It was like someone butting in front of you in line.

No, it was worse than that. It was more inconsiderate.

It was like someone throwing a dead fish on you. No, it was even worse than that. And, besides, that already happened--in Cornell.

It was like someone sending you a box of candy. And, inside, you find something far from sweet...

Two weeks ago, the RPI hockey team came to Bright Center and insulted the Crimson to its face, 4-0. Harvard got burned. Harvard got skunked. Harvard got humiliated.

How bad?

"It was probably the most embarrassing loss in my four years here," Crimson forward Andy Janfaza said.

RPI beat Harvard by being brash. The Engineers were not impressed with the Crimson's 16-3 record. Or its first-place standing in the ECAC.

RPI told the Crimson, "You're not as good as you think you are, and went out and proved it. The Engineers took chances. Goalie Steve Duncan roamed far from his net to make saves and buy cotton candy for his friends in the stands. Graeme ("The Slam") Townshend played sheriff, backing Crimson players into the corner and reading them their rights.

Joe Juneau played Fred Astaire. He tapped danced through the once impenatrable Harvard defense. He brought Ginger Rogers with him...

"They took it to us two weeks ago," Harvard Associate Coach Ronn Tomassoni said. "We owe them something."

Two weeks ago, RPI was scrambling to make the playoffs. The Engineers brought their slide rules to figure out the possibilities of their withstanding a late-season surge by Dartmouth, a team going nowhere slow.

Two weeks ago, RPI made a cream puff pie and laid it right in the Crimson's face.

"We played poorly," Crimson senior Don Sweeney said, "and they beat us in our own rink."

Two years ago, Harvard delivered a similar humiliation to RPI. The Crimson put spiders in the Engineers' soup. Harvard put itching powder in RPI's jocks. Two years ago at Bright, it was Harvard 11, RPI 0.