PORTLAND, ME.--The Harvard linksmen were bunched in the pack but still within striking distance of front-running UConn after the first round of the NCAA New England Division I tournament held here yesterday at the Portland Country Club, straddling the waters of Casco Bay.

The Crimson fired a team total of 321 to hover in 6th place, 13 strokes behind UConn and a single shot behind Providence. UMass was second at the halfway mark with a 310 aggregate. The winning quintet qualifies for the NCAAs later this month at the Wake Forest University Course.

Co-captain Jim Dales led the linksters by carding a 7-over par 78 on the 6488-yd. Robert Trent Jones-designed layout.

Carroll Lowenstein posted an 80, followed by Chip Raffi at 81 and Ron Himelman at 82. The fifth score, which is dropped from the team total was an 83 cranked out by Glenn Alexander.

The individual leaders after the first 18 were Dartmouth's sweet-swinging number one man Joe "Ugly" Henley and UConn's John Collich, who blazed in tied at 72. Dartmouth's number two man, bon vivant Gordie Daisley, missed the tourney after punching his hand through a window in a fraternity frazzle.

Dales appeared headed for a jubilee round when he played the first seven holes at even par. Then he came to the 380-yd. eighth hole and shot an eight when he manhandled his six-iron approach over the green and into a gulley.

After making bogeys on nine, 11 and 12, he bagged a birdie on 13. He had another bonafide chance at a birdie on the par three 17th when he hit a ripcord three-iron through the wind, ten feet from the pin. Dales then three-putted for a bogey and remarked afterwards. I couldn't even talk. I was so mad."

Lowenstein got off to a fast start, moving through the first seven holes in one-over. He faltered on the backside when he lost five strokes to par in the densely wooded four-hole stretch from 13 through 17.

After playing the first five holes without any untoward incident. Raffi took a triple-bogey six on the par three 6th. The Winchester native, clad in canary yellow from head to toe, crushed his six-iron from the tee, but it hit the embankment just short of the green and rolled back into Casco Bay. He played his lost ball shot from the ladies' tee and this time banked a nine-iron over the green.

Raffi also found misfortune on the same par three 17th that plagued Dales and Lowenstein. He hit a fat three-iron from the tee that kerplopped into a bunker, and then he bladed his sand wedge shot over the green. After taking a double bogey there, however, he came back to birdie the par five 18th for his 81.

Alexander was the victim of a freakish incident on the ninth hole. His seven-iron to the green flew long, landed on a cart path, and then bounced over the clubhouse roof in one gigantic hop. He located the ball in the course parking lot next to the Dartmouth team mobile trailer. After taking a drop. Alexander wanted to play a pitch-and-run to the green but his approach was blocked by the UMass team van. He therefore executed a perfect comme-il-faut wedge shot that landed on the putting surface. Alas, he missed his put for par.