Dawson Rolls in Harvard Loss

The Crimson’s 27-24 loss to Princeton Saturday was just one more indication that Harvard’s Ivy League dominance is a thing of last season.

Clifton Dawson’s performance, however, was a refreshing blast from the past.

The Tigers were able to contain the All-American junior tailback in the fourth quarter when it counted—keeping him from the endzone and the go-ahead score on fourth-and-two at the five-yard line—but not before Dawson racked up 203 yards and two touchdowns.

The Payton Award candidate, who has been hampered by nagging injuries since the second week in the season, carried 35 times as the Crimson focused its offensive efforts towards a running attack, throwing the ball just 16 times.

“The offensive line really did a great job today,” Dawson said. “There were holes open all day. We challenged our linemen to make the running game a priority.”

Injuries have plagued Harvard all season. The most noticeable loss has been in the receiving corps, which has seen the top three wideouts felled for weeks, months, or longer. Compounding the Crimson’s offensive inconsistency was Dawson’s decreased output.

In each of the first two games, he carried the ball over 30 times for more than 150 yards, including three touchdowns in a win over Brown. It was in the game against the Bears, though, that Dawson was first hindered by an injury, leaving the field for a spate in the first quarter with a slight hip bruise.

It was the start of a downward trend. The next week against Lehigh, Dawson was held to 59 yards on 15 carries as the Mountain Hawks stacked the box to contain him. He missed much of the first and fourth quarters, and after the game, Harvard coach Tim Murphy would call his tailback’s health at “85-90 percent.”

The low point was Cornell, in which a wounded Dawson—and Crimson—were soundly trounced by the Big Red. Dawson had just 39 yards in the loss.

Last week against Lafayette, Dawson finally looked himself again, racking up an even 100 yards in the Crimson win. Still, his longest run was 13 yards, hardly the game-breaking sprint that had distinguished him in years past.

Fortunately for him, Princeton was next on the slate. Last week, in a muddy game at Brown, the Tiger defense was ravaged by Bears tailback Nick Hartigan for 245 yards, including a 74-yard touchdown.

Though Princeton’s defense was heralded, pre-season, to be the strength of the team, Hartigan’s success suggested that Saturday’s matchup would be the game where Dawson would break out of his slump.

Add to that that Dawson was healthy at long last, and it made the perfect recipe for a day at the races.

“This week was the first time in a few weeks that I practiced at 100 percent,” Dawson said, “and I think that really allowed me to get back into running form.”

“One of [Dawson’s] major commodities is, while he can be very flashy, what makes him a great back is he rarely loses yards,” Princeton coach Roger Hughes said. “You hit him, and you think you’ve got him stopped at nothing, and he’s got four. We certainly saw that today.”

Ultimately, though, the Princeton defense was able to keep Dawson from a win, if not from player-of-the-week caliber numbers.

Princeton cornerback Jay McCareins acknowledged that playing Hartigan last week prepared the Tigers for the challenge of containing Dawson.

“Be relentless to the ball; there’s no choice,” McCareins said. “If you miss a tackle, someone has to be there right behind. If you can stop him after 20 yards, that’s a big run, but if you can get to him, that’s the big difference.”

It’s tough to speculate whether the Crimson would have lost to Lafayette and Cornell with a healthy Dawson. Saturday at least proved that, first, his legs can keep Harvard in the game; and second, he isn’t ready to cede the title of premier Ivy League back to Hartigan just yet.

—Staff writer Lisa J. Kennelly can be reached at kennell@fas.harvard.edu.