"It was an uninspired effort," said Harvard women's field hockey captain Lucy Wood, following the stickwomen's fourth tie in as many Ivy outings, a 0-0 "thriller" (please detect that ting of sarcasm) with Brown in lovely Providence (now you know for sure I'm being sarcastic!)

Frustration.

"We couldn't break Brown's man-to-man coverage of our forwards," commented third year mentor Debi Field. "But we thoroughly outplayed Brown, and deserved to win; in fact, all our ties this season were games we should have won."

Frustration.

"I almost fell asleep because nothing ever came to me," cracked Harvard goalie Ellen Seidler, who handled five shots with aplomb in adding yet another shutout to her All-New England ledger. "It was disappointing and disconcerting because we are a better team than Brown." she added.

Frustration.

"Ties burn me up--I don't think we were taking chances," Wood wailed.

"We were reacting to Brown's play rather than anticipating. A couple of people tried to spark the club here and there, but on the whole, we looked like we were moving in slow motion," lamented Lucy.

Frustration.

Harvard managed only 14 shots on a goal against a Brown (now 2-4-2) unit built on the 'best offense is a good defense' theory. Only five of the Crimson missiles found the general vicinity of the twines, and, c'est la vie, all were repelled successfully.

Frustration.

Brown rarely penetrated the midfield stripe and received no penalty corners in the clash. As far as post-season tournament rankings are concerned, Harvard will be credited with a triumph on the basis of piling up more penetration time over the course of the affair.

Determination.

"We have to get our act together and prove to ourselves that we can win," goalie Seidler, discontented with the tie-syndrome that has (pardon the pun) the squad in knots, said yesterday.

Motivation.

"The team was definitely flat going into the game," bemoaned coach Field. "Our confidence is down--frankly, our next two contests are crucial," she added.

Anticipation.

Harvard takes on Ivy arch-rival Yale in New Haven on Wednesday (face-off time 2 p.m.) before hosting Penn next weekend. "We're executing very well," adds Field, "but we have to give 200 per cent in order to beat a quick, tough Yale team."

Deliverance.

"We have to get mad--I mean really, really psyched in order to break out of this," captain Wood asserted. "It's a matter of not talking about it anymore--we just have to do it."

Enough said.