When the Greek general Pyrrhus knocked the Romans around way back when, he soon became a discouraged man, despite his victories.

Every time he battered his luckless foes into the ground, they gained strength from the pounding and returned to fight, stronger and more confident than ever. Pretty soon the general's string of Pyrrhic victories began to turn into a string of Pyrrhic defeats.

Metaphorically, that appears to be the fate of the Harvard cross-country team's opposition this past season. Four teams--Princeton, Penn, Dartmouth and Northeastern--outran the Crimson in meets earlier this year, but the Harriers caught up with all four in last Monday's IC4As and qualified Harvard for a slot in Monday's NCAA finals in Denton, Texas.

Spirits

"We've come back even from our losses and fought better," coach Bill McCurdy said after the IC4A win. "This year's team is incredibly spirited."

"The fact that we lost the Heptagonals helped us in the IC4As," sophomore Pete Fitzsimmons agreed. "Paradoxically, the loss made us feel more relaxed and confident as a team."

It's an unusual team, and it's been an unusual season, even by Harvard standards. Laden with talent, the team has performed better than any Harvard cross-country squad for decades. Not lacking in depth, the roster boasts a host of heavies that have been running ahead of the pack all season.

No Fruit

But despite its merits, the team has not always reaped the fruit of its efforts. No matter how hard the harriers ran, it seemed the opposition was one step ahead. "We've got a really good team this year, but just the damned misfortune of running against some really great teams," coach McCurdy laments.

Indeed, due to the incredible ferocity of the opposition all of this year's meets have been close, and even when it seemed the harriers had bagged an easy match, the misguided hand of man or nature would sometimes interfere for the worse.

The opening tri-meet with Providence and UMass is a case in point. When the dust cleared, Harvard finished second. The judges then found, however, that some of the Providence and UMass runners, unfamiliar with the home Harvard course, had lost their way and run an extra half-mile.

The Providence squad, like the top national team they are, ran to a first place finish anyway, but since there was some question whether the poorly marked course had affected the UMass-Harvard outcome, the harriers had to take their lumps and the meet was declared no-contest, null, and void.

After that came the second tri-meet of the season, as Harvard tightly sandwiched between Penn and Columbia, losing to Penn, 24-34, while edging the Lions, 27-28.

Cakewalk

The next scheduled slot was Brown, which at first glance seemed to be a cakewalk, as Harvard swept the meet, finishing 1-2-3-4. But the judges thundered again, disqualifying five Crimson runners who stripped off their shirts during the downpour that marred the race, knocked the score from a comfortable 19-38 to a razor-edge 27-28.

The next disappointment came in Dartmouth. A fired-up Harvard team ran one of its hottest races, but the hilly nature of the course favored their opponent, and the Crimson suffered a painfully close 25-30 defeat.

Then the Crimson began to turn it all around. The Greater Boston Championships were officially won by Northeastern, but the meet symbolized a much-needed moral victory for Harvard. "It was a great team race," coach McCurdy said afterwards. "We finally began to pull together."

Indeed. The next meet was the Big Three, marked by a Crimson upset victory over Princeton and Yale, followed by a Harvard second-place finish behind the Tigers in the Heptagonals a week later.

And then came the IC4A win.

Now the final goal has come--the NCAA championships. "It's an unknown quantity," says coach McCurdy. "But it will be the final opportunity for us to prove ourselves."