Crimson Icemen Face Cornell In Ivy Battle Tomorrow Night

Shating as the number one team in the nation, the varsity hockey squad will try to maintain its undefeated record tomorrow night when Harvard meets arch-rival Cornell before a capacity crowd in Watson Rink at 7:30 p.m.

Defending Ivy League champion Cornell goes, into tonight's battle holding a 4-2 record, including a 9-0 loss to BU and a 10-1 loss to Clarkson. The Redmen are 1-0 in the Ivy, Leagues, having trounced Brown, 8-2 while Harvard has doped both Brown and Pennsylvania.

Although favored by tradition, the Redmen are not as powerful as the Cornell teams of the past seven years. When Harvard split with Cornell last season, the Crimson's victory was its first in the series since 1966.

This year, however, the Big Red defense has been weak, while on offense Cornell boasts no scorers as prolific as Harvard's "Local Line" trio of Dave Hynes, Bob McManama and Bill Corkery, who have combined for a total of 58 points in seven games.

Two All-Ivy defensemen for Cornell, Ron Simpson and Jim Higgs, graduated last spring, as did All-Ivy, All-American center Larry Fullen. In addition, the Big Red also misses John Fumio and Doug Dunsmuir, who did not go back to Ithaca this year.

Redman Dave Elenbaas has returned in the nets to give up 26 goals and make 162 saves in 17 periods of action so far this winter. Elenbaas currently holds a 4.6 goals-against average.

Second-line wing Bob Murray leads Cornell in scoring with 5 goals and 9 assists, placing ahead of Doug Marrett and Carlo Ugolini, who have collected 11 and 9 points respectively.

Cornell's coach, Dick Bertrand, kept his team practicing in Ithaca throughout Christmas vacation in preparation for January's games.