Harvard 73, Boston College 58: Crimson Make It Six Straight Over Hapless Eagles

Not much left to be said about the Boston College men's basketball team. The same problems -- ice cold shooting (20-of-50 from the floor), porous defense and poor rebounding (out-rebounded 36-24) -- plagued the Eagles in a 73-58 loss to Harvard in front of a sold-out Lavietes Pavilion crowd. The Eagles tried to climb back in this one in the second half, but couldn't come all the way back from a 39-25 halftime deficit to notch the victory.

Ryan Anderson paced the Eagles with 17 points and 9 rebounds. Olivier Hanlan added 13 despite a poor shooting performance (3-of-12) on the afternoon.

Boston College falls to 4-10 overall and 1-8 in road/neutral contests. Harvard improves to 12-1 and a perfect 9-0 at home.

With the loss, the Eagles have now lost six straight to Harvard. In a series dominated by Boston College all-time (32-15), Harvard has outscoring BC on average 76-62 over its last six meetings. Which program is supposed to be the one from the power conference?

All you need to know about this game can be told through the two coaches record of performance at each's current stop. After dropping his first four games to Boston-area opponents as coach of the Crimson, Tommy Amaker has now won 17 straight against Boston teams (including six straight over BC). Steve Donahue, the former Cornell head coach, falls to 1-5 against Ivy League competition as head coach of the Eagles. The only win over his former conference a 79-58 victory over Dartmouth last season.

More than the overall record, something is not right with this team. The Eagles' first-half performance was abysmal. BC shot just 26.9 percent from the floor and were out-rebounded 21-12. If not for five points from Joe Rahon right before half, Boston College nearly went into the locker room down by 20. BC IMG radio color man Danya Abrams described it as BC "playing in a fog."

Supposedly Boston College doesn't make it a practice of firing coaches mid-season and there doesn't appear to be anyone on the bench even remotely qualified to turn this thing around. The Eagles' first-half performance throws both of those things into question. Donahue is done at BC. Now it's only a matter of whether it happens during the season or after the Eagles limp to the finish.

The Eagles return home to face Clemson on Saturday, January 4, 4 PM at Conte Forum. Bates has called for a "Town Hall Meeting" of Boston College basketball season ticket holders to discuss the future of the program. It will be very interesting to hear what comes out of that forum.