During the Christmas vacation one basketball team traveled to the Mid-West to play two teams better than it and two teams worse. As expected, it lost to the better teams--Bradley and Washington of St. Louis--but it also lost to Denison, an inferior squad. The Crimson managed to beat only Chicago University.

The opening game of the trip was against Denison in Granville, Ohio, on December 28. The Crimson arrived a half-day late, missed a practice, and was without Jim Urdan, who was ill. Denigon, using a zone defense, took advantage of the Crimson poor shooting to win, 55 to 46. Jim Emanuelson had 17 and John Stevenson led the Crimson with 13 and 9 respectively.

The next day Harvard again ran up against a mediocre team which, used a zone, but this time its shooting from the outside was far better than the 21 percent it made at Granville. The result was a 48 to 39 victory over the Chicago squad.

Bill Hickey was high man for the travelers, hitting for 13 points. Gabler, acting captain in the absence of injured Ed Smith, was next with nine. Bob Bramhall and Stevenson had eight each.

After a one-day rest the Crimson met up with Washington University of St. Louis, currently ranked 12th in the nation. The wearers of the Myrtle and Gold showed their mettle by licking the visitors, 47 to 59.

In this game scoring was well spread out among the Crimson players, none getting more than ten points. Bramhall was tops with nine, Garry Murphy and Stevenson had eight, Dick Lienette six, and Forest Hansen five.

While the rest of the nation was out celebrating on New Year's Five, the Crimson was playing basketball, playing it, in fact, against the best team in the country--Bradley Tech. Just back from winning the Sugar Bowl Tournament, Bradley had quite a tussle with the Easterners, finally winning, 62 to 52.

Bradley was only four points ahead at the end of the first ten minutes of play, and the game was tight throughout the first half. Bradley used its second team freely, but when they were in the substitutes worked a full court press.

Dick Lionette had his best day of the trip, making six of his 20 tries from the floor, and collecting 14 points. Bramhall had ten, and Murphy eight. High scorer for the winners was all-American Gene Melchiorre with 12. In this game the Crimson played what Coach Norm Shepard called its best game of the year.

Starters in all the road games were Gabler, Murphy, Lionette, Hickey, and Hansen