Princeton earned the conference's automatic bid to the 2011 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament in a one-game playoff.
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's Kyle Smith, Cornell's Bill Courtney, Dartmouth's Paul Cormier and Penn's Jerome Allen (previously interim).
[3] 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.
[13] On March 8, Princeton defeated Penn to force a one-game playoff at the Payne Whitney Gymnasium at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut.
[19] 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.
[27] Princeton lost its opening game against the fourth-seeded and eventual national semifinalist Kentucky Wildcats by a 59–57 margin on a last second layup.