Last year, the Harvard baseball team batted .317 and finished with the fifth best mark in the nation.

Midway into the 1993 season, the Crimson's average has dropped by an astounding 82 points, to .235. This weekend, the top four spots in the Crimson's batting order went 17-for-47 (.362) but the rest of the line-up hit a measly 12-for-54 (.222).

Juniors Mike Giardi (22-for-57, .386) and Dave Morgan (22-for-64, .344) are the only players who are anywhere near the .300 barrier, while last year's team featured seven starting players who hit better than .300.

This lack of production, however, hasn't changed things much.

Last year's team was 9-10 overall through 19 games, 5-3 in league play, while this year's team is 8-11 overall with the same 5-3 mark in the Ivies.

Where the offense has let the Crimson down, the pitching has team up. Senior Ray Desrocher has lowered his ERA by over four runs per game, from 7.69 in 1992 to 3.29 this year.

The pitching staff has also received first-rate performances from the ambidextrous sophomore Jamie Irving (3-2, 3.72 ERA, a team-high 24 K's and 36 innings pitched, and a 2-0 Ivy League record) and from sophomore reliever Mike Cicero (2-0 Ivy and 2-0 overall with a 3.33 ERA).

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Key Weekend Games: Harvard has completed its play against the Lou Gehrig (southern) division and now must face Yale, Brown, and Dartmouth four times each the rest of the way. The Bulldogs (15-3, 6-0 Ivy) lead the Red Rolfe (northern) division by two games over Harvard and Dartmouth (9-6, 4-2 Ivy) and 4.5 games over Brown (3-12, 1-4 Ivy).

Last year at this point, Harvard was one game behind Yale, having split its two games with the Elis. The four games against Yale this Saturday and Sunday should be the key to deciding Harvard's fate for the remainder of the season.

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Opposition Theft Up: It seems like the word has been spread around the Ivy League to run on Harvard. Opponents are stealing bases at an 86.1 percent rate (31-for-36), while the Crimson is only 12-for-22, a 54.5 per-cent success rate.

Princeton's game-winning hit against Harvard on Sunday scored two men who had swiped second and third.

If senior catcher Phil Andriola and the pitching staff can cut down on the stolen bases, the team ERA should go down.

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