This season should have been better for the Tigers. They had high hopes a month ago, with Ivy ERA leader Sarah Peterman returning to start the season.

But there is a simple reason why Princeton failed to beat Dartmouth: Big Green freshman hurler Christine Quattrocchi.

Her stats are eye-popping: 17-2 record, 1.10 ERA, 17 complete games and seven shutouts. She has earned three of the five Ivy Pitcher of the Week awards thus far this season.

Her impressive stats may a bit misleading, however. Dartmouth has a non-conference schedule loaded with weak teams -Division 2 schools like UMass-Lowell and Stony Brook -a sharp contrast to the Crimson's non-conference schedule which included 1998 NCAA champion Fresno State.

The rest of Dartmouth's team has formed a solid foundation around the freshman ace. Sophomores Sarah Damon and Kristen King were the No. 2 and No. 3 hitters in the Ivy league last season, and this year they are leading the Big Green in hitting once again.

Harvard has already seen enough of Kristen King this year. In the ECAC women's hockey semifinals this March, she scored the first goal in Dartmouth's 3-2 overtime upset that abruptly ended the Crimson's season.

King is not the only women's hockey player on the softball team - in fact, there are five. Juniors Carrie Sekela and Liz Macri and freshmen Carly Haggard, Lydia Wheatley are the others.