Squashmen Look for Two Titles

In the four years he has been playing squash, Vic Niederhoffer has won every major amateur tournament held in the U.S. with one exception-the national singles championship.

This weekend he makes his second bid for that honor while a five-man Harvard squad defends the national team title the Crimson took home last year.

Last year the Harvard team won four matches, squeezing through the last two by 3-2 margins, to take home the national team championship. They did it without Niederhoffer, who was playing in the singles tournament; he reached the semifinals before bowing to Ben Hecksher '59 in four games. Hecksher went on to win the title.

Hecksher is back again this year, but the pre-tourney favorite has to be Henri Salaun, the four-time champ who has whipped every top amateur in the country this year.

The Man to Beat

Salaun is the only amateur to beat Vic Niederhoffer at any time this season. Neiderhoffer spilled Hecksher in a Massachusetts "A" League match; he has beaten former amateur champ Harry Conion, the tournament's fourth seed, twice. But he lost to Salaun in the Middlesex Bowl Tournament over Christmas vacation, and again in the Cowles Invitational in New York just after exams.

If both Niederhoffer and Salaun win their first three matches they'll meet in the semifinals. But the road to the semis is not free of obstacles for either man. The Crimson captain meets former Amherst star Bill Smith in the first round, then probably faces Bill Tully, a highly regarded New Yorker, in the second.

Also in Niederhoffer's quarter of the draw is Smith Chapman, the Canadian national champion, whom Vic beat last year in the Cowles.

Tough Draw

The Crimson team also has a rugged draw; they open against one of two tough Canadian teams this afternoon. Last year Harvard eked out a 3-2 win over a Canadian team in the finals to win the title.

The Crimson is headed by Romer Holleran, finally back on the squad after a three-year stint in the army and a term of ineligibility.

Last year Harvard won only one match at number one; the team took its matches by winning at the bottom of the ladder. This time again the pressure will be on the lower players: John Vinton, Terry Robinson, Bill Morris, and Alan Terrell.

Vinton was the number six player on the team until last week when he came rocketing up the ladder as a result of a series of challenge matches.

Robinson and Morris are veterans of last year's nationals. Both turned in big wins against Princeton this week and Coach Jack Barnaby is counting on them heavily.

Terrell, a junior who has lost only two matches in his two years of intercollegiate play, rounds out the squad.

The competition is as strong for the team as it is for Niederhoffer. Two Canadian squads, Philadelphia, Boston, Detroit, and New York, are all considered about equal, and about even with Harvard. It will take some luck and some good play for Harvard to win, but so far this year the Crimson has had a lot of both