"This ranks up there with the most exciting victories I have been involved with in my 24 years of coaching," Harvard Coach Dave Fish said. "The guys simply never stopped believing they could win this match."

What made the championship even more impressive was that the Crimson did it without the help of co-captain and top player John Doran. Doran has been suffering from patella tendonitis, and while he traveled with the team and hoped to get in his first action of the season, his knee wouldn't let him.

"I went with the off-chance that I would play," Doran said. "Basically I was there because only Joe [Green] and I had played in the tournament before. This is the best result ever in my years here."

The ECACs represented the first team matches Harvard played this year. After tuning up in singles and doubles individual tournaments over the last two weeks, the team was anxiously awaiting a chance to get in its first real dual meet.

The tournament was a 16-team, single elimination draw, with all the Ivy league teams competing. Luckily for Harvard, its first three matches were not all that challenging.

In the first round, on Friday, the Crimson took on No. 16 seed Georgetown. The teams of Green and Styperek, Lee and Choo, and Barker/Rich swept the doubles. No singles player dropped a set to the extremely overmatched Hoyas as Harvard won 7-0.

On Saturday, Harvard took on Navy, which had defeated Yale, in the quarterfinals. The Midshipmen actually won the doubles point with close victories by Mitch Koch/ Jim McHugh at No.1, 9-8 (8-6), and by Spencer Wilcox and Zafar Fisher, 9-8 (7-4), over Lee and Choo in another close match. However, the Crimson won five out of the six singles, all in straight sets, for the 5-2 victory.

Sunday, Harvard met Ivy League foe Brown in the semifinals. Up to that point, Brown had had easy wins over Marist and Penn State, and was on the short list of teams looking to take the tournament as the No. 4 seed. Fish switched around the doubles teams, pairing up a previously injured Lingman with Lee at No. 2 to replace Oli Choo. It proved to be a good move as Green and Styperek won at No. 1 and Lee/Lingman won at 2 to take the doubles point.