The fire alarm in Bright Hockey Center went off 15 minutes before last night's men's hockey game between Dartmouth and Harvard started.

Maybe somebody should have pulled it sooner.

For that alarm is nothing compared to the mental warning bell that went off after a woeful 2-1 Harvard loss.

Sure, there is time left for Harvard to recover, but the team hasn't given me or probably any other person good reason to believe that things are going to get better.

Harvard was flying high heading into the exam break, but it has lost four of its six games this month, and the two wins were one-goal victories over far weaker opponents. Many things have gone wrong, of which the following is a sampler:

1) Nobody can put the puck in the net.

There are no good excuses--when a team like Dartmouth that had allowed 88 goals against in 16 ECAC games (5.5 a game) limits you to one on 24 shots, you can't start blaming great goaltending or good defense for your offensive deficiency.

Yes, the Big Green played a hell of a defensive game, but the Crimson was outworked and created very few quality scoring opportunities after the first 12 minutes.

2) Related to problem 1: Harvard has no go-to guy to pick up the slack. Steve Martins is a hell of a player, but he is double-teamed, triple-teamed, gang-tackled, you name it.

There hasn't been one individual to come in there and score in the clutch, to take the pressure off Martins. Last year, Harvard had Brian Farrell '94, Chris Baird '94 and Sean McCann '94 putting up big offensive numbers, which allowed Martins's second line to see many more quality scoring chances.

Take away Farrell and Baird on offense and McCann's prowess on defense and the power play, and you have a drastic reduction in offense and an anemic power play (1-4 last night, the goal scored by the second unit).

3) No cohesion.

Tomassoni has juggled the forward lines numerous times all season to find the right combination, but not much has worked. Actually, the lineup Harvard had going into the exam break was working all right, but it wasn't producing the type of offense needed to go far over the rest of the season.

Nevertheless, both new sets of lines since the break haven't done the job.

4) Lack of discipline.

Harvard has spent hours in the penalty box this season, having taken many more unnecessary, undisciplined penalties than any Harvard team in recent history. Last night was no different.

The Crimson was about to go on a power play 4:37 into the third period, when a Harvard forward lost his cool and retaliated against his Dartmouth aggressor. The result--a penalty on both sides and an even-strength four-on-four situation.

5) Lack of confidence.

Harvard seems to let out all of its aggression and emotion in the first few minutes of game. When it scores early, things will generally go well.

But when an opposing goaltender makes a couple of big saves, Harvard gets deflated instead of working harder to beat the netminder. Two big saves by Dartmouth and a Big Green goal in the first minute-and-a-half set the somber tone for the rest of the game.

Let me just reiterate: Harvard isn't dead. It has five regular-season games left and then the ECAC Tournament to turn things around.

But unless the Crimson can respond to the alarm and put out the flames caused by its lackluster play over the last two weeks, its prospects look very bleak.