Harvard To Host Struggling Tigers

The Harvard football team (4-1, 2-0 Ivy) will look to extend its current four game win streak tomorrow against Ivy rival Princeton (1-4, 1-1) as the teams face off at Harvard Stadium.

After dropping the first game of its season to Holy Cross, the Crimson have bounced back strongly and have won every game since, including conference wins over Cornell and Brown.

A large part of Harvard’s early season success can be attributed to junior quarterback Colton Chapple.

Chapple started the season as the backup to senior Collier Winters, but after Winters was unable to play due to a hamstring injury, the junior quarterback was given the starting nod, and has shown no intention of relinquishing his job anytime soon.

“With every successful outing your confidence grows, but the key is not to get too high or too low at the quarterback position,” Chapple said. “You are never as bad as you think you are and you are never as good as you think you are.”

In week four against Cornell, Chapple threw for over 400 yards, and last week against Bucknell, the Crimson quarterback tied a school record with five touchdown passes in the game.

While the offense has proven strong in the early stages of the season, the Harvard defense has not been overshadowed.

Last week against the Bison, the defense had a very impressive showing, dismantling the Bucknell offense.  The Crimson defense created five turnovers, and held the Bison to minus five rushing yards.

A large part of the defensive success can be attributed to captain Alex Gedeon, who had 11 tackles and 2.5 sacks against Bucknell.

“Our motto on defense is that we want to keep it simple and we want to play fast and play physical,” Gedeon said.

Harvard seems to have it hit its stride—not a good sign for tomorrow’s opponent, Princeton. The Tigers have not started their season off with the same gusto as the Crimson.

Princeton is coming off a 34-0 routing at the hands of Brown—a team that Harvard soundly defeated earlier in the season.

The Tigers will come into the game with their backs against the wall, and if they want any chance to win they will have to play their best game of the season thus far.

Last week against Brown, the Tigers were outplayed on both sides of the field, earning just half as many yards as their opponent.

“I think the keys to this game are going to be how physical we play and executing our defense,” Gedeon said.

Although Princeton might have a bleak record so far this season, the Crimson will not take them lightly.

“To some extent you can throw out those numbers because they will be excited to play,” Harvard coach Tim Murphy said. “Harvard is a huge game on their schedule for them and it will be a more challenging game than people on the surface might think it will be.”

Despite their loss to Brown, Princeton opened conference play with a win over Columbia, which keeps it in the Ivy mix.

“Princeton is a good team,” Chapple said. “With one league [win] they are back in the race, so by no means are we going to take this game lightly. It is a big rivalry for us and we are excited to play Princeton and hopefully we can get it done on Saturday.”

On the Crimson side some key players to watch will be Gedeon, Chapple, and offensive tackle Will Whitman.

This week Whitman was named to the Jerry Rice Award Watch List, an accolade that recognizes distinguished freshman in subdivision football.

For Princeton, key players include freshman running back Chuck Dibilio, who has shown promise early in this season and rushed for 78 yards against Brown last week.

On the Tigers’ defense, junior Caraun Reid has been a consistently strong presence on the field this season with 31 tackles and three sacks.

“In our league a lot of [games are] like the playoffs,” Murphy said. “We feel like we are in a playoff game and we know this might not be the number one team on our schedule, but they are a very capable, tough team.”