Two Friends Thinking Field Hockey

I am going to give my buddy Mark a call. He's not going to believe it.

Mark my words, the Harvard field hockey team is enjoying its finest Ivy League season since 1983. The Crimson has waited and waited and waited. Six years of waiting, to be exact. Six years of trying to finish with a winning Ivy record.

Today, Harvard (7-2 overall, 3-0 Ivy) is the top team in the current league standings. Okay, so Brown is 3-0-1 in the Ivies and just a tie game away from first place. That doesn't matter.

Maybe if I give Mark a call really late at night when he's asleep. I'll tell him the field hockey team could very well win its first Ivy League title, and then hang up. He'll probably think it's some kind of dream, and knowing Mark, he'll believe it.

It all began with Yale last year. Harvard hosted the Elis for the final game of the season. The Crimson hadn't defeated Yale in six years. Harvard won, 2-1, when 1988 Rookie of the Year Ceci Clark notched the game-winner with eight minutes left in the game. Maybe that's what propelled the team to such a successful season this year.

For two years, Mark had the field hockey beat for The Crimson before he switched to football in his junior year. In those two seasons, Harvard compiled a 3-8-2 Ivy record. Now the Crimson is gunning for the Ivy title. No way he's going to believe it.

I'll just send him copies of this year's Crimson. He'll have to believe it then. Unless he thinks it some kind of Lampy prank.

This year's Penn game certainly has something to do with it. The Quakers were the 13th-ranked team in the nation before they faced the Crimson on October 1 at Soldiers Field. Penn fell, 2-1. The Quaker field hockey dynasty--it had won three Ivy titles in the last four years--was crumbling.

The Crimson hasn't lost a game since Penn. Four victories in a row, including two recent 1-0 wins over Holy Cross and Cornell on artificial turf. Last time Harvard played the Big Red in Ithaca in 1987, the Crimson dropped a 2-1 decision. Things have changed since then. The waiting could very well be over. He won't believe it.

Mark started covering the men's hockey team during his first year. He got to see the squad go to the Final Four in Providence, Detroit and then capture the national championship last year in Minneapolis. All those wins on the ice, and you probably think he enjoyed the hockey team the most. He didn't.

It was always field hockey. I vaguely remember a column he wrote a few years ago. Field hockey this and field hockey that. Yet the Crimson kept on losing. It was like some kind of fascination. He is a Indians fan.

How about a notarized letter by the league office addressed to him? That will definitely work.

The Crimson has three Ivy games remaining on its schedule. This weekend, it hosts Dartmouth (1-3). Next weekend, its Princeton (1-2).

Then, if all works out, the Crimson will battle the Bruins for the Ivy title on November 1 in Providence. It will definitely be one of the biggest games of the fall season. Things have certainly changed.

Harvard will no longer wait for next year; next year is already here.

Mark's just going to have visit Providence at the beginning of November.