ITHACA, N.Y.--Watching his football team lose a seemingly insurmountable 13-point advantage over Cornell with less than 4:00 remaining in the game was not the way Harvard Coach Tim Murphy wanted to celebrate his birthday Saturday afternoon.

In what has become an alarming trend this season, the Harvard football team (2-2, 1-1 Ivy) allowed another apparent win to slip through its fingers as Cornell (4-0, 3-0) surged back to score two touchdowns to win the game, 24-23.

To make matters worse, the Crimson had the chance to win the game with a 40-yard field goal by senior Mike Giampaolo with three seconds left, but his low kick was blocked by 6'6 Joe Splendorio, giving the Big Red a shocking victory at Schoellkopf Field.

"In my 21 years of coaching, I can't remember something like this happening," Murphy said. "Cornell deserved to win, not necessarily because they were the better team, but when they absolutely had to make the plays, they made the plays."

Cornell's heroics were nearly squelched before they started, when an apparent Crimson takeaway was nullified by a penalty.

With Harvard holding a commanding 23-10 lead over Cornell with 3:56 left in the game, a stunned Big Red crowd of 9,218 watched as Crimson linebacker Isaiah Kacyvenski grabbed a wayward pass by quarterback Ricky Rahne at the Harvard 12, seemingly sealing a victory for Harvard.

However, a yellow flag changed the Crimson's fate.

The officials called defensive holding, erasing Kacyvenski's critical

pickoff and giving the Big Red an automatic first down at the Harvard 9. Although college officials do not call numbers, the call was probably against senior cornerback Kane Waller for holding Splendorio in the back of the end zone.

Two plays and two completed passes later, Rahne found Splendorio in the end zone for a touchdown. Cornell then trailed 23-17 with 2:53 remaining.

"I felt disbelief at first," Kacyvenski said. "I just knew that we had to go on and refocus. But there was nothing that we could do about [the penalty]."

Harvard got a first down on its next play but then punted, and Cornell took over at its 42. Rahne completed 3-of-5 passes before finding Keith Ferguson for an 18-yard touchdown along the left sideline, giving Cornell a 24-23 advantage with only :26 remaining.

On Harvard's last-gasp drive, senior quarterback Brad Wilford, who completed 17 of 30 passes on the day for 183 yards, completed a 19-yard pass to senior split end Terence Patterson, who ran out of bounds with 11 seconds remaining. Wilford again connected, this time for 21 yards to freshman Carl Morris, who was tackled at the Cornell 23.

Although Giampaolo had hit a 39-yarder earlier, a low snap and a low kick allowed the Big Red to block the field goal attempt. Holder Mike Madden recovered the ball but was promptly tackled.

"We had a chance to put it away but didn't," Murphy said. "I'm not going to underplay it. It's somewhat devastating from an emotional standpoint."

Despite the Big Red victory, the Crimson outplayed Cornell for most of the afternoon, with spectacular performances by senior running back Chris Menick, who gained 115 rushing yards, and explosive junior tailback Chuck Nwokocha, who zigzagged his

way for 110 yards.

The Harvard offensive line didn't give up a sack--although it committed several holding penalties to make sure Wilford didn't take the beating he did last week--and consistently created holes for the running backs. Harvard gained 236 total yards rushing for the game, with Cornell (4-0, 3-0 Ivy) earning only 83 yards on the ground.

Kacyvenski, from Endicott, N.Y., had approximately 100 friends and family members in attendance Saturday and led the Harvard defense with 10 tackles and one interception. Senior linebacker Jeff Svicarovich and senior free safety Ben Green each added one interception, and the line sacked Rahne twice and knocked him down several other times.

"Let's face it, our kids played hard, and at times we played extremely well,"

Murphy said. "It looked like with [four minutes] remaining in the fourth quarter, we were in control of this football game."

However, in spite of the Crimson's superior performance on paper, Harvard's defense inexplicably crumbled at the end of the fourth quarter. With Harvard cradling a tender 23-17 lead with 1:14 left in the game, the Big Red began its drive from its own 42-yard line and obliterated the Crimson's defense.

