Harvard hockey.

It's mind-boggling how after two disappointing seasons, a temporary loss of home ice and a substantial loss of student support, this sport remains the classiest, the most intense, the most invigorating of all.

You can search up and down Soldiers Field and find few athletes as smooth or gifted as George Hughes, Gene Purdy or Jack Hughes. You can attend scores of practices, and you will never find the devotion that Coach Billy Cleary seems to muster yearly. You can walk away from a Yale football game, revelling in the size of the crowd and All That Tradition, and know full well it's nothing like The Beanpot.

And amidst all this, your heart still aches because your team, Harvard hockey, has mysteriously been absent from the ECAC playoffs for the last two winters. Why must fate be so disrespectful?

The winter of 1977 found the icemen rejoicing after two flawless games against Boston College and Boston University had captured the Beanpot title for them. Then, less than a month later, a 3-2 loss in the last eight seconds to Dartmouth bumped the Crimson out of the ECAC top eight for the first time in 11 seasons.

Last year there wasn't even Beanpot hardware. Only injuries, blizzards and brawls. The Lost Weekend of February 17-18 at Penn and Princeton started the bizarre slide amidst a torturous season-ending schedule of eight games in 15 days. Harvard lost seven of those eight games, including the Watson Rink clash with Cornell, when the Big Red rang up four goals in the last ten minutes to win, 4-3.

So True

The final slate read 12-14, 13 one-goal games, no playoffs. Palm-slapping and post-goal hugging were painfully absent in this most trying of seasons.

It seems unlikely that the fiery Cleary or any of his too-oft dissapointed seniors will be denied when the 1978-79 edition of Harvard hockey faces off at Dartmouth tonight. The varsity boasts 16 returning lettermen and the largest number of freshmen on the big club since the eligibility rule of four years ago.

In addition, the super-competitive Division One of the ECAC has now entered a patrician-plebian stage, where the stronger teams get stronger and the weaker squads increase their moral victories each season.

There will be only 16 teams in Division One this season, as Penn has stuck by its controversial decision to drop hockey. Stars from the Quakers last year have flocked to other ECAC squads. Powerful Cornell picked up five, Vermont got all-Ivy forward Tom Cullity, and the Crimson rescued defenseman Graham Carter.

The Crimson seemed improved in all departments and the squad's depth is probably the best since the Randy Roth squad of 1974-75.

The Crimson look especially strong in the forward department, where freshmen David Burke, Jack Burke, Mike Watson and Scott Powers have played well enough to push several lettermen for spots on the first four lines.

While Watson, the baby-faced center from Brunswick, Me., has been the biggest surprise of training camp, David Burke could be the goal-scorer machine that the squad has yearned for the past few years. Burke averaged 32 tallies his last three seasons at Belmont Hill.

Aside from the potentially potent first line of sophomore Bobby McDonald between George Hughes and Purdy, Cleary has yet to finalize his units for tonight.

The key veterans up front aretheseniors--Hughes, Purdy and Cochrane. George enters his final year with 121 career points--eighth on the all-time Harvard scoring list. Though he has led the team in scoring for the last three years, Hughes' production has fallen off as his stature around the league has risen. With some consistent scoring help from one or two teammates, George should have his finest season ever.

Purdy, though hampered by injuries, has been the squad's most consistent winger for the last two years while his point totals have risen. Cochrane and his brutal slapshot both came into their own last season as John took a regular shift on the power play and finished third on the squad in scoring.

In addition to McDonald, sophomores Phil Evans, Tommy Musran and Rick Benson were streaky last year, but all showed signs of the goal-scoring ability that will be demanded from them this time around.

On defense the loss of Kevin O'Donaghue and Bobby Fowkes leaves a rather questionable situation. Jackie Hughes remains the All-East, pro-bound patriarch of the backlines. Steady Jim Trainor returns for his fourth season on the varsity, while newcomer Carter and letterman John Dunderdale join him to form the upperclass nucleus. The strength of the supporting cast for Jackie, though, will rely heavily on the play of freshmen Mitch Olson, a bruiser from Minnetonka, Minn., and Alan Litchfield from Scituate, Ma.

Junior John Hynes, who received a severe baptism in the varsity nets last season but still wound up with the third best goals-against average in the Ivies, was beaten out at least for the moment by freshman Wade Lau for the starting goalie berth. Lau, a high school star in St. Paul, had a strong camp and was praised by players for his ability to force shooters to commit themselves.

So it's off to Hanover to face the always pesky Woodsmen, a game which will surely be an adequate first indication of whether or not Cleary, the Hugheses and the seven freshmen might throw off the shackles of late-season lethargy and become "Harvard hockey" once more.

Bill Scheft's ECAC Predix:

Pre-Season Playoff Favorites:

1. Boston University

2. Boston College

3. Cornell

4. Providence

5. New Hampshire

6. R.P.I.

7. HARVARD

8. Yale