Restic Attributes Win to the Defense

NEW HAVEN, Conn.--Last year at this time, Yale coach Carmen Cozza spent most of the post-Game press conference staring at the ceiling of Harvard's Dillon Field House.

This year, the object of interest was not the ceiling but the floor of Yale's Lapham Field House, as Cozza again had little to do but wonder why the heavens had deserted him for the second straight year in the waning minutes of the Harvard-Yale game.

After a few short minutes of introspection, the Yale mentor slipped quietly out of the building, while Harvard coach Joe Restic was just beginning to feel the pains of notoriety in the winners' locker room.

"We were very fortunate," was the phrase that began Restic's victory speech. "It could have gone the other way. They are a well-coached football team."

But compliments for Cozza were not what the crowd was waiting for. As the raucous throng quieted, Restic moved to the middle of the room and greeted the anticipation with a simple phrase: "We delivered."

After the resulting pandemonium died down, the coach slipped into his role of expert game analyst.

"In the first two quarters, we were as tight as you could possibly be. We just couldn't get started. Defensively, though, we played very well all the way through. Last week it was our offense, and this week it was our defense that really did the job," he said.

The key to the Crimson success lay in stopping Yale's offensive stalwarts, end Gary Fencik and halfback Don Gesicki. "We knew we had to take those aspects of their offense away," Restic said. "The double-team on Fencik in passing situations worked very well, and the line did a good job with Gesicki."

Though Crimson quarterback Jim Kubacki was constantly harrassed throughout the first half by a Yale pass rush that Restic said he "never expected to be so good," the Crimson offense got its game untracked in the second half.

Restic concluded with a characteristic comment on his own good fortune: "Tonight and tomorrow will be Thanksgiving for me." But not for Carmen Cozza.