The beat goes on. It may go slowly or unevenly at times, but it goes. Yesterday at the Business School Field. New England's number one lacrosse team--Harvard (check Tuesday's Globe if you don't believe me)--beat its opponent into the ground for the seventh time in its latest seven outings. The victim was a surprisingly tough UNH squad, and the score was a misleading 11-6--misleading because it was closer than that.
Only after Crimson marksmen Mike Faught and Mike Ward exploded for four unanswered goals in the last 16 minutes of play did the laxemen gain full control over the frisky Wildcats. Whereas coach Bob Scalise's well-conditioned troops may have made a habit of scooping up ground balls at twice the right of their foes all season, they edged out UNH by only 41-37 in that department yesterday.
"We didn't really have our sticks today," steady senior midfielder Bill Forbush, who provided key assists on Ward's late goals, said afterwards.
Harvard was also without the services of starting midfielders Peter Predun, who will be lost for the season with his broken thumb, and Gordie Nelson, who missed the action with bruised ribs but will return for Saturday's pivotal clash with Princeton. Standout defenseman Scott Pink also missed most of the game--he played only in man-down situations--with his pulled hamstring, but he too will be ready for the weekend's festivities in New Jersey.
Faught, recently named Ivy player of the week for his four-goal effort against Yale, matched that performance by scoring two critical goals late in the first half as prelude to his pair of fourth-quarter tallies. With three and a half minutes left in the half and the Crimson holding a man advantage, the Harvard single-season goal scoring record holder broke a 5-5 tie by taking a feed from assist factory Norman Forbush and blowing it by Wildcat goalie Peter Sheehan. A few minutes later, Faught cranked one again.
With just seconds to go in the half, Crimson goalie Kennedy First stoopped a UNH shot and quickly fired the ball to streaking middie Jamie Egasti. Egasti hit Dave Wigglesworth, who in turn whipped it ahead to Norm Forbush, who again flipped it to Faught, and the rest was history. "That was the goal of the game," a delighted Egasti noted afterwards.
The Wildcats came back again in the third period, however, moving within one on Jay Leech's fastbreak goal with four minutes gone in the half. Crisis point came a few minutes later when some unfriendly referees left the Crimson two men down. The Harvard defense held, however, creating a turning point and setting the stage for the late Crimson assault.
The incident typified Harvard's intimidating, quick-checking defensive play. Haywood Miller was particularly effective in shutting down the Wildcats' lone offensive superstar, John Fay. Fay scored only once all afternoon, and that tally came midway through the second period with Miller sitting in the penalty box for slashing.
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