On October 18, 1986 in Hanover, N.H., Harvard defeated Dartmouth, 42-26.

In the race for the Ivy League championship, the game was unimportant. That year, Harvard finished fifth and Dartmouth fourth.

But for Harvard quarterback Tom Yohe, the game was momentous. Against Dartmouth, Yohe got his first varsity start.

Today Yohe has thrown for more yards than any Harvard quaterback.

"You could see Yohe's capability and what he started to do," Harvard Coach Joe Restic says. "He became very aggressive that game. He ran the option well. He controlled that game for us."

The stats show that Yohe did not have a tremendous passing afternoon. He threw for just 106 yards and a touchdown. But he also ran for 120 yards and two TDs.

"It was important just getting into a game and getting a chance to show the coaching staff and the rest of Harvard how I could play and prove myself," Yohe says.

The Dartmouth game made it clear that Harvard had a quarterback who could run and throw and put points on the scoreboard.

Yohe started four more games for the Crimson, including The Game against Yale. Harvard beat the Elis, 24-17; Yohe threw for a pair of TDs.

Yohe appeared in seven games as a sophomore, throwing five touchdowns. By the beginning of the 1987 season, he was a veteran.

"The fact that he had a half year's work as a sophomore was very, very critical," Restic says. "That doesn't happen to too many people, not in our system. But he did get the experience and built on it, and last year he just got it done."

Last year Yohe and Harvard had the kind of fairytale season that only happens in football-hero novels. Expected to finish in the second-division, Harvard posted a 6-1 record (8-2 overall), including a title-clinching victory in The Game.

Last year, Yohe rewrote the Harvard record book, signing his name to just about every career passing mark.

Yohe completed a whopping 158 passes for a single-season record 2134 yards. He threw for a record 17 TDs. Yohe is the owner of the Harvard career records for passing attempts (423), completion (203) and yardage (2730).

There is just one major record which has eluded him. His career total of 22 TD passes is just one shy of Larry Brown's 23, set in 1978. Look for Brown's mark to fall sometime during the first half of tomorrow's game against Columbia.