Midway through the season, the nationally ranked Harvard women's soccer team leads a particularly competitive Ivy League race.

The Ivy's top four teams (Harvard, Dartmouth, Columbia, and Yale) have compiled a combined 25-4-1 record. With many critical intra-Ivy matchups upcoming, the race for the League title promises to be nerve-wracking.

Leading the Ivy pack is the 17th-ranked Crimson, last year's league champion. Harvard (7-0, 3-0 Ivy), which has won 17 in a row, is off to its best start since 1981. The Crimson is outscoring its opposition by a 6-1 ratio. Junior midfielder Emily Stauffer leads the team and ranks third in the Ivies in scoring with eight goals.

Also starring for the Crimson has been freshman Julia Blain, who was recently named Ivy League Rookie of the Week.

Looming for Harvard is an out-of-conference showdown with third-ranked Connecticut on October 23 and a crucial Ivy contest against Dartmouth.

The Big Green (6-1, 3-0), undefeated in the Ivy and with only one loss overall, is establishing itself as Harvard's main competition. This week may prove critical for Dartmouth, however, as it faces difficult tests against Connecticut and Massachusetts.

Also in the Ivy vanguard is surprising Columbia (7-1, 1-1). The youthful Lions are led by sophomore Tosh Forde, the Ivy League Player of the Week, who halfway through the season has already set single-season school marks for goals and points.

Yale (5-2-1, 1-1-1) has also been impressive this season. After the Bulldogs, however, the Ivy suffers a big dropoff with Princeton, Brown, Cornell and Pennsylvania, teams that are all well below .500. Cornell, in fact, suffered the indignity of its first-ever loss to Columbia, while the other teams lack even a similarly ignominious feat on which to report.

So the Ivy League is singularly top-heavy. The upper echelons will feed on the weaklings, building up their records while aiming towards the important contests against the other league powerhouses.

At this point, Harvard, by virtue of its imposing start, must be considered the favorite, but the Nov. 2 showdown against Dartmouth will be telling. IVY STANDINGS   IVY  OVERALL Team  W  L  PCT  W  L  PCT Harvard  3  0  1.00  7  0  1.00 Dartmouth  3  0  1.00  6  1  .857 Columbia  1  1  .500  7  1  .875 Yale  1  1  .500  5  2  .688 Princeton  1  2  .333  3  5  .375 Brown  0  1  .250  1  6  .222 Cornell  0  2  .000  3  5  .375 Pennsylvania  0  2  .000  2  5  .313