Despite a couple of disappointing individual results this past week, things continue to look up for the Ivy League, which ended 2006 ranked among the Top 20 conferences in two of the three major ratings services. This is technically the final Power Rankings prior to the start of league play, since Harvard and Dartmouth kick off things once again this year on Saturday.

Key sequence: Brown trailed just 22-21 when Matt Mullery found Mark McAndrew for a layup at the midpoint of the first half. But Cedric Smith answered with a three-point play, and Taurean Mitchell scored a layup in transition a minute later. Smith then grabbed an offensive rebound and followed with a dunk, and after a Chris Skrelja layup, Josh Ervin drilled a three-pointer. Scooby Johnson converted two free throws to push the margin into double digits, and Seth Engelken finished off a 14-2 Islander run that gave the hosts a 36-23 led with 5:30 left in the first half.

Key sequence: Mack Montgomery gave Columbia its first lead of the second half with a three-pointer at the 6:34 mark, but Jamaal Womack knotted the game at 52 with a free throw 17 seconds later. Womack missed the second, but St. Francis got the ball back out of bounds, and Robert Hines put the Terriers back on top with one of two at the line. Ben Nwachukwu missed a layup and John Gooden hit a jumper to put the hosts up three. The Lions sandwiched missed three-pointers around a blown front end of a one-and-one by Gooden, who atoned for that with a three-point play with 3:07 left to stretch the Terrier advantage to 58-52. After nearly two minutes of scoreless futility for both sides, Gooden got a layup and foul to make it an eight-point game with 1:09 remaining.

Key sequence: Three-pointers on three consecutive Navy possessions had slashed Yale’s 12-point lead to just three midway through the second half. Nick Holmes stopped the bleeding with a three-pointer, then after a Greg Sprink miss, Jason Abromaitis hit two free throws. Following a string of fruitless possessions for both teams, Casey Hughes stuck a jumper to make it a double-digit game. When Hughes found Abromaitis for a layup, Yale had answered Navy’s 9-0 run with one of its own, as the Bulldogs’ lead was back to 12 at 64-52 with 6:20 remaining in the contest.

Key sequence: After leading nearly the entire game, an 11-2 UMES run put Dartmouth in a 55-50 hole with under four minutes left. But Michael Giovacchini brought the Big Green within three with two free thows, then after an offensive foul on the Hawks, Marlon Sanders located Giovacchini for a three-pointer plus a foul. Giovacchini converted the free throw for a four-point play and a one-point Dartmouth lead. Antonio McMillion put back his own miss to put the Hawks back in front, but Alex Barnett’s jumper gave the Big Green the lead again. UMES grabbed offensive rebounds of two of its misses before turning it over, then a Dan Biber jumper extended the Dartmouth advantage to three with 53 seconds left.