Harvard vs Columbia 1/14/23 College Basketball Picks, Predictions, Odds

The Columbia Lions and the Harvard Crimson meet Saturday in college basketball action from Lavietes Pavilion. Columbia is 6-12 on the year right now. The Lions lost to Penn in their last outing. As for Harvard, they’re currently 10-7 following a loss to Yale last weekend. Check back all season long for free college basketball picks at Sports Chat Place.

Columbia managed to go just 4-8 over their first 12 games, beating only Delaware State, SUNY Maritime, New Hampshire and Sarah Lawrence. The Lions are 2-4 since then with losses to Fairleigh Dickinson, MD Eastern Shore, Princeton and Penn. 

Matched up against Penn last Saturday, Columbia was down 39-30 by the break. The Lions were drilled 45-25 in the second half and lost 84-55 in a blowout. The only double-digit scorer was Geronimo Rubio De La Rosa with 13 points.

Over on the Harvard side, they went 8-4 over their first 12 games, falling to Louisiana, Fordham, UMass and Howard along the way. The Crimson have since gone 2-3 with losses to Kansas, Princeton and Yale. 

In the Yale game last weekend, the Crimson trailed 28-24 going into the second half. Harvard didn’t end up getting any closer in a 58-54 loss. Chris Ledlum doubled on 15 points and 14 rebounds, while Idan Tretout posted 15 points of his own. 

PICK: I’ll probably stick with Harvard. I’m also probably staying away from this one. The Crimson are decent scorers in the right matchups; they’ve hit 66 or more points in three of their last four games but aren’t cracking 70 with any kind of regularity this year. As for Columbia, they’ve had their share of scoreboard duds as well: 62 or fewer points in four of their last five games, in fact. This one could end up a close matchup, but on paper Harvard should have the cover.