Harvard's wrestling team routed Princeton and Boston College in a triangular yesterday at the Malkin Athletic Center, despite injuries and illnesses to key team members.

In the first match of the round-robin tournament, Harvard beat league-rival Princeton 30-16.

The Tiger grapplers are reeling this season from their university's decision to stop funding wrestling as an official school sport starting this year and thus make the program's survival entirely contingent on the paltry and whimsical flow of alumni donations.

"They seemed weaker than in the past," Crimson sophomore Craig Vitagliano said. "They had to forfeit a lot of matches. Wrestling has become like a club-sport there."

Against the Tigers, Harvard jumped out to a quick lead and never looked back.

The Crimson got off to an 18-0 lead with a forfeit in the 118-pound category and pins by 126-pound freshman Brendan Noonan at 4:28 in the second period and 134-pound junior Todd David at 2:08 in the first period.

The Tigers bounced back in the 142-pound division when junior wrestler Brian Duckworth got the better half of a 7-6 match with Harvard's Ron Mitra, but Harvard junior Khris Reina came back with a 7-4 decision in the 150-pound weight class to increase the Crimson lead to 21-3.

Princeton made its most serious surge midway through the match. Harvard sophomore Steve Gerstung lost a 9-7 decision to Junior Doug Roskos in the 158-pound division and Crimson junior Bill Forlano was pinned in the 167-pound division.

But with the Crimson lead cut to 21-12, Harvard put the match away. First, Crimson Sophomore Dan Vandermyde won a convincing 10-3 decision in the 177-pound weight class.

And then, after Crimson freshman Jeffrey Perkosky dropped a 10-1 decision at 190 pounds, Harvard's heavyweight Bill Counihan won by forfeit.

"Princeton had to forfeit a couple of weights," head coach Jim Peckham said. "That gave us an advantage."

After Boston College narrowly defeated Princeton in the second match of the tournament, the Crimson were unleashed on the weary Eagles, coming out of the battle with a convincing 40-6 win.

"[Boston College] has got a fair team," Peckham said. "But we expected to win so we substituted a bit."

Vitagliano started things off in the 118-pound division with a quick pin at 1:38 of the first period.

Noonan followed with an 8-7 win in what was the day's most exciting decision. Down 6-7 with 11 seconds left in the third period, Noonan tallied two quick points to steal the victory.