The Harvard Crimson men's basketball program represents intercollegiate men's basketball at

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

. The team currently competes in the

Ivy League The Ivy League is an American collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference of eight Private university, private Research university, research universities in the Northeastern United States. It participates in the National Collegia ...

in Division I of the

National Collegiate Athletic Association The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates College athletics in the United States, student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, and Simon Fraser University, 1 in Canada. ...

(NCAA) and plays home games at the Lavietes Pavilion in

Boston Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...

, Massachusetts. The Crimson are currently coached by Tommy Amaker.

History

Tommy Amaker era

On April 11, 2007, Tommy Amaker was named men's basketball coach at

. On January 7, 2009, Amaker's Harvard squad defeated then- ranked

Boston College Boston College (BC) is a private university, private Catholic Jesuits, Jesuit research university in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1863 by the Society of Jesus, a Catholic Religious order (Catholic), religious order, t ...

(#17 AP Poll/#24 Coaches' Poll) for the first win over a ranked team in the program's history. The following season, after Amaker coached Harvard to its most successful season ever behind the play of Jeremy Lin, the 2009–10 team was invited to participate in the 2010 CollegeInsider.com Tournament. The team was defeated in the first round by Appalachian State. Amaker led the 2010-11 team to a share of the 2010–11 Ivy League men's basketball season championship, which was school's first men's basketball Ivy League Championship since the league was formed during the 1956–57 season. Harvard finished the season a perfect 14–0 at home, which surpassed the prior season's school record of eleven home wins. The team's 12 conference game wins established a school record. The team's victory over

Colorado Colorado is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States. It is one of the Mountain states, sharing the Four Corners region with Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. It is also bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas ...

was the team's first ever against a

Big 12 Conference The Big 12 Conference is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference in the United States. It consists of 16 full-member universities (3 private universities and 13 public universities) in the states of Arizona, Colorado, Florida ...

opponent since that conference commenced play in 1996. His fourth season also marked the fourth straight season that the team defeated at least one power conference opponent. By finishing as Ivy League Co-champion, they faced Princeton in a

one-game playoff A one-game playoff, sometimes known as a pennant playoff, tiebreaker game or knockout game, is a tiebreaker in certain sports—usually but not always professional—to determine which of two teams, tied in the final standings, will qualify for a ...

and lost by a score of 63–62. Harvard earned an automatic bid to the 2011 National Invitation Tournament, but was defeated by by a 71–54 margin in the first round. The final record of 23–7 surpassed the prior season's total of 21 wins for the most in the history of the program. The team appeared in the

NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament The NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament, branded as March Madness, or The Big Dance, is a single-elimination tournament played in the United States to determine the men's college basketball national champion of the NCAA Division I, Di ...

2014 The year 2014 was marked by the surge of the Western African Ebola epidemic, West African Ebola epidemic, which began in 2013, becoming the List of Ebola outbreaks, most widespread outbreak of the Ebola, Ebola virus in human history, resul ...

, where Harvard upset 5-seed

Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ; colloquially nicknamed Cincy) is a city in Hamilton County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. Settled in 1788, the city is located on the northern side of the confluence of the Licking River (Kentucky), Licking and Ohio Ri ...

61–57 before being eliminated in the round of 32 by 4-seed

Michigan State Michigan State University (Michigan State or MSU) is a public land-grant research university in East Lansing, Michigan, United States. It was founded in 1855 as the Agricultural College of the State of Michigan, the first of its kind in the ...

by a score of 80–73. In 2015, Harvard tied with

Yale Yale University is a private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, and one of the nine colonial colleges ch ...

for the Ivy title with an 11–3 league record. Despite having lost to Yale 62–52 at Lavietes Pavilion on March 6, 2015, just eight days later Harvard won a playoff between the two at the

Palestra The Palestra, often called the Cathedral of College Basketball, is a historic arena and the home gym of the Penn Quakers men's and women's basketball teams, volleyball teams, wrestling team, and Philadelphia Big 5 basketball. Located at 235 So ...

Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

to determine the Ivy League's NCAA automatic bid by a score of 53–51. Harvard thereby achieved its fourth straight NCAA tournament appearance while extending Yale's 53-year NCAA tournament appearance drought. Harvard was eliminated from the 2015 NCAA tournament by UNC by a score of 67–65 after leading with under one minute to play in the game. Harvard stood at 10-4 in the Ivy league during the 2019-2020 season when the remainder of the season was cancelled due to the COVID-19 crisis. The entire 2020-2021 Ivy League men's basketball season was cancelled due to the continuing COVID-19 crisis. At the conclusion of the 2021-2022 season, Amaker's record at Harvard stood at 264-152.

Financial aid and recruiting

Another key to Harvard's recent success in basketball has been a 2006 change in the school's financial aid policy. Although the Ivy League strictly prohibits

athletic scholarship An athletic scholarship is a form of scholarship to attend a college or university or a private school, private high school awarded to an individual based predominantly on their ability to play in a sport. Athletic scholarships are common in the U ...

s, Harvard has adopted an aid scheme that makes the school far more accessible to low- and middle-income students. Under current policy, all students (not just athletes) from families with annual incomes less than $180,000 pay at most 10% of family income, and those with family incomes under $60,000 receive full scholarships. According to Jay Hart of

Yahoo! Sports Yahoo! Sports is a sports news website launched by Yahoo! on December 8, 1997. It receives a majority of its information from Stats Perform. It employs numerous writers, and has team pages for teams in almost every North American major sport. ...

With the financial barrier to entry lifted, an offer to play basketball at Harvard became instantly competitive with the rest of the world of collegiate athletics, where full-ride scholarships are (purportedly) the only currency.

Roster

Men's basketball roster
/ref>

Postseason results

NCAA tournament results

The Crimson have appeared in the

five times. Their combined record is 2–6. Until their appearance in the Tournament in 2012, they had gone 66 years without making an appearance, the longest drought in NCAA history.

NIT results

The Crimson have appeared in the

National Invitation Tournament The National Invitation Tournament (NIT) is an annual men's college basketball tournament operated by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). Since 2023, all rounds of the tournament are played at various sites across the country whi ...

three times. Their combined record is 1–3.

CIT results

The Crimson have appeared in the CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament once. Their record is 0–1.

Notable players

Crimson in the National Basketball Association

Bold denotes active player.A player is considered inactive if he has announced his retirement or not played for a full season. * Wyndol Gray * Jeremy Lin * Saul Mariaschin * Ed Smith