What My Father Saw

My father didn't go to Harvard, so I think the first time he saw The Game was in 1978, the fall of my freshman year.

He told me he could come up from New York that weekend so I bought two tickets. We sat with the rest of the freshmen, including almost all of my entry. Wigglesworth B, in the temporary bleachers erected to plug the gap at the north end of the Stadium, packed in tight, high above the goal posts--the worst seats in the house.

And because they were the worst seats in the house (or maybe because we were freshmen), my friends and I soon found ourselves singing and drinking and talking and swaying and paying very little attention to the conflict on the field.

But my dad was watching, and at one point he tapped me on the shoulder. Spagnola just caught a screen and he may throw it," he said. And Spagnola did throw it--a halfback option and there was a man all alone at the 40 (split end Bob Krystyniak, we learned later) and he raced into the end zone untouched to give Yale a 21-14 lead it never relinquished.

We were perhaps the only people in section 42A to see that play, and it was the only one I remember from the entire afternoon.

Which was a shame. I found out later, reading the Crimson extra in my room long after the partying had stopped and everyone had gone to bed and my dad had flown home from Logan after treating me to dinner. The game had been a classic--35-28 Yale was the final--"one of the most exciting Harvard-Yale games in recent years." John Donley's story said.

Today I will see The Game for the last time as a student. My dad won't be there this time, which is just as well, because I couldn't get him into the press box even if he were. And I'll have to pay attention to the game, because I will be covering it for the Crimson. After all, those freshmen who don't pay attention have to find out what happened somehow.

But paying attention to this game won't be a chore. If nothing else. I'll watch Jim Callinan run for the last time, and few things at Harvard have been more pleasant these last three autumns than watching Jim Callinan run.

I'll see him get his richly-deserved 1000th yard of the season, and even though Rich Diana passed that milestone long ago, everyone there will fell excited and just a little bit sad for Callinan. And for all the seniors.

I'll watch Ron Cuccia and the Multiflex try to solve the Eli defense, the league's stingiest. He will mix his plays, offering Yale a dive by Callinan here, a flip to Acheson there, the quarterback-in-motion play (with a few new twists. perhaps). and maybe even a halfback option, too. And whether he succeeds or fails, it will be interesting.

And if you've been around here for any time at all, you realize that Harvard plays its best games against Yale. Especially at Yale. Especially when there is no chance to win, supposedly. The gridders may diddle at Dartmouth and dawdle at Brown, but when it comes to the Yale Bowl and some 70,000 fans of both persuasions (the color of the scarf is the give-away), well, things happen that just weren't supposed to.

And maybe, just maybe. I'll watch Harvard win its first Ivy title since 1975, when I was a sophomore in high school. Sure, some strange things have to happen (and after watching Penn last week I have trouble believing the Quakers could beat Hanover High, much less Dartmouth), but that's what Ivy League football is all about, strange things happening. Like halfback options and quarterback-in-motion plays, and the worst team beating the best team more often than not. It's crazy, but then lots of things around here are crazy.

But Ivy title or no. I'll be watching. When it ends, a part of my life will be over, so you can bet I'll try not to miss a play, to take every nuance and every subtlety in. Because I may not come back for a while, and when I do, it will all be different.

So there will be no socializing this year. It's The Game (how long has it been since you heard anyone call it anything else?) and it all starts at 1 p.m. at the Yale Bowl in New Haven, Conn., and I will be there by 11:30 ready to go, my eyes on the field. If there's a halfback option this year. I won't miss it.

HARVARD 24, YALE 19--First of all, I couldn't sleep if I picked Yale. But Harvard really has a chance to win as well. It's time for Cuccia to explode with a 400-yard passing day (hey, Bob Holly did it, and he wasn't even Southern California athlete of the year) and lead the squad to an upset. You have to like Rogan, you have to like Grieve, you have to like Diana and you have to be seared as hell of Fred Leone, but you also have to, as Brian Wilson erooned so elegantly, "Be True to Your School."

DARTMOUTH 83, PENN 0--I'd love to say it was otherwise, but those clowns from New Hampshire are going to win the Ivy Title this year. This is bad because (a) the team is really not that good, fourth-best in the conference. I'd say, and (b) everyone here hates someone up there, be it a neighbor from home, a hockey player or the guy who punched out your sister Dartmouth weekend, ...and the rest don't even matter.