"We were down by one goal going into the third," Dooley recalls "I had been outside the locker room thinking that I should tell them that no matter what happened, it had been a great season. After all, I expected to walk in the room and find a really upset group."

Dooley was correct on most counts, except he wasn't counting on Palmer. "I walked in there and there was Vicki doing a handstand I couldn't believe it. If I didn't know it before. I knew it then women's athletics was different from men's If that had been a men's team, everyone would've been banging down the walls and had fire coming out of their nostrils."

"And there's Vicki, doing a handstand in the middle of the locker room I lost it when I saw that. I had to walk out side and regain my composure," Dooley concludes.

To Palmer, that "embarrassing moment" was her way of "doing her own thing."

Six days after that now infamous handstand, Palmer joined Lightfoot as the squad's Co-Captain. That, she says, is one of her greatest memories of Harvard women's hockey.

"I was so lucky to get it," she explains. "I was so thrilled, I could hardly believe it."

A four-year star on the Crimson team, the Wellesley native says she has really cherished her present role and the memories she will take from her senior year.

"Winning has made everyone feel a lot better" she says. "It's certainly made us feel better about ourselves and made us believe in ourselves, it's really made all those years worth it."

And as a second liner on those early Crimson squads, Palmer clearly remembers those early days. "We had just moved into the new rink, had gotten all kinds of new equipment and really looked like a team. The only problem was that we still weren't very good. We were last in the Ivies, last in the Beanpot, last in everything."

In her junior year she emerged as the team's top skater and led the team in assists And then came this year.

"Vicki has improved so tremendously this year." Dooley says. "She has been such a key performer, especially in our big wins The key to those wins has been out relentless forechecking And for forechecking, you need great skating Vicki really offers us that."

Palmer, who during her freshman year scored the squad's first goal ever in Bright Center, attributes her improvement to her aggressive style. "I just try to be as aggressive as I can," she says. "If I skater as fast as I can, hopefully I'll get the puck first"

And when Palmer lines up across from Princeton today, she'll get her last chance for that elusive first win over the Tigers. "I wish I could say it was just another game I keep telling myself it is, but then I realize it's really not."

Funny thing is, that's what Alex Lightfoot said, too.