Harvard's women's lacrosse team has established itself over the past few years as being one of the veritable jewels of Harvard's sports.

With a national championship in 1990 and three consecutive trips to the six-team NCAA play-offs, including a trip to the final four last season which ended in a heartbreaking over-time loss to Virginia, the squad can justifiably boast--along with Harvard's men's and women's squash teams--that it is one of the best three or four programs of its kind in the country.

"We've put together some really good teams while she's been here," Harvard senior co-captain Margot, McAnaney said. "Ever since I've been here we've gotten to the NCAA's and have ended the season thinking that we could've won it all. We've almost been disappointed."

While disappointed might not be the right word to describe the team's take on its recent performance, it is fair to say that the team has been focused on the search for prize that has eluded them since 1990.

And, of all those years, those in the know in women's lacrosse circles say that this may well be the year.

"Honestly, of all the teams that I've been on since I've been here, this one has the most promise," McAnaney said. "I've felt really good about all the other teams I've been on, too."

"Of course, our immediate goal is to win the league, and then to worry about NCAAs," she added. "But I think that we'll be able to accomplish a lot this season. I'm excited."

The reason for the excitement is, quite simply, depth. Across the board-- in just about every position--the Crimson seem to have strong, experienced players, and lots of them.

"Our try-outs this season were really competitive," junior Genevieve Chelius said. "We had to cut a lot of very good players--everyone seemed to have really good skills."

Most imposing from the opposition's standpoint is the Crimson defense.

The Crimson lost only one player to graduation from a defense which last season held its opponents to an average of only 7.6 points per game.

"We're virtually returning our entire defense," junior Megan Colligan said. "We should be all the better because last season we were pretty inexperienced."

Headlining that defense will be midfielder Francie Walton. Walton led the team with 66 ground ball stops and 39 draw control efforts en route to garnering first-team all-American and first-team all-Ivy honors.

On offense, the team's prospects are a little more up in the air.

The Crimson lost one of the best offensive players in Harvard history to graduation--leading scorer Liz Berkery (65 points, 17 assists)--but returns the next six leading scorers, including junior attacker Sarah Winters (47 points, 12 assists) and senior midfielder Sarah Downing (34 points, seven assists).

"We're going to miss Berkery--she was a great player, but we have a lot of people who might be able to pick up the slack," Chelius said. "We'll have a more balanced attack."

The Crimson will have the opportunity to put that balanced attack into motion this afternoon at 3 p.m. when it takes on Boston College. Because of the weather, the game will be played at Holy Cross on the school's turf field.

"We don't know that much about them, to be honest," Chelius said. "We do know, however, that they've had the opportunity to play outside and we haven't--that could be a factor."

The Eagles took off to Florida last week on their spring break to practice outside.

"It's been frustrating not being able to practice," said Colligan, referring to the Crimson's indoor practices. "It might hurt us for the first few games, but then we should adapt."

The Crimson beat Boston College last season 13-2 in the Crimson's best defensive effort of the season.