Deacons Retain Lead for Straus Cup As Inter - House Sports Season Lulls

All has been quiet on the intramural sports front for more than a week, and all will continue to be quiet for several more weeks, giving Generalissimo Adolph Samborski a breathing spell after a furious fall and winter season and a chance to figure out how the eight entries in the Grand Harvard Handicap stand.

Late releases reveal that the Kirkland Deacons are strongly entrenched in first place as the Houses have gone well past the half-way mark in the year's activities. The Deacons have amassed 8511/2 points as compared to second place Lowell's 7851/2. The Bellboys, however, are expected to close the 66 point gap this spring, but whether they can overtake the flying Deacons is another question.

Adams with 705, and Winthrop with 7011/2 totals round out the first division Houses in the present standings. Eliot's 655 tops Leverett's 644 to lead the second division, and Dudley's 603 lands the Commuters in seventh place ahead of Dunster, which occupies the cellar with 538 points.

Kirkland got off to a flying start last fall by sharing top honors in the football league with the Winthrop Puritans. After that the Deacons piled up an amazing succession of seconds and an occasional first or third. Only in two sports, squash and hockey, did they find the going really tough, with their racquetmen and pucksters ending seventh and eighth respectively.

Lowell's record is also characterized by consistency, for the Bellboys have a long string of seconds, thirds, and fourths to their credit. An interesting feature of the 1938-39 fall and winter House athletics is that the total number of points lost by defaults has shrunken appreciably from last year's figures. So far, 79 points have been lost by defaults as against 168 thus far in the 1937-38 season.