bulldogs wouldn't let the game get farther away than that in the first 10 minutes, as a Zach Chionuma (Jamesville, N.Y.) triple trimmed the margin to 24-16. But the second half of the frame would be all Crimson, as the hosts held the Bulldogs scoreless for seven minutes and without a basket for more than nine minutes.

Ware would capitalize on a Nisre Zouzoua (Brockton, Mass.) (8 points) steal and feed for a breakaway layup with 51 seconds to play for the final points of the first, and the Bulldogs would head to the locker room trailing, 41-23, at the intermission.

Bryant shot just 27.6 percent from the floor in the frame with 11 giveaways, allowing Harvard to connect on 56 percent of its shots en route to the 18-point halftime lead.

Harvard came out of the locker room to score the first 12 points of the second half before Ware put the Black and Gold back on the board three minutes in, 55-25.

The Crimson would maintain a 30-point lead and would bully the Bulldogs on the glass to start the second frame. Back-to-back threes from the home side moved Harvard's lead to 67-32 with 11:15 to play, and the Crimson would keep Bryant scoreless for five-straight minutes, running the clock down to 8:19 and the margin up to 70-34 before a Pettway layup got the Bulldogs back in the scoring column.

But Bryant would not be able to make up ground in the final minutes of the contest, falling by the 80-45 final.

The Bulldogs hit the road again after the Thanksgiving holiday, traveling to Washington, D.C., to take on Georgetown at the Verizon Center Saturday at 12:00 p.m. to wrap up action in the 2K Classic benefiting Wounded Warrior Project.