The Harvard women's basketball team was in a generous mood over the holiday weekend. The Crimson allowed an inferior opponent to make a respectable showing on Saturday and then handed over a tournament championship yesterday. WOFFORD  72 HARVARD  76 MISSISSIPPI STATE  64 HARVARD  51

Harvard (2-3) defeated Wofford (1-3), 76-72, on Saturday afternoon in the first round of the 18th annual Harvard Invitational at Lavietes Pavilion. Yesterday, in the championship game, the Crimson fell to Mississippi State (4-0), 64-51. Harvard was trying to win its second consecutive tournament title.

"We had trouble with our offense; I thought we should have gone inside a little bit more," said Harvard Coach Kathy Delaney-Smith. "We're not clicking offensively. When we run our offenses we are getting tremendous shots, but there were breakdowns."

Harvard's weekend effort was led by co-captain Suzie Miller, who recorded a double-double versus Wofford with 15 points and a career-high 10 rebounds and poured in 13 points against MSU. Miller and senior center Rose Janowski were named to the All-Tournament team.

MSU 64, Harvard 51

Yesterday's championship game was as defensive as a battle can get. Neither the Crimson nor the Lady Bulldogs came out swinging for victory, as both teams combined to score only 19 points in the first 10 minutes.

Harvard played a 2-3 zone defense that was effective in slowing down MSU's athletic forwards and forcing the Lady Bulldogs into difficult shots from the perimeter. With MSU shooting just 32 percent from the field, Harvard had ample opportunity to take control of the game.

But the Crimson's all-too-familiar nemesis--the turnover--descended on Lavietes Pavilion in the early going and smothered Harvard's offensive attack. The Crimson committed 15 turnovers in the first half, at one point relinquishing the ball on four consecutive possessions. Harvard took only 20 shots in the period to MSU's 34.

"You can't score if you don't take shots, and we had a tremendous number of turnovers," Miller said. "We had 15 turnovers in the first half--how are you going to score? You can't get a shot off."

Despite Harvard's difficulty holding onto the ball, and its shooting trouble--the Crimson shot 35 percent in the first half--the score remained close. Junior forward Laela Sturdy connected on a baby hook off a feed from freshman Katie Gates with 2:51 remaining in the first half to bring Harvard to within two at 19-17.

MSU, however, responded with a pair of three-pointers on its last two possessions of the half, the first by All-Tournament team selection Nitra Perry from the right corner and the second by point guard Angela Harris as time expired to give the Lady Bulldogs a 25-17 lead at the intermission.

The eight-point cushion gave MSU some breathing room in the second half, and while the Crimson continued to shoot 35 percent for the entire game, the Lady Bulldogs solved their shooting troubles. MSU shot 44 percent after halftime.

Harvard did not go down easily, however. The Crimson cut its deficit to three when Janowski found Miller slashing to the basket. Miller finished the play with a nice weaving lay-up to make the score 31-28.

But Harvard would get no closer. MSU scored the next five points and hit seven of its eight free throws in the final 1:07 to pull away.

Harvard was also plagued by a lack of defensiverebounding, due largely to the difficulty ofboxing out in a zone. MSU not only out-reboundedHarvard 44-34 but, more importantly, the LadyBulldogs grabbed 15 offensive boards.

"You can never be satisfied when you lose--youcan always do something better," Miller said. "Thekey was defensive rebounding. Even when we did geta good box out, they would go right around us andwe would tip the ball, we wouldn't grab it."