Like all years, this year had moments. Both highs and lows. Only this year's moments operated under a strange formula. The lower the moment, the greater the attention.

Witness the Columbia football team. For each game, the Lions invented new ways to lose. (Unfortunately, Columbia didn't copyright its playbook, 101 Ways to Fumble and Bumble Your Way to Sports Infamy, and now the Baltimore Orioles are stealing passages from it right and left.)

This year, the Lions got more attention than any other team in the Ivy League. Sports Illustrated, the New York Times, the Washington Post and two dozen other prestigious journals all sent reporters to chart the plight of the Lions.

Columbia broke the Division I record for most consecutive losses--it was 34 before last season, now it's 41 and counting--and earned lasting glory.

Harvard won the Ivy League championship. Did anyone notice?

Crimson football success was matched by Crimson soccer success and Crimson swimming success and Crimson lacrosse success. Ivy League titles were as common in Cambridge as street-corner guitar players.

Columbia got the press. Harvard got success.

What follows is a blow-by-blow account of Harvard's athletic year:

September 19, 1987: The Harvard football team gets off on the right foot. The Columbia football team tries to get off on the right foot, but puts its left foot forward instead, trips and falls flat on its face. Harvard triumphs, 35-0, sending Columbia to its 32nd straight loss--two shy of the NCAA Division I collegiate record.

The Crimson writes, "The Columbia Lions, the team that never wins from the city that never sleeps, inched one game closer to collegiate football immortality this weekend."

Harvard quarterback Tom Yohe (two touchdown passes) and running back Dave Bunning (80 yards rushing) help give the Crimson its ninth straight opening-day victory.

The Harvard soccer teams get the better of Columbia, too. The men sneak by, 3-2, and the women blank the Lions, 3-0.

September 23, 1987: The men's soccer team (2-0-1) goes scoreless, but so does the University of Connecticut and the game finishes, 0-0.

The women's squad is more potent. The Crimson gets all the offense it needs with 29 minutes gone in the first half. Freshman Christin Biggs gets her own rebound and tips it into the net to give Harvard a 1-0 victory over New Hampshire.

September 26, 1987: The Harvard football team takes on Northeastern and its fabled Wishbone offense. The Crimson (2-0) picks the 'bone clean. Yohe (265 yards passing, the eighth best day in Crimson quarterback history) again leads the attack.