Last year, Harvard lost to these four Ivy League contenders by a combined margin of 10-2.
The Yale and Cornell home games are especially important since they will come in the midst of a five-game mid-season homestand that could either give the Crimson added momentum or derail the promising young club.
Ultimately, though, Harvard has its eyes firmly set on its objective for the season--wresting the Ivy League crown from nemesis Princeton and recapturing it for the first time since 1996.
"Our goal from the first day has been to win the Ivy League title," Kelly said. "We haven't done it since I've been here and we've come close a couple times. We just want to win the Ivy League and get into the [NCAA] tournament and see how far we can go."
And if the start of the Crimson's season is any indication--with the tempered play of the veterans punctuated by the flair of the freshmen--then Harvard can look forward to ending this chapter of its history with a happy ending.