W. Cagers Prepare for ECAC Tournament

While most Harvard students are stuffing their faces with turkey and stuffing over the Thanksgiving holiday, the Harvard women's basketball team will be hard at work.

The Crimson (2-0, 0-0 Ivy) heads into the ECAC Holiday Festival at Holy Cross this weekend where it will face its first true test of the young season. The tournament includes Holy Cross, Maryland and Mt. St. Mary's.

Harvard will play Maryland (1-2, 1-0 ACC) in the first round on Saturday afternoon. If the Crimson defeats the Terrapins, it will play the winner of the Holy Cross-Mt. St. Mary's game for the championship on Sunday.

Harvard has much more at stake on Saturday than its perfect record. Maryland is a talented opponent from a nationally prominent conference, and a Crimson victory against the Terps would be an enormous plus toward seedings for the NCAA Tournament should the Crimson win the Ivy League.

"[Maryland] is a very athletic team," Harvard co-captain Megan Basil said. "We need to go into the game and not be shocked by their quickness."

Last season, despite its first ever 14-0 Ivy League record and a second consecutive league title, Harvard received only a 16 seed in the national tournament due to several losses in the pre-Ivy season. Pitted against top-seeded North Carolina--also from the ACC--in the first round of the NCAA tournament, the Crimson was ousted quickly, 78-53.

"These [pre-Ivy] games are very important for the long term," Basil said. "Last year our early season screwed us."

Harvard has already shown quite a turnaround from last year. Convincing victories over Army and Boston University show the Crimson to be much more organized than it was during the early part of the 1996 season.

However, Harvard has yet to play its best basketball. While the Crimson played well at both ends of the floor against B.U. last Thursday, 20 team fouls allowed the Terriers to score 62 points and keep the final score respectable.

Harvard cannot afford to make little mistakes against teams like Maryland. The Terps are well-coached, perennially strong and more than ready to exploit a small window of opportunity.

"We expect Maryland to be a good team, probably similar to North Carolina," Harvard co-captain Allison Feaster said. "We know we can win if we're playing well."

Maryland concluded last season with an 18-10 record and a third-place finish in the ACC standings. The team qualified for its 15th national tournament where it lost in the first round to Purdue, 74-48.

The 1997 Terrapins are an experienced group, returning four of their five starters from one year ago. They are led by All-ACC candidates and co-captains Stephanie Cross and Sonia Chase.

Cross, a 6'1 forward, led Maryland in scoring and rebounding last season, averaging 11.8 points per game and 6.5 rebounds per game. Chase is a 5'11" guard who recorded 58 steals in 27 games last year to lead the Terrapins.

As Maryland's top defender, Chase is usually assigned to guard the opposition's best player. That means she will most likely find herself with the daunting task of trying to contain Feaster.

Feaster enters the weekend averaging 20.5 points and five rebounds per game. She is the focal point of the Crimson's offense and arguably the team's best defender. The Feaster-Chase matchup may be a crucial factor in the final out-come of the game.

Maryland also brings height and a deep-shooting threat into the contest. Five of the Terrapins are over 6'2", including 6'8" sophomore center Branka Bogunovic. Bogunovic is coming off of a career-high 16-point performance in the Terps' 74-42 throttling of Georgia Tech last Friday.

"[Their height] doesn't concern me," Feaster said. "We faced a taller team in Vanderbilt two years ago."

Maryland's sophomore guard Tiffany Brown is a terror from downtown. Last year in her rookie season she connected on 38 percent of her shots from beyond the arc, and she set a school record for most three-pointers made in a season with 48.

However, Harvard boasts some long-range weapons of its own. Co-captain Megan Basil, junior Suzie Miller, seniors Sarah Brandt and Karun Grossman and Feaster can knock down a trey at anytime.

In addition to the perimeter game, the Crimson has a corps of forwards who have played exceptionally well through the first two games. Junior Rose Janowski leads this group, averaging 10.5 points and 10 rebounds per game.

Sarah Russell, who was the Crimson's main energy source a year ago, has come alive offensively and is averaging eight points per game. Sophomores Laela Sturdy and Courtney Egelhoff have also played solid basketball coming off the bench.

While the Crimson will face either Holy Cross or Mt. St. Mary's on Sunday, Harvard is focusing only on the immediate task at hand--namely defeating Maryland. Feaster is confident that her team is ready to meet the Terps' challenge.

"[Maryland] probably will be our biggest test of the pre-Ivy season," she said. "I think we will respond well."