Entering the 2010–11 NCAA Division I men's basketball season, four of the eight teams had coaches entering their first full season as head coach: Columbia'sKyle Smith, Cornell'sBill Courtney, Dartmouth'sPaul Cormier and Penn'sJerome Allen. Most preseason publications predicted Princeton would finish in first place and Harvard would finish in second place, although the Sporting News projected that would finish in first followed by Princeton and Harvard. Breaking a three-year streak by Cornell, the Ivy League media poll selected Princeton as the top team with twelve first place votes, Harvard second with four first place votes and Cornell third with one first place vote. It was the first Princeton team to be the preseason selection since the.
Season
Non-conference play began on November 12, 2010. The first conference game took place on January 8, 2011. Although no Ivy League teams appeared in the 2010–11 NCAA Division I men's basketball rankings, for a few weeks during the season Harvard received a vote in the AP Poll. When Harvard earned its 20th win on February 19, against Columbia, it marked the eighth time that two Ivy League teams totalled 20 wins. On March 7, Harvard received a vote in both the AP Poll and the Coaches' Poll. Then, in the final regular season poll on March 13, Princeton received 3 points in the Coaches' Poll. The conference had two players recognized as Academic All-Americans: senior guard Garrett Leffelman and junior guard Chris Wroblewski. Harvard's Oliver McNally concluded his season with a 100 for 108 Free throw percentage mark second to Chris Warren of the Ole Miss Rebels who led with a 168 for 181 mark. On March 5, Harvard clinched a share of the league championship for the first time since the Ivy League was formed. On March 8, Princeton defeated Penn to force a one-game playoff at the Payne Whitney Gymnasium at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. The matchup was widely anticipated in the press.
Postseason
Prior to the game both teams received championship trophies. Princeton prevailed in the playoff with a final score of 63–62, on a last-second jump shot from Douglas Davis. This earned them the conference's automatic bid to the 2011 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament for being the regular season champion. The 2011 one-game playoff was the eighth in Ivy League history. Princeton appeared for the eighth time, and have won at least a share of twenty-six league titles. Entering selection Sunday, Harvard ranked 35th in the Ratings Percentage Index and Princeton ranked 40th. Princeton was a #13 Seed in the 2011 NCAA Men's Division IBasketball Tournament, while Harvard was not selected. Unfortunately, neither of Harvard's quality wins helped them because both teams were left out of the NCAA tournament and relegated to number one seed status in the NIT tournament. As a regular season champion not invited to the NCAA tournament, Harvard earned an at-large selection for the 2011 National Invitation Tournament, where they were seeded #6. On March 15, Harvard was defeated by by a 71–54 margin in the first round. It was the school's first appearance in the National Invitation Tournament. Princeton lost its opening game against the Kentucky Wildcats by a 59–57 margin on a last second layup.
Honors
In season
Each week the Ivy League selects a player of the week and a rookie of the week.
Postseason honors
The league selected its postseason awards on March 9. Player of the Year: Keith Wright, Harvard Defensive Player of the Year: Kareem Maddox, Princeton Rookie of the Year: Sean McGonagill, Brown All-Ivy League
