This team is like a middleweight boxer who is talented and has all the hunger and desire he needs to be great but lacks a knockout punch. It wouldn't have taken much, just another score in the third quarter or an extended drive to break up the string of three-and-outs.

Instead, Harvard's offense once again failed to put together a drive when it needed to the most. Its offensive line went from great to terrible during halftime, and it coughed up two crucial turnovers. Defensively, Harvard continued to show a lack of big-play ability in the secondary. Losing senior corner Kane Waller to a thigh injury didn't help, but the Crimson looks uncomfortable in nickel situations and tentative when protecting a lead. The defensive backs appear to play tight, which slows them down.

It takes a team-wide collapse to get outscored by 24 in a half, but now the problem has the potential to ruin the team's confidence as it enters the most important part of the season. Harvard has five Ivy games left, with the last three--Brown, Penn and Yale--being the toughest.

Harvard's first half was amazing and showed the team that the Crimson can be when it concentrates. It showed that there's no way the Crimson should have lost to Cornell, which Colgate destroyed 55-16 this weekend. The first half also affirmed that Harvard should have beaten Holy Cross and Fordham by a lot more than it did.

Football's easy when you're on a roll, but Harvard needs to learn to stop its opponent when the other team has the momentum. The only ways to do that are a long, crowd-silencing drive on offense or a takeaway on defense. If this team develops the ability to come up with big plays when it needs them most, it should go into the Yale game 7-2.

Fordham Coach Dave Clawson said there's no such thing as a moral victory in football. Nevertheless, this weekend was clearly a moral loss for Harvard. If Harvard wants to fulfill its potential in the second half of the season, it has to play to its potential in the second half of games.