THE GAME '08: Stepping Out of the Shadow

With the season drawing to a close tomorrow, Harvard will see the finale of fifth-year senior quarterbacks Chris Pizzotti and Liam O’Hagan, a tandem that has passed for 8801 yards and logged 61 touchdowns. But nobody will miss the pair more than their favorite target, junior wide receiver Matt Luft.

“It’s been kind of weird, because Chris and Liam have been the quarterbacks here since my freshman year,” Luft says. “So I’ve kind of almost not had anything but them. So I think over the three years, I’ve really been able to develop a chemistry with them.”

Harvard coach Tim Murphy recognized Luft’s potential early, thanks in large part to fellow Thousand Oaks, Calif. native Corey Mazza ’07-’08.

“[Corey was] a big part of me getting in here,” Luft admits. “He would take my film to the coaches and show them about me.”

“We had a lot of knowledge of him because he came from Corey Mazza’s high school,” Murphy adds. “I actually made three personal visits [to] the West Coast to see him, and it was a very tough sell at first for his family.”

When Luft ultimately decided on Harvard, Mazza instantly took him under his wing.

“Corey was always kind of a role model for me coming in,” Luft says. “He was the person I always went to with questions like, ‘Corey, what do I want to do here? What do I need to do here in this type of coverage?’ That type of stuff.”

And as a result, Luft quickly emerged as the Crimson’s second receiver behind Mazza.

But with Mazza’s graduation, Luft has finally come into his own, anchoring an injury-ridden wideout corps of young, inexperienced players.

“He’s gotten faster every year, he’s gotten better every year,” Murphy says.

Luft had 337 yards on 19 receptions in his rookie year, then more than doubled those totals in his sophomore campaign with 721 yards on 43 catches.

But this year, Luft has really broken out. He has recorded 100 or more yards in five games on the season, including a 139-yard performace against previously unbeaten Cornell. His season-high 148 yards came against Brown, currently the only other one-loss team in the league. Luft tallied 99 of those yards in just the first quarter.

What has marked Luft’s career has been his ability to make the big plays. Luft has 11 catches for 25-plus yards and five for 50-plus, including a 66-yarder against the Big Red.

“I know where [Pizzotti] wants to go with the ball, I know what he’s looking for,” Luft says. “And also, in certain situations, I know what he wants me to do. Instead of maybe dropping a route out, he’ll want me to continue going if the situation calls for it, if we need a big play or something.”

Equal in modesty as he is in talent, Luft is quick to share the credit.

“A lot of it has to do with the whole offense in general,” Luft says. “We have to have a good run game going to open up the pass, you have a bunch of receivers to make it really difficult for them to single out one receiver to cover. The [offensive line] has done a really great job blocking this year, protecting Chris, and Chris always puts the ball where it needs to be.”

But with the senior quarterbacks graduating, and a crop of young receivers beginning to mature, Harvard will need a new leader to emerge for the offense. It needs look no further than Luft.

“He’s just gotten a little bit better at everything each year to the point now where, as our guys on defense say, as [senior] Andrew Berry says, he’s a beast,” Murphy says.

—Staff writer Dixon McPhillips can be reached at fmcphill@fas.harvard.edu.