PHILADELPHIA--Penn's Bruce Collins went a long way towards proving that those big, bulky track meets can be exciting when he barrelled his way through two hurdles records and a mile relay win en route to giving Penn an 84 to 79 victory over its closest rival, Navy, in Saturday's Heptagonal meet here.

The sleek Penn star led a come-from-behind attack against the outflanked Navy squadron that drydocked the Middies and gave Penn its fourth Hep title in a row.

But while the mighty Quakers were decking the Middies, the Harvard 'clads were busy re-affirming old records, engraving new ones and generally having a fine ending to an abbreviated but successful spring season. High jumper Mel Embree and long jump victor Vincent Vanderpool-Wallace paced the Crimson to 24 1/2 points and a fourth place overall behind Penn, Navy and Cornell.

"We had some pluses," a satisfied Coach Edgar Stowell said immediately after the meet. "I was particularly pleased with several performances, including the most unexpected showing of the 440 relay."

Stowell had good reason to be happy with his 440 squad. Mike Horton, Fred Nance, Alan Boyer and VPW combined for a perfect 41.7 time and snapped the old school record by .5 seconds.

The well-honed group tied for fifth with Princeton in a race in which the top three teams all broke the old Heptagonal mark. Running coach Peppy Hunt said that he was "tickled to death" with the relay's performance.

"They have had more bad luck this year--it was either dropped batons or bad passes. But they finally put it together out there today," Hunt said.

Harvard's mile relay squad shouldn't be overlooked either. The event beleaguered Butler--he had already taken a fourth after two heats of the intermediate hurdles--and tired freshman Steve Brown teamed up with quartermen Joel Peters and captain Nick Leone to hit 3:15 and take fourth in a surprisingly fast mile relay field.

Leone, smarting from a nose-out in the individual 440 finals, blazed to a 47.4 last leg, one of the fastest 440 times run in the day. Brown, who had just completed two 49-plus individual quarters, came back strong with a 48-flat split.

"The freshman had a good day, especially considering that he had just come back two weeks ago from an achilles injury," Hunt said delightedly after the festivities.

Low-Key Happiness

The big point-getters, VPW and Embree, evinced a low-key happiness concerning their winning efforts. Embree erased any doubt that his previous high of 7 ft. 1/4 in. was a fluke by jumping the same height again Saturday. At first he commented only that his victory "was hep." But Harvard's finest high jumper even later mentioned that he was "looking forward to the upcoming IC4A's and Nationals."

The modest Vanderpool-Wallace admitted that he was happy with his victory in the long jump but expressed dissatisfaction with his other performances. "I'm embarrassed," VPW said as he heard his name announced on the loudspeaker for fifth place in the triple jump. "I should have placed higher in that one."

Jay Hughes, Kevin McCafferty and Leon Sharpe notched a few tallies in the hammer throw, shot put, and long jump. Hughes's 186 ft. toss came within 18 ft. of Navy's victor, Ted Bregar, and netted the Harvard captain 3 points towards the Crimson total. McCafferty's 52 ft. 7 1/2 in. earned him fifth place in a field dominated by Cornell freshman Dave Doupe--who snapped the old shot put record by 6 inches with his 59ft. 8 3/4 in. toss.

Sharpe completed what Stowell called "a surrounding of Navy in the long jump." Three Navy runners fell between VPW's 24 ft. 8 1/2 in. and Sharpe's 22 ft. 11 1/2 in. jump.

John McCulloh's fourth place in the high jump, with a 6 ft. 8 in. leap, puts the talented freshman in solid high jump company. McCulloh, who earlied jumped 6 ft. 10 in. said he was "only one inch short from being in the national championship." He hopes to get in that inch in the upcoming IC4A's at Pittsburgh.

Unfortunately, some of the Harvard competitors' best marks won't appear in any of the 40th annual meet's box scores. Bill Okerman's strong half-mile run is a case in point.

Okerman, a miler for most of the season, ran a personal best of 1:52.5 and finished second in his half mile heat, qualifying for the finals. Although, as Hunt said after the meet "he shot his wad in that first run," and came back with only a 1:56.9 in the second race, Okerman's performance was a fine tribute to the sophomore's dedication and to the coaching staff's personal program for the runner. "Because of all that mile practice I had the stamina to finish strong in the half," Okerman said elatedly after his final race. "With my speed I couldn't stay with the pack, but when I got to the last 220, I was strong enough so that it was only a little problem to stay up front."

Miler Jeff Campbell was another victim of a strong field. Competing against a corps of tough runners, including several men who broke the old meet mile record, Campbell was only about ten seconds off Jeff Kramer's winning clocking of 4:03.5. But the freshman standout, plagued by insufficient time to work out, did manage to log a 3:08 3/4-mile time while running the mile. "He was really strong in the cross-country season, and he is going to be a comer," Hunt said.

Perhaps one of the most unfortunate contests for a Harvard runner was Ric Rojas's performance in the three mile. Rojas, whose time in the Penn Relays was ten seconds faster than Princeton winner Ron Vander Kraats's 13:40.8 in Saturday's action, led for about two miles until he succumbed to a recent sickness. Hunt explained after Rojas's race that Ric picked up the bug on Thursday and "his lungs were just too congested to run well. He would have won it otherwise."

Even though the Crimson 'clads looked disappointing on paper they really weren't outclassed by Penn or Navy. The two top teams had the depth necessary to win, but few of the competitors could match the Crimson's field strength, and the Harvard runners fared well in a market glutted with recruited schoolboy 440 and 880 champions. "Overall I was really pleased," Hunt said after Leone crossed the finish line to end the mile relay and the meet. "The bovs did a hell of a job."