Harvard football players hope they will be breaking the wishbone a week earlier than usual this year--not at the Thanksgiving dinner table but at the Yale Bowl.

Much of the first-place Elis' success this season has been attributed to the team's full-time use of a wishbone formation, an offensive scheme that places three running backs in the backfield.

Instead of being a big-play offense, the lineup is designed to wear out the defense by grinding out short run after run. While Yale (8-1 overall, 6-0 Ivy) throws the football more than most wishbone teams, passing is still a rarity under the Eli's bone.

"The wishbone is usually a predictable offense," Harvard Captain Greg Gicewicz said.

But predictability does not make it any easier to stop. Just ask the six Ivy squads who have fallen to the Elis this season. Given Yale's accomplishments, there is obviously some validity to the bone as an effective offensive philosophy.

Quick-footed Eli signal-caller Darin Kehler needs only 73 yards on Saturday to break the Ivy single-season rushing record by a quarterback. In addition, three Eli runners--Kehler and running backs Kevin Callahan and Chris Kouri--have totalled more than 400 yards, while Harvard rushing leader Jim Reidy, with 420 yards in six games, is the only Crimson ground-gainer over 300.

Cozz's Causes

Yale Coach Carm Cozza, an institution in New Haven who earned his 150th victory last Saturday, said he switched to the bone this year because of his team's inexperience.

"We entered the season totally inexperienced up front. With the wishbone, you don't have to hold blocks as long and blocking schemes are easier," said Cozza, who is closing out his 25th campaign at the Yale helm.

However, blocking techniques in the wishbone tend to be somewhat unorthodox.

"The lineman come out real low in their blocking schemes," Gicewicz said. "They go for your legs."

Cozza noted that another major advantage of the wishbone is that most teams have not seen it before, and therefore do not know how to defend against it.

This does not hold true for the Crimson (4-5 overall, 4-2 Ivy), which faced the bone against Army earlier this season. But if the Army game is indicative of how Harvard performs against that offense, there could be trouble in New Haven.

"Against Army in the first half, I was trying to get under the blocks and just got buried," said Gicewicz, the Crimson's starting nose guard.

True, Army is a Division One team, but in that game the Cadets tacked up 412 rushing yards and only had to pass the ball three times. The 59 points yielded by the Crimson were the most given up by Harvard football in 29 seasons.

While the Cadets' wishbone is certainly stronger than the Bulldogs', stopping the bone this weekend at the Yale Bowl is perhaps the greatest challenge the Crimson has had to face this season. It could be the difference between Yalies tearing down the goalposts, and Harvard fans stumbling away smiling.

No Bones About It

But Kouri asserted that it is Yale's team that has made the bone, rather than the bone that has made Yale's team.

"I think anything we had done this year would have worked," said the sophomore rusher, who will be playing in his first Game on Saturday. "We have a winning attitude."

Julio R. Varela contributed to the reporting of this story.