It was easily Harvard's best defensive game all year. More importantly, the recent success of Harvard's defense hasn't been a fluke. Rather, the Crimson defense has steadily improved and learned to compete as a unified ensemble of skilled players. On Saturday, the defense matched the success of the offense, and now the Crimson can be considered a balanced team.

The dramatic progress made on defense has, as the clich indicates, made Harvard a serious championship contender.

"Our development as a team, and the fact we're alive in the title picture, is directly correlated to how our defense has improved," said Harvard Coach Tim Murphy.

To keep hope alive, however, the defense will have to continue to improve and save its best performances for a tough Penn team on the road and a perennially competitive Yale team at home. Based on what I've seen, the Crimson is up to the challenge.

In addition to praising the developing strength of the defense, I should devote some time to discussing another area essential to a final run at the Ivy Title - the placekicking situation. Two weeks ago, when the Crimson special teams specialists were anything but special, I wrote a sarcastic column lamenting our field goal kicking woes.

Well, I'm glad to be able to take back my good-natured cynicism. On Saturday, freshman Robbie Wright kicked two solid field goals on two attempts, snapping a streak of eight straight missed opportunities and silencing me and anyone else who made light of the kicking problem.

In fact, in honor of the two field goals (which was double the entire season output up to that point), I would like to dedicate this column to Robbie "He finally got it" Wright.