When it came down to the final card, and Army's surging track team seemed to hold an unbeatable hand. Harvard coach Bill McCurdy found an ace that he didn't know he had, and used it to nip the Cadets, 48-45, for the Crimson's second consecutive Heptagonal title Saturday at Cornell's Barton Hall.

As had been expected, and as Harvard had feared, the meet went down to the final event-the one-mile relay, with the Crimson holding a tenuous 44-10 lead McCurdy had said before the meet that the Harvard entry would be lucky to place fifth in that relay.

With the pole vault results still out, and Army assured of at least two points there, the Crimson needed to place second in the one-mile relay to tie the meet, if the Cadets won the relay. Or if Princeton won, Harvard had to nip the Cadets in the relay to win the meet. It didn't seem likely.

But Harvard stayed near the leaders, Army and Princeton, throughout the first three legs, and although Tiger anchorman Fred Schnure brought Princeton come first in 3:19.0. Crimson senior Tom Downer edged the Cadet anchorman for second, and the four points Harvard needed to win.

Despite the closeness of the meet, Harvard had never trailed after Downer and junior John Gillis placed second and fourth in the 600 to thrust the Crimson ahead of Dartmouth, 16-15 after four events.

On Friday, senior Skip Hare had come within an inch of his best career effort while capturing the long jump with a 24??? performance and classmate Bob Galliers had placed fifth.

Junior Ed Nosal who had been one of Harvard's top hopes in the weight-throw, placed a disappointing third behind Dartmouth's Bob Dineen and Dewitt Davies, and the Crimson suffered a shutout in the shot, an event it had dominated for the past three years.

On Saturday, however, the anticipated points began rolling in Captain Keith Colburn, the defending champion in the 1000, won the event again. this time by 20 yards in a time of 2:10.9. Roy Shaw, another of last year's titlists. retained the mile championship in 4:09.1. and teammate John Heyhurn took fifth.

The dash. as had been expected left Harvard pointless as Princeton's Heim Stevenson established a new Heptagonal mark of 6.0, and Army runners placed second and fourth.

But Harvard's Dave Pottetti kept the two-mile crown at Cambridge for the fourth consecutive year in 8:56.0, and sophomore Mi Koerner picked up fifth. And when Walter Johnson came in third behind Yale's Kwaku-Ohene Frempong, things were looking better.

Army's bid had been weakened by shutouts in the long jump, shot put and two-mile run, and even though Cadets Bruce Olson and Gary Steele placed 1-4 in the high jump, with Harvard's Ed Baskauskas fifth, it took an Army victory in the two-mile relay over Harvard to bring them within threatening distance.