Tradition, some say, runs thick at Harvard. The men's squash team reaffirmed a tradition yesterday that is showing signs of becoming hoary from age by defeating Yale for the 20th consecutive year, this time with an 8-1 thrashing at Hemenway.

The victory over the Elis virtually assures the Crimson squad a second place national finish in nine-man squash team competition.

Despite the implications of the lopsided score, Yale brought a team that was considered their finest in years. And though the Crimson expected a number of matches to turn out as "gimmes" for the Bulldogs, the scoreboard registered H's for each racquetmen win as rapidly as the NBC toteboard lit up with Reagan's state victories on election night.

In the first slot, Brad Desaulniers pulled off the most impressive victory of his freshman season by upsetting Victor Wagner in four games. Wagner, whom Crimson coach Dave Fish considered likely to defeat Desaulniers and who last year ranked as one of the nation's finest players, played a steady and often masterful match and captured the first game, 15-12.

Desaulniers, however, proved a study in momentum as he upended Wagner in the second game and continually raised the level of his play in the succeeding games to hold off his opponent and take the last three frames 15-8, 15-8, and 15-10.

Another Crimson surprise took form in the fifth position as Clark Bain edged Eli Alex Stahl, who was also heavily favored in four rough-and-tumble games, culminating the win in a final-game, 18-16 tie-breaker victory.

The afternoon's requisite visceral thriller pitted number-six man Charlie Duffy against Scott "Fur-head" Schumann. After splitting the first four games with the Eli, Duffy found himself down 14-11 in the final frame. "That's when I started getting a little scared," Duffy said afterwards. "When I got to 14-14 and the three-point tie-breaker, I knew I could handle him."

The players were locked at two apiece when, after a questionable let call by Schumann, Duffy emerged victorious as he nailed a perfect nick off the back wall, sending the ball rolling quietly across the floor.

The lone Harvard loss of the afternoon came at the hands of Yale's Jim McBurney, who subdued Geordie Lemmon in five see-sawing games.

And in the aftermath, with a Harvard streak older than half of the current undergraduates still intact, Dave Fish said about the historical importance of the victory, that "Some of the guys mentioned that before the match, and I said I thought that was the most irrelevant thing I'd ever heard. But it is kind of nice. It was just a helluva win."