Zuckerman Says Football At Harvard Not Worth It

Phil Zuckerman stands 6'1", weighs 200 pounds, captained his football team at Exeter, earned All-Prep honors, came to Harvard, and had an outstanding football season as a freshman.

Then he quit. He became dissatisfied with the football program at Harvard. "Football here is disappointing." he said. "With all the talent they have, they don't do much. I didn't want to waste my time."

Zuckerman was actively recruited by Princeton, Dartmouth, Cornell, Penn, Yale, and Stanford. He received weekly letters from Yale and Cornell and talked to a succession of alumni and coaches. Cornell flew him up to Ithaca for a weekend and gave him hockey tickets, a good time, and "a hell of a lot of money."

Harvard did not recruit him. Yet when the fall of 1967 arrived, Zuckerman found himself at Harvard. He guesses that Harvard was just "too hard to turn down."

He is happy with Harvard, but disillusioned with Harvard athletics. "You wouldn't want students to be as narrow-minded as to think that football is the only thing in the world, but you would want the Athletic Department to think that," he said. "Athletes want to be on winning teams." To Zuckerman, a coach who treats a sport as "fun" has an essentially "high school JV attitude."

"The thing that is fun is winning," he commented. "Obviously some teams win and some teams lose, but any team that doesn't work to live up to its potential isn't worth the effort to play on."

Zuckerman is also a lacrosse player, and he has stuck with the lacrosse program here. At Exeter, he was considered by many to be the best attack-man in New England, and as a sophomore here last, year, starting for the varsity, he finished second in scoring on the team and among the top five in the league.

He was disappointed with last year's 6-8 team. "We beat Princeton and Cornell, the two best teams in the league, and then lost to Dartmouth, he worst," he said. "After that Exeter could have beaten us." Yale did, and the Crimson finished sixth in the league.

Optimistic

He is optimistic about this year's team, which has lost only three starters from last year. But, he adds, "Probably six or seven players from last year's freshman team who could have really helped the varsity will not come out this year." Without the sophomores, he feels the Crimson will lack depth, and any in juries will seriously hurt the chances for a good season.

Zuckerman, who looks a little like the Sundance Kid. wants to go to Law School, preferably at Harvard. He doesn't think his athletic career will help too much, though. "The criteria that got you into college and the criteria that get you into law school are different," he said. "You can't just be a jock with slightly above average grades."

He has heard that athletics may give him a slight edge, however, because law schools feel that athletes learn how to lose, and that will be helpful in their careers.