Rock Steady

The Crimson hockey squad didn't have a lot to say about last Saturday's 7-3 loss at the hands of Boston University in the ECAC finals. On the other hand, they weren't making any excuses either.

"There isn't much I can say about it," team captain Randy Roth said Sunday. "There are no excuses. We were simply beaten."

To many disgruntled fans, that may sound like the understatement of the season and a rather unsatisfactory explanation of Harvard's collapse. But for Roth there are no easy answers to such painful questions, and there are no alibis.

"We gave up too many cheap goals," Roth added. "It was really frustrating to go out there and score on the power play, then give them a cheap score."

Certainly it cannot be argued that the B.U. attack was overwhelming. It was nothing like it was in the Beanpot finale when the Terriers peppered Brian Petrovek with some 33 (depending on who you talk to, the official scorers or the team managers) testing shots. Saturday evening, B.U. merely took advantage of sloppy plays and slow reactions by the Crimson squad to tuck seven goals past Petrovek.

"It must have looked as if neither team wanted to win it," Roth said. To which one might reply that Harvard wanted to win it less. "There are a lot of people who will say we didn't want it," the senior center responds, "But there are 12 seniors on the team that have never won an ECAC championship. We wanted to win it."

One of those seniors, Jim Thomas, was forced to watch the game from the stands as a misguided shot in Friday's game struck him above the eye for a seven-stitch cut. Thomas went to an eye specialist who advised that he sit out the finals.

"It was more preventative than anything," Thomas said Sunday, "My left eye still isn't opened all the way. We [Thomas and hockey coach Billy Cleary] agreed I should not play, but it was tough to just sit there and watch."

Thomas's hustle, which never ceases to amaze Crimson followers, was sorely missed in Saturday's lethargic game. But the absence of one player cannot be used as an alibi (Harvard won the quarterfinals without Leigh Hogan).

"The biggest thing I noticed," Thomas said, "was that we were slow. It was really disappointing how slow we looked out there."

The Terriers, who were only slightly faster than Harvard Saturday, exploited Harvard's slowness to clear their own zone and execute simple clearing plays. A bit of pressure resulted in errant passes from the defense and B.U. goals. Harvard's defense will have to look sharper for the NCAAs.

"We looked flat," Roth said. "We weren't concentrating on the little things. We weren't executing very well."

Harvard's sloth-like play might be attributed to the physical beating Cornell administered the night before in the semifinal contest that the Crimson squad struggled to pull out, 6-4.

Clearly seemingly set the stage for such an excuse last Thursday when he complained to the tournament committee about Harvard, the number one seed, having to play the 9 p.m. game in Boston Garden. The steamy Garden, slow ice and lateness of the contest, Cleary argued, was a disadvantage the top team should not have to endure.

And indeed the slushy ice surface and the elbow merchants from Ithaca, N.Y., took their toll Friday night. ("It was a very, very brutal game," Thomas said.) But nobody is buying it as the reason for such a convincing defeat, least of all Roth. "Bullshit" was all he had to say about using the Cornell game as a lone excuse.

The only bright spot in the game was the Harvard power play. In the Beanpot finale, B.U. effectively stifled Harvard's man-advantage situations by favoring the Crimson corner man. Cleary's strategy has a man at the face-off circle hash marks ready to take the pass from the point.

"Billy [Cleary] and Tim Taylor noticed what B.U. was doing in the Beanpot so we adjusted to it," Roth said. "We were shooting more from the point this time." The revised strategy worked on three power plays.

But Harvard will not be able to rely on its power play alone against Minnesota in the upcoming NCAAs in St. Louis. The squad will have to "regroup," as Roth puts it and get itself prepared mentally for the national championships.

"We were geared for another chance at B.U. and blew it," Thomas said. "It's not enough to say we can beat them in the consolation round, we have to be geared to go to the finals."

The squad will have to concentrate on executing faster and skating harder in order to upset Minnesota, another fast-skating team like the Terriers. Harvard will have to come out flying from start to finish or it will be the consolation round-again.

"You can talk all you want," Leigh Hogan, who has not been up to par due to a nagging abdominal muscle pull, said Sunday. "But you've just got to go out and work a little harder."