M. Soccer Falls Out of Ivy Race

HANOVER, N.H.Diving sophomore goalkeeper Jamie Roth could could not quite reach Dartmouth forward Scott Darcis back-breaking goal as the the Harvard mens soccer team suffered a 2-0 loss that ended its hopes for an Ivy League championship.

With his back facing the goal, Darci gathered a bouncing pass, then spun and struck it towards the lower right hand corner of the net. Roth, already leaning to his right, tried to dive back the other way but could not quite reach the well-struck shot. With less than 10 minutes to play and down 2-0, the Crimson had little hope for a comeback.

With two games left to play against Columbia and Penn, Crimson (8-5-1, 2-2-1 Ivy) cant win the title even with a win over the Quakers, since Penn has won all five of its Ivy games thus far.

Contributing to the loss was the fact that two of Harvards star players, junior midfielder Kevin Ara and senior back Mike Lobach, were forced to sit out of the game due to injuries. Ara, who was questionable going into the weekend, and Lobach, who has been nursing an injury reaggravated against Yale two weeks ago, both hope to rejoin the team this weekend against the Lions.

Its actually one of the hardest things Ive ever done, Lobach said of watching the game from the sidelines. I actually probably could have played, but I thought that against Yale two weeks ago and I went out and hurt myself. So I had to stand there and watch.

Lobach watched as Dartmouth (7-6-1, 3-1-1) struck early in the first half. Freshman forward Darnell Nance dribbled down into the corner, then hit a low cross in front to Darci. The Dartmouth player passed it back out to the top of the 18, where senior midfielder Tom Billings blasted it past Roth and into the net.

The Crimson tried to respond with a score of its own but was turned away repeatedly. Oftentimes, Harvard seemed to be suffering from a case of bad luck, as an obscene number of shots hit the posts and the crossbar. Other times, the ball just couldnt quite make it over the goal line.

Almost immediately after Dartmouth scored its second goal, Harvard freshman midfielder Brian Charnock took a hard shot from the outside. Dartmouth senior keeper Doug Carr was able to deflect the ball just enough so that it trickled along the line for two or three seconds, inches from being called a goal, before it was cleared away by a Dartmouth defender.

[The bad breaks] were really frustratting, said senior back Michael Cornish. If one of them went in, it would have changed the entire game.

While he did receive a number of breaks, Carr was impressive in the Dartmouth goal, especially considering his limited soccer background. Carr is playing goalie, not to mention soccer, for the first time since eighth grade. A lacrosse player, Carr was recruited by the soccer team at the beginning of the season after the starting keeper quit and another was injured.

His shutout of Harvard was his fourth in five games.

After such a tough loss, the Crimson needs to rebound quickly if it hopes to make the postseason.

We still have two big games to play, Cornish said. We have to focus on the task at hand, and thats making the playoffs.