Amidst a torrential downpour 13 years ago, Steve Abbott single kendedly propelled the University of Maine football squad to a stunning upset over the University of Rhode Island.

He was just eight.

'That was Steve's game," recalls the Maine coach, who ordered the young baliboy to make sure his squad got a dry football on every offensive down and to make sure the visiting URI squad got a wet one.

"They fumbled the ball four times, as a week, and we won a going we never should have been in," laughs the former Maine coach.

His name, by the way, is Walker Abbott.

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Thirteen years since his son stood on the sidelines as the sneaky bellboy, Walter Abbott will sit in the Stadium's stands this weekend us Steven Warren Abbott closes out a football career that began well before he dished out wet pigskins to frightening opponents.

Harvard's 111th gridiron captain, Steve Abbott was introduced to the game as a toddler, and his father--the Black Bear's head coach from 1966-1974 and the man responsible for that initial indoctrination--recalls those early days.

"Steve was with us from the time be could walk," says the elder Abbott, currently an associate professor of physical education at the University of Maine. "And as the coach, we'd have some of the players over to the house and they always spent time playing with the kids. I think Steve learned his work habits from them and I think they were great role models for him."

And few would disagree these days that the Crimson's starting tight end is a model of class.

"If you were ever going to define a captain or a leader," says junior linebacker Brent Wilkinson, "you'd look to Steve Abbott."

Harvard Coach Joe Restic adds that the soft-spoken Abbott "has handled the captaincy with a touch of class."

It came as somewhat of a surprise last fall, however, when Restic dropped Abbott's jersey at the squad's post-season luncheon--the customary way of announcing Harvard captains.

"I had never really thought about it," Abbott says these days.

In fact, it even surprised some of his teammates and most of the media.