Ivy Hopes Ride on Must-Win Match

In 2008, an overtime loss on the final day of the regular season left the Harvard men’s soccer team green with envy of Dartmouth, which gained a share of the Ivy title with Penn after the the Crimson’s loss. This year, the teams are again battling for position atop the Ivy League, but this time Harvard has the chance to start taking business into its own hands.

Earlier this week, the No. 14 Crimson—who had at one point been fifth in the country and seemed like a safe bet for its first conference title since 2006—needed help to put the team in control over its destiny. Last Sunday, just as Dartmouth did last year, Harvard got the assistance it required, and it now needs to take advantage of the opportunity to grab the Ivy crown.

“I think that our team plays with a little bit of a chip on its shoulder because we feel like we missed out on an opportunity to win the Ivy League championship [last year],” senior Adam Rousmaniere said. “So yes, it is motivation.”

Columbia’s road win against the Big Green gave Dartmouth its first Ivy League loss, sending it into a two-way tie atop the Ancient Eight with Brown. Each team boasts a 3-1-0 Ivy record with nine points. The Crimson sits in third at 2-1-1 with seven points, but a win over the Big Green could shoot it to the top of the standings. If Harvard wins out and Brown ties or loses one of its final three games, the Crimson could be poised to grab a share of the Ancient Eight crown.

All of this points towards a pivotal match on Saturday for Harvard (10-3-1, 2-1-1 Ivy), who looks to take down No. 21 Dartmouth (8-4-1, 3-1-0) at Ohiri field.

“I tell [my teammates] that everyone’s been in big games before, this is nothing new,” co-captain Brian Grimm said. “If we control things that are controllable we’ll be just fine.”

The Crimson meets a Dartmouth team which has struggled recently, coming off two shutout losses to No. 8 South Florida and Columbia.

To win, Harvard will need to manage more offense than it was able to muster its last time out in a 2-1 double-overtime loss to Princeton. The Crimson will likely need offensive contributions from more than co-captain Andre Akpan, the All-American star who has scored three of the Crimson’s last four goals and has 10 on the season.

“We just need a 90 minute, full game performance by the whole team and maybe a couple special players to step up and have their biggest game of the year,” Grimm said.

Defensively, the team will look to shut down Big Green midfielder Daniel Keat, who leads Dartmouth with seven goals and five assists on the year; senior Craig Henderson, the defending Ivy League Player of the Year; and sophomore Lucky Mkosana, the 2008 Ivy League Rookie of the Year.

This will be no easy task, as the Big Green features the most aggressive and high-powered offense in the Ivy League, leading the Ancient Eight in nearly every major statistical offensive category. It is first in the conference in shots, corner kicks, shots on goal, goals, and points—and ahead of the second-place team in each of these categories by a landslide.

“Our defense has been very solid all year,” Grimm said. “We’ve faced some strong offenses before, so I think we’re prepared for a good attack like Dartmouth has and we expect another solid performance.”

The game will be a challenge for sophomore goalie Austin Harms, who has given up just two goals in his past three games—both against Princeton–and has the best goals-against-average percentage and most shutouts in the league.

At the same time, Dartmouth has also allowed the most scores in the conference, so Harvard will need to be on the attack against Big Green rookie keeper Sean Donovan.

“We just need to be very sharp on the ball, we need to make sure we’re moving it quickly,” Rousmaniere said. “They’re a very skilled team. We’ll have to defend for large parts of the game and we’ll have to counterattack.”

At the head of that counterattack is Akpan, who is closing in on the Harvard all-time goals record, sitting just three behind Chris Ohiri ’64.

While Akpan looks towards that achievement, he and his teammates hope to prevent the Crimson from losing back-to-back games for the first time since Sept. 2006. If the team is able to do so, it could mean a green light to the Ivy title as the NCAA tournament fast approaches.