Third seed racquetmen Brad Desaulniers, who just returned to the Crimson this semester, yesterday announced that he had decided not to play for Harvard for the rest of the year.

"I can't say at this point whether I'll play for Harvard again," Desaulniers said, "but I do plan to play as an amateur in the tournaments in the Boston area."

Sophomore Desaulniers played as top seed his freshman year (1979 1980), but decided to take a year off before the squash season began his sophomore year. Returning this semester, he gave an added boost to the lineup when it was most needed against Princeton, and made it to the quarterfinal round of singles competition at Nationals last weekend.

Teammates said yesterday that they feel Desaulniers' talents will be missed at the Intercollegiate six-man team tournament March 2 "He's a very strong player," Co-Captain John Dinneen said of his former teammate "We'll definitely miss him against Yale and at Intercollegiates, but I don't really blame him for leaving the team."

Dinneen added that Desaulniers "took a year off and came back to a much more structured team than past years, and he had a lot of trouble fitting in. He's been on his own, and it wasn't easy for him to fit on the team unit Maybe he wanted to stay on his own."

Another teammate, who asked not to be identified, said, "I think he alienated himself to some degree." He added, "We felt he was a really good player and maybe he was justified in training a little differently from the rest of the team and doing things his own way."

Harvard Coach Dave Fish said he didn't expect Desaulniers back on the squad, adding, "I think he wanted to concentrate on some of the other things he's interested in at Harvard "Fish also said, "I want him to get as much as he can here, and he felt he needed more time."

Desaulniers did mention that squash had often gotten in the way of his studies (Economics) in past years "I put my academics before squash, it's my first priority," he said.