Head Coach of Football Timothy L. Murphy's arrival at Harvard in December 1993 was widely heralded as the dawn of a new era. It was 10 years since Harvard's last Ivy championship and eight since its last winning season, and Murphy was hailed as a savior.

Today, in the midst of a dismal season, with Harvard football 1-8 and winless in the Ivy League, many are still waiting for a sign that things are moving in the right direction.

When Murphy was named as the Crimson's head coach, everyone knew rebuilding would take time, but many hoped the longed-for turn around would be sooner.

Upon becoming coach, Murphy overhauled the recruiting program in hopes of building a championship team.

Each year Murphy examines thousands of candidates, who he terms "suspects" because so few of them are realistic recruiting prospects for an Ivy League sports program.

The challenge faces all coaches and administrators in Ivy athletics: How to forge a winning combination out of two small groups--division one athletes and top-flight students?

A Different Ball Game

Although all of the 41 College teams recruit to some degree, football's recruiting program is a different beast--35 football recruits matriculate every year, more than for any other team. Then too, the pool of talented high school football players is enormous.

"We recruit for all our sports, but football is just so much bigger," says John P. Reardon Jr. '60, athletic director from 1978 until 1990 and current director the Harvard Alumni Association.

When Murphy took over, the College's football recruiting program was anachronistic. During the 23-year tenure of previous coach Joseph Restic, coaches seldom visited players and avoided extensive nation-wide searches.

Murphy has increased visits to prospective players, expanded the number of recruits examined and launched nation-wide mailing campaigns to uncover as many prospects as possible.

Although the efforts have yes to show results, many say they expect Murphy's hard work to pay off in future seasons, and the coach himself says he is still two years away from fielding his team.

Still, recruiting is the building block of the team. Even though the only schools Harvard really recruits against are Yale, Princeton, Dartmouth and some of the service academics, it is becoming increasingly difficult to find winning combinations of athletic ability and academic aptitude.

Admission Process

The admissions office is very much a part of the recruiting process, particularly at Harvard.

"Each of the 41 sports teams has one person on our staff who acts as a liaison. We ask coaches to provide information on people applying who would make a tremendous difference to that particular sport," Dean of Admissions William R. Fitzsimmons '67 says. "We then ask coaches to rank applicants in order of priority and go from there."