"All the publications have the attitude of 'what have you done for me lately?,'" said co-captain Ted Shergalis. "We as a team don't emphasize the fall season. Crew is a nine-month sport so the fall is a chance to have fun and get back into shape. There was no despair in our hearts."

However the first race of the spring season did nothing to dispel the rumors of Harvard's decline.

The team normally dominates the San Diego Classic as the only Eastern team in attendance. This year, rival Yale decided to make the trip--Harvard paid for it.

Yale came in at 6:29.50, about a boatlength ahead of Harvard's second-place 6:33.33. But revenge is ever so sweet.

"Yale beat us by a boatlength and we had that on our minds going into the Harvard-Yale-Princeton race three weeks later," Hirsch said.

During those three weeks, Harvard seemed to regain some form, dominating Dartmouth by eight seconds and destroying Navy by more than 20 seconds.

At H-Y-Ps, Harvard turned the tables on Yale, defeating them by a nearly identical four-second margin. Harvard also gained a mark of revenge over Princeton, defeating them by a slim .4 second margin. This close race echoed the national championship race of 1996 where Princeton edged Harvard by a measly .02 seconds.

The faces and the results were the same two weeks later at the Eastern Sprints.

"Things worked out for us again," said Hirsch. "We beat Yale by a length and took the race."

Suddenly the team that many wrote off at the beginning of the season had to be the favorite heading into the national championships in Camden, New Jersey.

"People looking past us was helpful in a way," Hirsch said. "It gave us motivation to know they were writing us off. We weren't surprised--we had faith in ourselves and the team and especially the coach."

Coach Charlie Butt has been the driving force in Harvard's turnaround for the fall season.

"Coaching was really the number one thing," Hirsch said. "He told us what we were not executing and made sure we turned those things around for the spring."

"Coach Butt is a great guy who is coming into his own as a coach," Shregalis said. "He has devoted himself to the Harvard lightweights and really knows how to make boats move. In the past three years I have been with him he has really learned and improved."

With two-and-a-half weeks between Easterns and Nationals, the rowers have been eagerly anticipating a return to the competitive waters and a shot at regaining their national title.