Saturday the Harvard baseball team trounced Yale, 18-6 and 24-9. But though the Crimson dropped one of two games with Brown yesterday, the day proved even more productive.

Because while the Crimson fought to a draw with the visiting Bruins, the Elis did their Cambridge buddies a favor by sweeping league-leading and previously unbeaten Dartmouth.

The losses drop the Big Green to 6-2-0 in the Eastern Intercollegiate Baseball League, just a few percentage points ahead of the 8-3-1 Crimson. Yale is now 9-5 and Brown carries a 7-6-1 mark into a doubleheader at Dartmouth today.

If a few breaks had broken differently yesterday, the batmen could have earned themselves a share of first place. Harvard took the nightcap, 6-4, but four Harvard errors brought about four unearned Brown runs in the opener and the Bruins won, 4-1.

Harvard's Bill Doyle allowed only five bits, but two of them came at an unfortunate time. In the first inning, Bruin Steve Doyle reached base on an error by second baseman Gaylord Lyman, Ryne Johnson and Mike Sweeny then stroked back-to-back singles to drive him in. With two outs, Doyle walked three straight Bruins, and two more Brown runners strolled across the plate. Those would be Doyle's only walks, as the senior regained his control and gave up just three hits the rest of the way.

But the three first-inning tallies were enough for Bruin pitcher Chuck McGrath, who held the Crimson to five hits. Only Vinnie Martelli and Don Allard had McGrath's number. Martelli's leadoff homer in the second produced Harvard's only run, and Allard drove a long single to the right field fence in the seventh.

Allard and Martelli continued their success in the nightcap, as each one smashed a homer off loser Torn Heckard. Allard's blast was his 20th career round trip, a new school record.

"That was game as soon as I hit it," Allard said after the game. "When the wind's going out and you hit it like that you know it's gone," he explained.

Meanwhile, Ed Farrell continued his assault on Harvard's single-season home run mark. The senior first baseman shot his eighth homer of the season. He picked up his seventh in the opener with Yale Saturday.

That game produced seven Crimson homers, two of them by designated hitter Mickey Maspons. And Maspons continued to hammer the ball in Saturday's nightcap, belting a first-inning grand slam and a sixth-inning double.

"If I can get the ball up in the air at this field," Maspons said yesterday. "I've got a chance to hit it out."

On a day like Saturday, even a pop up posed a threat. Gusty winds swept infield flies to the outfield grass and routine fly balls had a habit of clearing the outfield fences. The winds certainly helped get Maspons his four-for-eight, nine-RBI day.

But the winds also blew when the Elis stepped up to the plate, and they tallied just two fence-clearing fly balls. Crimson hurlers Greg Brown and Jeff Musselman generally succeeded in keeping their pitches low enough to produce mostly ground balls. And few teams have the power of the 1983 Harvard baseball squad.

"It gives you that big inning." Crimson Coach Alex Nahigian said of his contingent's awesome power. "It gives you that jump."

Harvard got that jump in both of Saturday's games--a four-run, two-homer first inning in the opener and a five-run, two-homer first in the nightcap. Yesterday's runs came much later Charlie Marchese, who threw a four-hitter in the second game, took only a 1-0 advantage into the top of the fourth, and Martelli's solo homer in the first game came after Brown had established a three-run lead.