Harvard Win Messes Up America's Brackets

14th-seeded Crimson gets first NCAA tournament win
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Mar 22, 2013 2:28 AM CDT
Harvard Upsets New Mexico, 68-62
Harvard players celebrate on the bench after beating New Mexico Thursday, March 21, 2013.   (AP Photo/George Frey)

Give those Harvard kids an A-plus in another subject: Bracket-busting 101. The school known for producing US presidents, Supreme Court justices, and Nobel Prize winners earned its first NCAA tournament victory last night—a 68-62 upset of No. 3 seed New Mexico—and it didn't feel like a fluke. Wesley Saunders scored 18 points and Laurent Rivard made five 3-pointers to help the 14th-seeded Crimson pull the biggest surprise of March Madness so far.

The Ivy Leaguers put the clamps down on New Mexico's Tony Snell, holding him to nine points on 4-for-12 shooting after he dominated in the Mountain West Conference tournament. They banged inside with Lobos big men Cameron Bairstow and Alex Kirk, whose 22 points provided New Mexico's only consistent offense. Mostly, they showed none of the jitters that marked their trip to the tournament last year, a 79-70 loss to Vanderbilt in the Crimson's first NCAA appearance since 1946. Tweeted the jokesters at the Harvard Lampoon: "America, we are sorry for messing up your brackets and also your financial system and everything else." (More NCAA basketball stories.)

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