Northeastern Triumphs Over Trackmen, 75-61

Coach Bill McCurdy, curious as to whether undefeated Harvard or mighty Northeastern would be the victor of Saturday's indoor track meet at the ITT, sent to the oracle at Delphi for the anticipated results. The oracle, it is said, sent back the encouraging news that if the team crossed the river Charles, a great team would fall.

But oracles have a way of covering themselves, and when the last relay had been run, the Huskies returned to their inner-city home as the proud owners of a 75-61 victory that had witnessed the setting of eight institutional records, five of which represented the best New England performances of the season in their respective events.

Harvard was the first team to score points in this hotly-contested meet, and they did it in a big way. Ed Ajootian led the Crimson troops to a one-two-three sweep in the 35 lb. weight throw, rewriting the first facility record of the afternoon with a prodigious hurl of 61' 1 1/2."

Northeastern was never far behind for long. Ron Chambers, an eventual triple winner in the long and triple jumps and the 60-yd. dash, took the long jump event with a personal best of 24' 9". He was followed closely by Huskie freshman standout Ricky Thompson, who hauled in second place with a leap of 24' 4 1/2." Harvard jumper Sola Mahoney tried his best, surpassed that, but still found himself in third place with a new personal best of 23' 9".

After taking time out to run one-two in the 60-yd. dash, Chambers and Thompson came back to the pits, where Chambers easily won the triple jump by jumping 49' 5", beating an excellent performance by Harvard's Bruce Brooks, who took second with a jump of 47' 3". Right behind Brooks was Huskie jumper John Caffrey, with a mark of 47' 2". Harvard's chances in this event were hurt by the loss of ace Crimson jumper Hasan Kayali, who was forced out of the long jump event with a strained leg muscle.

Except for the shot put, where Northeastern landed the top two slots (as Huskie hurler Bob Otrando set an institutional record with a 56' 3 1/2" mark), Harvard fared well in the other field events. The Crimson grabbed first place in the pole vault, where Geoff Stiles elbowed his way into the top slot by equalling his personal best of 16' 0" and took first and second place inthe high jump with winners Dan Sullivan and Mike Young.

In the running events, Northeastern applied the squeeze. Senior Frank Mortimer began the slaughter by winning the 440 with a time of 49.8. Then All-American runner Mark Lech turned on his jets to outdistance Crimson runners Brian McAndrews and Dave Frim, setting an institutional record and posting a record New England best-performance mark with a 1:10.16 finish.

Tom Mortimer did the same for the Huskies in the half-mile event with 1:52.5 finish, followed by Crimson runners John Cahfee and John Pickering in the second and third slots, respectively.

Thad McNulty cranked out a win in the 1000-yd. event to break up the Northeastern monopoly on first place in the running events. McNulty had finished second behind Huskie top gun Bruce Bickford in the mile event.

Northeastern's Flora twins sewed up the team win with a one-two finish in the two-mile, followed by Ed Sheehan of Harvard at third. The relay events split down the middle as the Harvard mile relay team of Frim, Lamppa, Nicodemus and McAndrews edged their Huskie counterparts by less than two seconds while Northeastern was the undisputed victor in the two-mile relay event.