"I don't know if we put enough pressure on the quarterback," Kacyvenski said. "We handled the run pretty well, but we couldn't handle [Rahne's] passes."

In spite of errors made by the Harvard defense during the last few minutes of the game, the Harvard offense also allowed key opportunities that could have sealed the win to slip away.

"I thought we had a great effort, but we didn't make the plays when we had to," Murphy said. "There were any number of times when Cornell would not have even had the opportunity

to get back in the game if we had put them away when we had the chance."

With Harvard leading 17-10 early in the fourth quarter, the Crimson faced two chances to score touchdowns that could blown the game open, but the Cornell defense held. Waller intercepted a Rahne pass with 11:58 left in the game and returned the ball at the Cornell 37. After a two-yard Menick run, Wilford completed an 18-yard pass to Patterson. Menick rushed again for three, but two incompletions followed. The Crimson had to settle for a 32-yard field goal that increased its lead to 20-10.

On Cornell's next offensive play, Harvard's defense again presented its offense with an opportunity to seal the victory, but mental mistakes by the Crimson limited its success. Green intercepted Rahne, two-time Ivy League Offensive Player of the Week this year, at the Harvard 46.

Nwokocha got the ball to the Cornell 23-yard line on two carries, but a holding penalty (Harvard's third of the game) cost the Crimson 10 valuable

yards, pushing it back to the Cornell 33. After freshman Kyle Cremarosa couldn't come up with a Wilford pass under heavy coverage, Harvard had to settle for a 39-yard field goal.

The 23-10 lead was not enough to keep the Big Red from staging its second dazzling comeback in two weeks. Last week, Cornell, which remains the only undefeated Ivy League team, trailed Brown by the score of 28-7 in the third quarter but ran up 26 consecutive points to snatch victory away from Brown, 33-28.

"We were nervous, we were jittery, and we were out of sync," said Cornell Coach Pete Mangurian. "We hung in there and finally got it done in the end. We feel tremendous about the outcome, and I'm so proud of this football team. It's not a fluke when you [stage a comeback] two weeks in a row."

Early in the first quarter, Harvard gained a quick 3-0 lead on a 20-yard Giampaolo field goal, but Cornell soon answered with a 23-yard field goal by McCombs.

With 1:57 left in the first quarter, Cornell's special teams unit then put on a clinic for its Harvard counterpart. Giampaolo kicked a 35-yard punt to the Cornell 27, and Vincent Bates then returned the punt 73 yards down the right sideline for a brilliant touchdown and 10-3 first quarter lead.

Harvard tied the game 10-10 early in the second quarter in a touchdown drive that spotlighted the dazzling moves of the 5'5 Nwokocha, who carried the ball five times for 28 yards during the series. At the Cornell 25, Wilford completed two consecutive passes to sophomore flanker Andy Fried to move the ball to the 11. Nwokocha got a good kickout block from the fullback then outran the defense wide to the right for the score.

Harvard's second touchdown came early in the third quarter. In another example of the Crimson defense creating scoring opportunities for the Harvard offense, Kacyvenski intercepted a wayward Rahne pass at the Cornell 38 and then ran to the Cornell 22.

Menick exploded with three consecutive carries for 19 yards to put the ball at the Cornell 3. Wilford then rushed left on an option keeper to score for the Crimson, with Giampaolo's extra point giving Harvard a quick 17-10 lead with 9:42 remaining in the third quarter.

"At times, the special teams played really well, and at times, the offense played really well, and at times, the defense seemed like it was in complete control," Murphy said. "But on the whole, there were lapses in all three areas [Saturday], even though there were some very positive things."

Next weekend, the Crimson will travel to Fordham (0-5, 0-2 Patriot), which lost Saturday 35-18 to Penn and lost two weekends ago to Cornell, 42-14. Fordham barely poses a threat on paper, but Harvard has to shake off two week's worth of disappointing losses.

If there's anything the last two weekends have shown Harvard anything, it's that there is no such thing as a sure win.