By Zolan Kanno-Youngs, News Staff
There was a feeling of loss for the Huskies after their game Wednesday, not only because of their 72-66 defeat at the hands of Harvard University in Matthews Arena, but also because it was announced that All-CAA forward Quincy Ford will be out for the season.
The forward will have surgery on a back that has plagued him since last year.
On the court, with the two-headed healthy monster of senior Kyle Casey and junior Wesley Saunders, scoring 7 points each, Harvard put away their crosstown rival Huskies. They also did their due diligence in interior defense, which held the Huskies at bay throughout the game.
While redshirt junior Scott Eatherton (17 points, 11 rebounds) and junior Reggie Spencer (16 points, 6 rebounds) led the way for Northeastern, there was not one play where a Husky had the ball in the paint and Harvard didn’t make its physical presence known.
“This is a couple times in a row our teams played a winning effort but we haven’t gotten the win and I think that’s due to the competition were facing early in the season,” coach Bill Coen said. “That’s by design we want to make sure we’re playing the best.”
Great play production by Spencer and Eatherton was the only thing that kept the Huskies in the game after Harvard hit on six of their first seven shots to take a 13-8 lead. Spencer then found the stroke and shot five for six in the next seven minutes, putting Northeastern within one possession, 18-19.
However, after the Huskies took a 22-19 lead behind made shots from freshman T.J. Williams and Eatherton, Casey and Saunders combined for eight points, propelling a 15-7 Crimson run to close the half.
It looked like the Huskies had another run in them in the second half when they closed it to a 44-41 lead off a three-pointer from sophomore guard David Walker with 13 minutes left in the game but Harvard quickly responded with a 10-4 run over the next five minutes of the game.
“I thought it was a game of runs,” Harvard coach Tommy Amaker said. “They battled back and I thought we did a good job maintaining composure. I was very pleased we were able to make some critical plays.”
Northeastern never recovered from that, as they only shot 10-18 from the charity stripe (12-23 for the game). Eatherton alone shot just three for 11 from the line.
“They’re two big, tough guys that played well and scored well against us,” Amaker said. “We weren’t surprised at that. We were a little disappointed that we didn’t do a better job in the first half against their post players, but I thought we had a good balance with our team that might’ve negated some of their interior scoring.”
It didn’t help that even when both junior Steve Moundou-Missi and Casey picked up four fouls late in the second half, the Crimson got the spark they needed from sophomore Evan Cummings. The forward had 10 points (eight coming in the second half), six rebounds and two emphatic blocks on the game.
“Evan played well for us in Alaska and I think it’s nice for a coach when you see kids make the breakthrough, make the jump, make the strides,” Amaker said. “You can see the confidence growing, and I thought he continued his impressive play here tonight.”
The Huskies will take on University of Alabama at Birmingham this Saturday in Matthews Arena at 7 p.m.
