Harvard still plays basketball four flights up the stairs of the Indoor Athletic Building (IAB). The freshman rule still prevents freshmen from playing on the varsity team, and coaches still cannot leave the campus to recruit players. No enticing offers of a new Porsche attract 7-ft. basketball wizards to Harvard.

But despite all the disadvantages and restrictions of the Harvard program, basketball is undergoing a transformation. A new spirit of optimism and a confidence lacking the past few seasons now pervades the IAB. The laid-back, low-key days of Harvard basketball seem to have made their exit, and an aggressive, spirited program has moved into its place.

The coaching staff of Satch Sanders, Mike Jarvis, and Buddy O'Neil is gone. With them went the days of four-hour, lackadaisical practices and a Harvard style of play that often resembled sleep walking.

The new Harvard coach Frank McLaughlin has revitalized Harvard's basketball program. McLaughlin brings with him a spirit that the IAB has lacked for some time now. Satch, an ex-Boston Celtic, was a great player and a knowledgable coach, but he was quiet, low-key, and just the wrong man for Harvard. The Crimson program needs someone to pick it up off the floor and kick it back into shape. It needs an active, aggressive leader. McLaughlin can be that type of leader and he has wasted no time starting.

"There's nothing phony or hypocritical about being a rah-rah," says the spirited coach. "People try to knock the Harvard image, and if they can do that through the basketball program, they will. But we're not gonna give them the chance, because there'll be nothing in this program to knock."

His strong words come across as slightly over-optimistic to many who have lived with the struggling Harvard program for the past few years, but those words are not idle verbalizations; McLaughlin backs them up with action.

McLaughlin has cut back to two hours the four-hour practices that Satch ran by eliminating time-wasting during practice.

"Practices are shorter, but they are more intense," says co-captain Steve Irion. "We get a lot more done now because there's no standing around. We used to come out and practice a little, then take a break, and it dragged out for hours. But now we just work continuously, and we really work hard."

McLaughlin comes here after a successful, seven-year association with Digger Phelps. First at Fordham and then at Notre Dame, McLaughlin assisted Phelps with the coaching chores. His post at Harvard marks McLaughlin's debut as a head coach. But the new situation does not intimidate McLaughlin, who has approached his formidable task with great enthusiasm.

"It's a big challenge, but I have accepted and I think the players have accepted," says Harvard's 14th head basketball coach. 'Everyone wants to win and everyone is giving 100 per cent every day because we want to represent Harvard in the best way."

But McLaughlin faces his biggest challenge in obtaining support for his program. The players are behind him and so is the Athletic Department, but the fans are another story. Severe attendance problems have plagued Harvard basketball in recent years. Often the stands were occupied almost entirely by players' families and friends. McLaughlin feels student support is crucial for the program to work.

"If we get the student support, we'll have a good team," he says, "but it starts now and the fans have to help us out. They can't wait 'til we win and then jump on the bandwagon.

"The first thing that other college coaches say when they're recruiting is that no one cares about basketball at Harvard. They tell the high school athletes that no one watches the games," explains the 1969 Fordham graduate and Ram basketball star. "Then the high school kids come here and see 40 or 50 people at the game and they get really turned off to the program.

"But if we have good support, then they'll come and even if we lose, they'll say, 'Okay, they lost, but look at all the support and attention the team gets.' The program suddenly becomes attractive."

McLaughlin believes that Harvard can overcome the obstacles that make successful basketball difficult here.