It's not too often that the Fighting Irish of Notre Dame deign to send any of their teams to play Harvard. But it was just such a show-down that drew a season-high 40 fans to Blodgett Pool last night, as the Crimson water polo team dumped the vaunted men from South Bend, 21-9

Actually, most of the Crimson aquamen were hoping for a change from the usual pattern of lopsided decisions. But their own offensive fireworks in the first quarter put that out of the question.

The Irish defense diligently cut off the angles on most outside shots. But Harvard repeatedly worked the ball to the area in front of the goal, and Notre Dame goalie Chris Packer was ineffective, recording no saves in the period. Four goals in 90 seconds, including two by Co-Captain Dave Fast, broke the game open midway through the quarter.

At the other end of the pool, it took nearly half the game for Notre Dame to set up its attack close enough to the Harvard goal to give netminder Brian Graham trouble. When the Irish finally started asserting themselves in the second quarter, their offense proved to be a two-man show of Mike Roberts (four assists) and Steve Blaha (five goals).

Get Out

Eventually, the Indianans resorted to a wide-open, rough style of play, which resulted in Roberts's ejection from the game and enabled the Crimson to reach the 20 goal mark for the first time this year. Eight Harvard aquamen made the scoring sheet, with freshman Mike Rogers pumping in five goals and Fasi and Steve Munatones notching five assists each.

Notre Dame, on a quick four-game trip through the Boston area, saw its record drop to 7-4, while Harvard rose to 12-4. This weekend will be the aquamen's final appearance at Blodgett, as they host an Ivy invitational--not a championship, since only half the league (Brown, Yale, Princeton, and Harvard) will play, along with MIT, a frequent rival of the other schools.

THE NOTEBOOK Notre Dame's Roberts, who most of the Crimson called the roughest Irish player, is the brother of Harvard aquamen Courtney Roberts, who recently switched from polo to swimming.

The most recent polls have Harvard ranked tenth in the East (the entire U.S. outside of California), with Loyola of Chicago and Brown as the top two.. David Chao has a sore left shoulder and is questionable for this weekend.