The numbers don't reveal the true importance of Greg Olson to the Harvard hockey team.

Yes, as a freshman he led the Crimson with 16 goals and shared the team's Most Valuable Player trophy with Mark Fusco.

Yes, as a sophomore he turned on the red light 18 times and had 14 points, both team highs.

Yes, as a junior he had 15 goals (second on the squad) and 24 asists (also second), and scored 20 points in the last seven regular season games when Harvard put together a drive to the playoffs.

Yes, he led the team in power play goals last season and in shorthanded goals in each of the last two. Yes, he was second on the team in scoring up to the Princeton game. And yes, he was the only Harvard player to have notched a point in every game up to that same Princeton game.

Yes, yes, and yes But the true importance of Greg Olson. Harvard's 85th captain, was something more.

"He kills penalties as well as anyone," says Harvard Coach Bill Cleary. "He puts the puck in the net He comes back and play defense. But it's those little intangibles, that little bit of spunk, that made Greg Olson special.

"He can set a team on fire. He gets knocked down, he gets up, he gets knocked down again, he gets up and gets a shot off. The other players got inspired just by watching him.

"You don't run into kids like him every day. He's got that fiery competitive instinct. Any coach would like to have Greg Olson."

Right now, Cleary is the one who would like to have him For in the above-mentioned Princeton game, on December 18, Greg Olson got knocked down. And this time he didn't get back up.

It was midway through the third period, and Harvard had a comfortable lead on its way a 9-2 win. Olson was forechecking at the Princeton blueline.

"One of their defensemen had the puck," the senior right wing says, "I was going at him and he passed it up the boards I was starting to turn when some guy pushed me from behind.

"It was nothing dirty or anything, but I think my skate caught and twisted."

Olson slammed into the boards went down to the ice and came up limping to the bench. "My ankle hurt like hell," he says "I thought I'd sprained it."

He should have been so lucky. By the time he got his skate off. Olson realized the pain was above the ankle "I just said "It's broken "I knew it was broken."