In some college sports, December tournaments with names like "Harvard Invitational" are buzz-words for "joke."

The host school invites three hopeless teams to beat up on and manhandle for a weekend. An extended practice, a joyride before the rigors of the season set in.

This weekend, Harvard will host Worcester Polytechnic Institute, North Central Illinois State and Babson at the Harvard Invitational.

Patsies, brought in like lambs to the slaughter for the merriment of the home crowd. That's what some college programs do.

But not the Harvard women's swimming team. It has to be different.

Starting this afternoon, the dare-to-be-different Crimson hosts swimming powers Syracuse, Villanova and Indiana in a three-day meet at Blodgett Pool.

The Crimson is no slouch of a team. In fact, it's pretty damn good (Eastern Champions four of the last five years). However, this weekend's opponents are larger and perhaps stronger, according to Head Coach Maura Costin Scalise.

But that's a good thing.

"Sometimes you beat people you didn't think you could beat," Costin Scalise said. The meet is a good opportunity for Harvard to face stiff competition outside the Ivy League, she added.

"In the Ivy League, Harvard is a big fish in a little pond," she said.

Nothing except pride is at stake this weekend. (Kinda like a Patriots-Jets game.) Harvard will use this meet to size up its very young team--10 of the 24 swimmers are freshmen.

That's what early season tournaments are for, anyway: a chance to evaluate the team early in the season.

"We always gear up for a meet in December...to see what we have," Costin Scalise said.

Still, Harvard is taking the meet quite seriously. Not only is the team "shaving down"--swimmers shave their legs to gain an extra hundredth-of-a-second or two--but Costin Scalise has tapered the team's workouts to conserve her swimmers' energy.

"People are really pumped, rested, and raring to go," tri-Captain Eva Romas said.