The Russians Are Coming

For the Harvard men's hockey team, Santa Claus won't be the only man dressed in red coming to town this Christmas.

That's because a team from Russia will be visiting Cambridge as well.

The Soviet Union's Spartak Hockey Club will visit Harvard from December 22-28 to play in an exhibition tournament at Bright Center.

The Soviets will compete against teams from Harvard, Boston College and Brown University. The Crimson and the Soviets will square off on December 27.

The Chinese National "B" team will also compete in the tournament, but is not scheduled to play the Crimson.

Freshening Up the Ice: A couple of freshmen tallied the first points of their Harvard careers over the weekend. Third line center Tod Hartje assisted on four Peter Chiarelli goals, while first line right wing C.J. Young got the assist on Lane MacDonald's second goal of the Army game.

MacDonald, with two goals in each contest, moved into a tie with Tim Barakett for the team's scoring lead with eight points in four games. The pair are tied for fifth place in the ECAC scoring race, three points behind Clarkson's Luciano Borsato. MacDonald has notched a team-leading seven goals, while Barakett has four.

It was also a successful weekend for the Crimson's third line, which picked up its first points of the year. Chiarelli was assisted by Hartje and Nick Carone on each goal of his hat trick on Friday night, and the trio hooked up once more in the Army game.

Harvard's fourth line of Craig Taucher, John Murphy, and Andy Janfaza has yet to tally a point for the Crimson, while Butch Cutone, Scott McCormack and Gerald Green also remain scoreless.

First-line center Allen Bourbeau didn't score against Princeton, but he plucked home a power-play goal against Army--for the Crimson's first tally of the night.

"It's nice to get up by a couple of goals on the road," Bourbeau said. "There's not as much pressure then. I got one to start us off, but we've been doing well on all four lines."

Bourbeau has two goals on the season.

Tending the Twines: Goalies from opposing teams have a large advantage over their Crimson counterparts in saves this season: 132-80. But that deficit is more indicative of the strength of the Crimson blueliners than of any failings by Harvard goalies Dickie McEvoy and John Devin. The flip side of this equation is that the Crimson offense gets off more shots than its opponents.

Last season, opponents out-saved Harvard goalies 1082-902, but Harvard held a 2.77-5.45 advantage in the most important netminding statistic, goals-against average.

Last weekend, Devin injured his knee in warm-ups before the Princeton game and was unable to play against either the Tigers or the Cadets. McEvoy got the call both nights and surrendered a meager five goals.

McEvoy gave the Harvard coaching staff a scare when he went down in the third period of the Princeton game. The Crimson had no back-up goalie on the bench, and Harvard Coach Bill Cleary admitted, "I don't know what I would have done" had McEvoy not been able to finish up.

Cleary was thinking about sending for one of his freshmen goalies to come to West Point, N.Y., Saturday night for the Crimson's game against Army. But, said Cleary, "I didn't know how I'd get him up here." So the Crimson again sent McEvoy onto the ice without anyone to back him up. "I was praying nothing would happen to him," Cleary said.

"Maybe it's a blessing to see McEvoy get that kind of experience," the Crimson coach added.

Same Time Last Year: The Crimson has gotten off to a faster start in 1986 than last year's NCAA runners-up Harvard squad. After four games last season, against the same quartet of opponents of Brown, Yale, Princeton and Army, Harvard was only 3-1. The team had scored 22 goals and allowed 16.

This year's Crimson squad has scored one fewer goal, but the stingy defense has given up only eight.

A Glance at Hockey East: Sixth-ranked Maine is making its presence felt in the Hockey East conference. Earlier this month, the Black Bears twice knocked off then-nationally ranked Boston University. Friday night, they tied last year's national champion--Michigan State--3-3, in East Lansing, Mich. The third-ranked Spartans came back the following night to upend Maine, 4-0.

The contests were part of Hockey East's arrangement with the CCHA to play interlocking schedules. The experience of playing teams from other conferences should come in handy for these squads come NCAA tournament time. The ECAC teams, on the other hand, are handicapped by the fact that they play games mostly among themselves, although lack of experience didn't seem to hurt Harvard last year, or NCAA Champion RPI two seasons ago.

Blowing the Whistle: Harvard's games thus far have been penalty-fests, as the officials are making an effort to crack down on unnecessary violence. There were 17 penalties in the Princeton game, and 16 last week in the Yale contest.

A new rule this year in college hockey mandates that a skater committing a violation remain in the penalty box for the duration of his penalty, even if the other team scores a power-play goal in the meantime. He can be substituted for if the other team scores, but the player himself cannot return to the ice. It is hoped this stiffer penalty will discourage needless aggression.

THE NOTEBOOK'S NOTEBOOK: Harvard has yet to fall behind in a contest this year...Clarkson walloped Cornell 7-0, and St. Lawrence beat the Big Red, 2-1, to hand the highly-regarded squad from Ithaca, N.Y., its third loss in four league games. The Big Red had been ranked as high as seventh in the nation at one point this season...After an 8-3 victory over Colgate, St. Lawrence (4-0 ECAC) is the ECAC's only other undefeated team...Harvard scored three goals in a five minute span three times in the two contests...The polite Army crowd applauded when the Crimson took the ice Friday night...The icemen are at Dartmouth the day after Thanksgiving, and then return to Cambridge the next night to host the Big Green.