On almost any other day, it would have been a rout.

The Harvard women's field hockey team thoroughly dominated Northeastern in almost every aspect of their showdown yesterday at Soldiers Field. The Crimson stickwomen consistently controlled the ball, stifled the NU offensive attack, and outshot the Huskies by a 3-1 margin.

But in the only statistic that really matters, Harvard came out on the short end of a 1-0 score.

"On the field and on paper we were a better team than Northeastern, " said Couch Edie Mabrey. "I think se played very well."

Just not well enough to win.

Harvard controlled the action early on, keeping the ball in Northeastern territory for virtually all of the first half. The Crimson tested Husky goaltender Sharon Spittle only five times in the half, however, and the NU senior easily turned away each Harvard that.

In fact, Harvard never seriously threatened on five density corners during the first stanza. Some scrappy Husky defense made sure of that, and as a result, the Crimson on down for intermission with a scoreless deadlock on the scoreboard.

Harvard came out swinging in the second half. Within three minutes the hometown stickwomen put together perhaps their most serious threat of the afternoon, but freshman Kate Felsen couldn't convert a scoring opportunity in front of an open NU not.

The Crimson pressured the Huntington Hounds relentlessly for the middle portion of the second half, capping it with an invaluable scoring opportunity when just over 12 minutes remained to play.

Bamb! Taylor fired the ball from the left point towards the Northeastern net, and with Spittle Blocked out., Eili Pew unload a stinging shot. The ball deflected off a Husky defender and onto the waiting stick of Trina Burnham, but the senior toward couldn't turn it into a Crimson tally.

But while the Cantabs had controlled much of the second half play, the Huskin simply refused to roll over and play dead. From that point on, the visitors successfully neutralized the Harvard black, but failed to generate a serious offensive challenge of their own.

That is, until Northeastern link Karen Lloyd fired a hard shot at Harvard freshman goalie Kriston Abely with just under nine minutes to play.

Abely, facing her first shot of the second half, turned away Lloyd's threat, but kicked the ball out to Husky forward Karen Davidson. Davidson look little time in depositing the ball deep into the Harvard goal.

"When it counted we just weren't there," Co-Captain Andy Mainelli said. "We needed that scoring punch, and we needed to put more pressure on the goalie."

Perhaps what hurt the Crimson most was the Northeastern ploy of shadowing Harvard's high-scoring Mainelli as well as Harvard's always powerful Taylor. "They marked our tough players," Mabrey lamented.

Mainelli concurred. "Teams sometimes do a good job of taking your key players out of the game," she said.

Now 2-2 in their early-season, non-league schedule, the Crimson stick women will fact Boston University on Friday.

But there was little doubt after yesterday's second straight loss of the season that Harvard is clearly gearing for its Ivy League schedule, which opens October 6 against Pennsylvania.

"It's a whole different game," Mainelli said.

The Crimson, who are the early season favorites to take the league crown, hope that it's a game where the team that plays the best will win.