Two Victories Ahead, Two Weeks Behind

The Harvard Men's Hockey team is already 2-0 and atop the ECAC, and the first hockey notebook hasn't yet appeared in the Crimson. At least until now.

Neither of its weekend conquests, of Brown, 5-2, and Yale, 4-1, were particularly taxing, and the Crimson has begun to display the mid-season form it used to reach the NCAA finals last March.

The East's most shocking result was that when the dust cleared after a weekend of intra-conference play, only two other ECAC squads had survived unbeaten.

Even more surprising is the fact that Cornell is not one of those teams.

In the ECAC's most stunning upset in memory, lowly Army knocked off Cornell, 6-5, at Ithaca's Lynah Rink Friday night.

That's roughly the equivalent of Harvard's football team upsetting Miami in the Orange Bowl on New Year's Day. Just roughly.

The Big Red has been ranked as high as seventh in the nation, and had been expected to give the Crimson its toughest battles in the war for the ECAC crown. The Cadets, on the other hand, finished 2-9 in conference play last year, and were ranked last in the ECAC coaches' preseason poll.

Army's "five minutes of fame" ended Saturday night, however, as Colgate brought the Cadets back to earth with a 4-2 thumping. The Red Raiders and St. Lawrence are tied with the Crimson with 2-0 conference records.

This week's national Top Ten has not been released, but when it does come out, Harvard seems assured of being the only undefeated team among its ranks.

The catch is that the other nine teams started their seasons two weeks ago and have already played nearly 15 games.

Last week's WMEB/CHSB poll: 1. North Dakota 2. Bowling Green 3. Michigan State 4. Minnesota 5. Harvard 6. Maine 7. Cornell 8. Boston College 9. Illinois-Chicago 10. Boston University.

B.U. started the season as the top-rated team, but has already lost three contests, and will fall out of the rankings this week, as will Cornell.

Right wing Tim Barakett leads the Crimson with six points--three goals and three assists. The senior has shown considerable variety in his repetoire, having scored a goal of each type: power play, regular, and short-handed.

Crimson Coach Bill Cleary continues to be pleased with play of his freshmen. First line right wing C.J. Young, and centers Tod Hartje and John Murphy saw action both nights, while defenseman Scott McCormack played briefly in the Brown contest.

"They all played very well," Cleary said. "It's nice to be able to come in with an older group. It's a good thing we don't have to depend on them."

Cleary was alluding to his situation in 1983 when 11 freshmen played for the varsity.

The "Cheer of the Week" was directed at the white-helmeted Yale goalie. "Hey Schwalb, you're not a goalie...you're a Q-Tip!"...The Crimson travels to Princeton and Army this weekend, and returns home November 29 to face Dartmouth. That will be its last home game until January.