HAVERFORD, Pa. – The Haverford College men's basketball team completed the season sweep of Washington College with an 83-73 victory on Wednesday night. A complete team effort guided Haverford to its second highest shooting percentage in school history. Only a 66.7% shooting mark during a 67-63 victory at McDaniel in 2007 topped tonight's 63.5% performance from the field.
In a very fitting manner, Haverford's offense was a balanced attack with five different players finishing in double figures. Three of those players recorded double figures during just the second half. Joe Hartman and Jonathan Lang finished as the team co-leaders with 16 points.
Lang scored 12 of those points with the help of a 3-for-3 mark from distance in the second half. Hartman matched his freshman classmate by shooting 4-of-5 from the field during the final 20 minutes. Matt Sherman scored all 15 of his points in the second half on 5-of-5 shooting from the field to tie Kahlil Garnes in the final scoring column. Kyle Goldfarb also added 10 points, while Grayson Roth pulled down 10 rebounds.
Haverford held the lead for the vast majority of play (31:19 in total), including all 20 minutes of the second half and the final 1:28 of the opening half. The first half of play saw eight lead changes with the back-and-forth action accounting for the majority of WAC's five-plus minutes with the lead. Most of that advantage came when the Shoremen scored nine of the game's first 11 points. The Fords poured in 24 points in the paint during the opening half and got three layups during an 8-0 run to retake the lead after their opening basket. Haverford's largest edge of the first half was seven points after Lang knocked down a jumper to set the score at 20-13.
The Fords held at least a two possession lead for a majority of the second half. After Haverford built the lead up to as many as nine points early in the period via back-to-back three-pointers from Hartman and Lang, Washington mounted its largest run of the half shortly after. WAC went on an 8-0 run of its own to make the score 49-48 with 10:57 to play. However, a jumper from Garnes and layup on the fast break from Sherman stretched the lead back out to five. The Shoremen only got the game within a single possession on two other occasions the rest of the night.
The last of those one possession stretches came with Haverford holding a 56-53 edge with 9:15 to play. Playing with resilience, Haverford scored on four of its next five possessions to reach its first double digit advantage of the night, 65-54. Not satisfied, the Fords followed up that 8-0 run with seven of the next 11 points. Those three straight scoring possessions gave Haverford a 72-58 lead and its largest advantage of the night. The Fords matched that edge at the free throw line with a pair of points at the charity stripe from Sherman.
Up by 14 points with just over three minutes to play, Haverford responded each and every time the Shoremen got the game to a single digit deficit before finishing out the 10 point Centennial Conference win.
Shooting was definitely the story of the night for the Fords as they jumped out to the lead in the opening half despite not attempting a three-point shot during the first 20 minutes. However, when the team did work the ball around for some open looks at the perimeter, Haverford made one more three-point shot than Washington College for the entire game despite eight fewer attempts from beyond the arc. Haverford also assisted on 15 of its baskets from the field. Hartman led that effort with seven helpers to go along with his team high in points.
Men's basketball will now head out on the road this Saturday for a 7 p.m. tip at Gettysburg. The women's portion of that doubleheader is scheduled for a 5 p.m. start.