NEW YORK--"The Star-Spangled Banner" wafted through the new stadium at Baker Field to signal the beginning of the Harvard-Columbia football game Saturday afternoon. At the same time, a breeze off the Hudson River slowly ruffled the Ivy League schools' flags, arranged in a row behind the north goalpost. One by one the banners stirred, until finally all of them, and the American flag, were visible to the 10,500 people in the stands.

It looked like a real football game, a contest that would signal the coming of fall. It was even televised, and the truck with the WGBH camera on it went lumbering along the sidelines throughout. The brand-new Lawrence A. Wien Stadium at Baker Field, all white and Columbia blue, almost sparkled in the sunshine. The assembled fans did their best to appear unimpressed, but the return of football to Manhattan after a 17-month absence put a note of hope into the air.

Perhaps some of them were remembering the old days, the glory days of Columbia football. I grew up about 5 minutes from the old Baker Field, and I remember it mostly for its decrepitude and the faded glamor of the brick gates that open onto 218th St. But my father, who grew up in our house 25 years earlier, remembers a time when kids from the neighborhood used to go across the river into Manhattan and sneak around the field until they found a way to creep in. You could see some of the best teams in the country, then, and he still remembers 1947, when he was 10, and Columbia broke Army's 32-game winning streak.

So maybe that's the kind of thing the Columbia fans were thinking about as they packed the stadium--the first sellout crowd at Baker Field in 30 years--to see the Lions lose to Harvard, 35-21. But maybe it wasn't. The stadium, after all, is half-complete, with plans for the visitor's side awaiting funding. There was a heavy Harvard concentration, and the New Yorkers who made up most of the Columbia contingent went back and forth between enthusiasm and hope for what most of the speakers touted as a new era in Columbia athletics, and embarassment over the fact that their gridders were getting creamed.

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On line before the game for refreshments, which did not include beer, a Columbia fan got a little too excited: "Columbia! Football! New stadium! Wein Stadium!" His companions were not impressed. "A loss! Harvard! New stadium! Same program!"

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In the concrete stands with wooden seats that have replaced the rotting green-painted wood bleachers, a bit of New York pragmatism: "I don't care if they win--I'm looking for Columbia to beat the spread."

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Planes flew over the field periodically, and threatened to drown