Stickwomen Pound Powerful Penn, 3-1

Teams with 2-3 records aren't supposed to do such things.

Teams like the Harvard field hockey squad, however, aren't supposed to have 2-3 records.

The Crimson made that fact very cleat Saturday, toppling a University of Pennsylvania team that, on paper, was supposed to be much better.

So much for the paper

For all the stick women did Saturday was opend a previously unbeaten, unstopped and unscored upon Penn squad And they did it all with apparent ease.

All of which added up to a stunning 3-1 victory for the high-flying Crimson squad (now 3-3) More importantly, however, the win in their Ivy opener was good enough to vault the Cantabs to the top of the league standings Penn, meanwhile, fell to 3-1 overall and 1-1 in the Ivies.

On Saturday, the Crimson showed just how car it had come since its season opener two weeks before, when it dropped a 7-0 disaster to Northwestern. And even if it hadn't shown in the squad's disappointing 2-3 record--which it hadn't--Harvard left few doubts by day's end that it is a legitimate contender for the Ivy title.

"Their record doesn't indicate just how good a team they are." Penn Coach Ann Sage said of the Harvard team. "They just completely dominated us."

Dominated was close, but for the game's first few moments, destroyed would have been more accurate.

Just six minutes into the game, the Crimson onslaught began, when Andy Mainelli found herself all alone in front of the Penn goal; any more alone and Mainelli would have been lonely. But Trina Burnham's picture-perfect pass left little for Mainelli to do but swing home the Crimson's first goal of the game, and the first scored on Quaker goalie Nancy Meisinger this year.

Burnham followed up Mainelli's goal just a minute later with one of her own, putting Harvard on top by two and leaving Penn wondering who had ignited the young Crimson team.

"They came out on fire," Sage said "It's hard to come back when you give up two goals so quickly."

And if it weren't for a tremendous diving save by Meisinger of a Bambi Taylor penalty shot, the Quakers would have found themselves down by three with less than 10 minutes gone.

The potent Quaker offense finally did find its way onto the scoreboard, when with 21 35 left in the first, the Harvard defense couldn't clear the ball Freshman Donna Berk seized the opportunity to blast the ball past Crimson netminder Juliet Lamont and close the Harvard lead to 2-1.

But it there were ever a blast in Saturday's game, it came from Crimson defender Beth Mullen with 14 minutes left in the first.

Off Taylor's centering pass, Mullen took the ball and sent it flying past Meisinger like Cape Canaveral sends rockets flying into space No, one was stopping Mullen's shot, which upped the score to 3-1 and set the stage for the defensive struggle in the second half.

"We've just been getting better and better every game." Harvard Coach Edie Mabrey said "Actually in practice I tried to play down this game by playing capture the flag."

If the stickwomen keep it up, they'll soon be playing capture the Ivy flag."

THE NOTEBOOK: Harvard takes it 3-3 record on the road this week, facing UConn in Storrs, Conn on Thursday and Ivy nemesis Cornell in Ithaca. N.Y. on Saturday Penn had beaten highly touted Delaware last week Lamont finished the game with 12 saves.