Forget about the candied apples and chocolate bars. The only Halloween treat that the Harvard women's volleyball team wants this weekend is the Ivy League crown.

In its most critical homestand of the season, the Crimson (12-10, 4-1 Ivy) will face off against two of its most dangerous Ivy opponents, facing Yale (14-7, 3-2 Ivy) Friday night and Brown (11-10, 4-1 Ivy) Saturday afternoon.

"We definitely expect to win as long as we come to play," said freshman setter Mindy Jellin. "We've really been prepared well [for this weekend], and we know that in order to win, we just need to keep our composure and play hard."

Last weekend's dominating 3-0 victory over Dartmouth allowed Harvard to grab a share of the lead in the Ivy League race. The Crimson is currently embroiled in a heated three-way tie with Princeton and Brown, and two additional league victories this weekend would aid the Crimson's bid to bring home the Ivy crown.

Harvard veered off its winning course last Tuesday when it suffered from mental lapses and lost to non-conference Providence. A lackluster Crimson dropped all three games to the streaking Friars, 15-12, 15-8, 15-3.

In each game against Providence, the Crimson fell behind early and was unable to summon enough energy to stage a successful comeback, a frightening trend that has defined Harvard's season.

Falling behind early in games has put the Crimson in the difficult and unenviable position of playing catch up for the remainder of the match.

"What we want to do is to start hard in each game this weekend so that we don't have to keep playing catch up," Jellin said.