Since 1947 no Harvard basketball team has finished in the first division of the Ivy League, but this tradition of frustration will be broken if the Crimson quintet can whip Cornell and Columbia this week-end.

Although Harvard should not have much trouble handling Columbia tomorrow, the contest at Ithaca tonight should be a lulu. When Cornell invaded the IAB last month, they rallied in the last three minutes of play to salvage an 80-77 victory.

Cornell, 6-3 in he League and 12-7 overall, has been tough all season, largely because of its depth. The Big Red's leading scorer is 6-7 sophomore center Steve Cram with a paltry 11.8 average, but eight other members of the squad are averaging seven points a game or better. And the Big Red is Big-six of their players stand 6-5 or better.

Against Columbia last month the Crimson turned in 20 minutes of brilliant basketball to win, 85 to 71. Currently tied for fifth place with Harvard, Columbia has a team centered around 6-1 Neil Farber, fourth leading scorer among the Ivies. Farber doesn't have much of a team behind him, however, and Columbia should provide easy going for the Crimson compared with tonight's game.

Since its shocking upset over Princeton, the Harvard quintet has gone straight downhill into the second division of the Ivy League. Merle McClung has continued to play well, but the rest of the squad has been sporadic at best. Even in the department where the team has been superb all season-rebounding-the Crimson has been disgraced recently.

Although the quintet is two games behind Cornell in the Ivy standings, a sweep of this weekend's contests would virtually guarantee Harvard a first division berth. The Big Red plays at Penn and Princeton next weekend and should lose both of those games; combined with a loss tonight, that would give them an 8-6 final Ivy record. Harvard has lost 3-6 final Ivy record.