Laurent Rivard scored a game-high 18 points as No. 23 Harvard took sole possession of the Ivy League lead with a 65-35 victory over host Yale on Friday.

Steve Moundou-Missi finished with 10 points and five rebounds for Harvard (17-2, 3-0 Ivy), which used a 15-6 run in the final eight minutes of the first half - capped off by Corbin Miller’s 3-pointer - to build a 30-19 advantage at halftime.

The Crimson, who have won four of the last five in the series, extended the lead to 48-27 midway through the second half and led by as many as 31.

Yale (12-5, 2-1) struggled from the start and went scoreless for more than three minutes on three separate occasions, including a stretch of four minutes early in the second half that allowed the Crimson to pull away.

The Bulldogs were held to their lowest point total since scoring 36 in a loss to Cornell on Jan. 29, 2009.

Greg Mangano, Yale’s leading scorer, finished with a team-high 17 points for the Bulldogs, who lost for the first time at home and for the first time in five games overall.