NOTEBOOK: Ground Game Punishes Weak Big Green Defense

In Saturday’s 28-21 win over Dartmouth, the Crimson earned more yards on the ground than it did through the air for the first time all season. Sophomore running back Cheng Ho cleared the 100-yard mark for the second straight week and the third time this year, running for 114 yards on 15 carries, including a 41-yard scamper. Freshman Gino Gordon added 64 yards on 15 carries of his own.

“Quite honestly, Dartmouth’s not been a super strong team against the run, so we felt like we could run the ball,” head coach Tim Murphy said. “We’ve gotten better, we’ve tried to balance our offense, and we’re getting back to being a more balanced offense the last two weeks—and that’s what we need to be successful.”

All four Harvard touchdowns came on the ground, though all four came from Crimson quarterbacks. Senior quarterback Chris Pizzotti scored two short touchdowns, while freshman backup Collier Winters had the finest day of his collegiate career, running for 28 yards and two touchdowns on three carries out of a shotgun package. Winters has yet to attempt a pass since first appearing against Cornell on Oct. 6, but has nine carries for 39 yards in three games.

Senior fullback Noah Van Niel sat out the game to rest and give Dartmouth a different look.

“He was a little bit dinged, but he could have played this week,” Murphy said. “We just decided that in this gameplan, they would probably prepare a lot for that personnel grouping, and that by taking it out, hopefully they would spend a lot of time in practice on that, and we were going to give them some other looks.”

PICK PARTY

Senior safety Doug Hewlett, at times the forgotten man in Harvard’s talented secondary, is sure to be remembered after a stellar performance against the Big Green. Hewlett, the last man in the Crimson secondary without an interception, made his mark by collecting three on Saturday, the first time since 1967 a Harvard player has had three in a game.

“The most interceptions I had in high school in a single game was two,” Hewlett said. “I was kind of anticipating that they’d throw it across the middle today, and they did, and I guess I was lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time.”

Senior cornerback Steven Williams had another interception, his seventh of the season, and tied the Crimson’s career interceptions mark with 15. He is also only one shy of the single-season record of eight.

As a unit, the secondary has 15 of the team’s 17 interceptions this season, including three by senior safety John Hopkins and one each from senior Andrew Berry and sophomore Derrick Barker.

GREEN CONNECTIONS

The Crimson has now taken 10 of the 11 games in the series with Dartmouth, a team that has struggled since current—and former—head coach Buddy Teevens departed for Stanford after a stint in Hanover from 1987 to 1991. The Big Green hasn’t won an Ivy championship since his initial departure, and hasn’t sniffed the top of the league since Teevens’ return in 2005.

“I think some of the established teams—Harvard’s been there for a number of years, Penn’s been there for a number of years, Princeton’s made a run of late—Dartmouth hasn’t been in that mix,” Teevens said. “But I think we’re closing the gap, and having an opportunity to compete successfully. We’re not there yet.”

With the loss, Teevens fell to 2-5-1 all-time against Harvard, and Murphy moved to 11-3 against the Big Green.

The two coaches have a long history together, having played together at Silver Lake High School and continued a lifelong friendship. Despite spending decades in coaching, the game marked only the third time they’ve faced each other from opposite sidelines.

“All I know is that there’s somebody watching our signals from the opposite sideline, and I was saying, ‘Shoot, we’re going to have to start running guys in because they think they know all our signals,’” Murphy said. “But, obviously, there’s a degree of familiarity, and I think it makes it more fun, more interesting.”

EXTRA POINTS

Harvard running backs have just four touchdowns this season, while its quarterbacks have six. Ho leads the Crimson with three touchdown runs, but quarterbacks Pizzotti, Winters, and Liam O’Hagan have two apiece...Harvard ran almost twice as much as it threw on Saturday, attempting 44 runs to only 24 passes...Dartmouth accumulated 143 yards on the ground, far exceeding the 85-yard-per-game average surrendered by the Crimson coming in. Milan Williams, back after missing last week’s game with Columbia, led the Big Green with 74 yards on 13 carries.

—Staff writer Brad Hinshelwood can be reached at bhinshel@fas.harvard.edu.