Rising Power

1986.

That was the last time that the Dartmouth women's lacrosse team beat Harvard. It was a long, long time ago.

In the late eighties, the Harvard program took off, while Dartmouth languished. The Crimson won the national title in 1990 and returned to the championship two years later. Meanwhile, the Big Green shared the 1987 title with Harvard and then began to slide.

But nothing lasts forever. This year, it was finally Dartmouth's turn against its southern rival, as the No. 3 team in the nation stopped No. 13 Harvard in its tracks by a 14-8 score yesterday.

At the moment, Harvard has a streak of seven consecutive appearances in the NCAA Tournament. That streak is as much over as the Crimson's domination of the Big Green.

"I'm so happy for the team," Dartmouth coach Amy Patton said. "It's been so long since we've beaten them. We've got the monkey off our back."

Over the last few years, the Big Green have been steadily improving, recruiting and developing players such as senior attacker Lauren Holleran (48 goals as of yesterday) and junior midfielder Sarah Devens (31 goals). And the team has steadily improved.

But, until yesterday, not enough to beat Harvard. Last year, for example, both teams were essentially tied for the No. 6 rank in the country and faced each other in Hanover for the last sport in the six-team NCAA Tournament.

It wasn't even close. The Crimson blasted the not-so-Big Green, 11-4. Hello, monkey.

This year would be different. The first sign came on April 1, when Dartmouth knocked off defending national champion Princeton, 10-9. The victory avenged heartbreaking losses over the past two seasons in which the Tigers overcome deficits in the closing seconds of the game to defeat the Big Green.

All of a sudden, the rags-to-riches Green was undefeated and No. 2 in the country. A loss to Penn State would ruin the perfect record, but in the Ivy League Dartmouth was still at the top. The only thing it needed to win its first outright title since--yep, 1986--was a victory over Harvard.

The game began like many other Crimson-Big Green games--with Harvard jumping out to a lead. Co-captain Megan Colligan scored 26 seconds into the game, and junior Sara Noonan tallied seven minutes later. That put Harvard up 2-0, and it looked like deja vu all over again.

But the day would be painted Green. Holleran netted back-to-back goals to tie things up at two, and after a couple of lead changes, the score was knotted at four.

Then Dartmouth took over. Wallis Cook tallied two in a row for the visitors and Devens added another--all in a 1:19 span, and all with less than three minutes left in the half. Harvard would never be close to the lead again.

"Harvard traditionally comes out early and gets a couple of goals," Patton said. "Once we realized that we were faster than them and could take them on the fast break, that's when the game really went well."

Teams busting out of the cellar is the theme of the Ivy League this year. Yale has busted out to a 9-2 record, good enough for No. 11 in the nation, and Cornell is at No. 13.

Harvard, meanwhile, is 6-4 overall and 2-3 in the Ivy League. With a win over Brown in a rescheduled game two Thursdays from now, the Crimson's league record will go up to .500, but that is a far cry from the team that won shares of seven straight Ivy titles.

From the 1995 season, one things is certain. Dartmouth--and Ivy women's lacrosse as a whole--is getting very good. And Harvard now has to catch up.