Cagers Seek to Snap Yale Home Jinx

New Haven has held bad memories for Harvard this year. When Tom Sanders and his Crimson cagers take to the Paine Whitney Gymnasium floor tonight against Yale at 8 p.m., they will be out to end the Bulldog jinx.

Twice this year the fired-up Elis have produced major upsets, in football and hockey. If past history means anything, however, Sanders can breathe a bit easier--for Yale's cagers fell to the Harvard squad in Cambridge on January 19, 59-53.

Since that reading period loss, the 7-15 Bulldogs have struggled, but coach Joe Vancisin's team is capable of pulling off an upset.

Harvard now stands 8-4 in the Ivy League and 10-12 overall so the final weekend of the season is a pivotal one. The cagers will finish with a .500 record if they can take Yale, and then Brown on Saturday night. Two victories would also give Harvard its second best Ivy League record ever.

Senior captain Tony Jenkins will be looking to pass Bill Dennis and grab fourth place on the Harvard career scoring list. Jenkins (1045), trails Dennis (1074), by 29 points and an even 30 for the weekend will put him over the top.

Harvard swept to victories over Cornell and Columbia last weekend while Yale lost to strong Penn and Princeton squads. The Tigers annihilated the Bulldogs 78-60 and Penn wasn't any more charitable, blasting the Yale cagers 90-79.

Yale's Mike Baskauskas, a 6 ft. 4 in. senior forward, has, like Jenkins, scored over 1000 points. Baskauskas (1126), is a two-way player, averaging 16.5 points a game, and grabbing 8.7 rebounds a game.

Captain Baskauskas, a second team All-Ivy selection last year, is backed up by center Jim Cartmell, who is second on the Yale team in rebounding. Gary Rinck, a 6 ft. 9 in. senior forward, who earlier this year had not seen much action, tallied 11 points against Princeton and 19 against Penn. Vancisin is expected to start Rinck against Harvard.

Jenkins, Lou Silver, Ken Wolfe, Bill Carey and Steve Selinger will be looking to end the mysterious jinx and should succeed.