Broadbent continued pressing his advantage in the third game, as he won the first five points and built a 6-3 lead. As Broadbent secured what he called the biggest win of his college career, he punctuated each of his final three points with a successively louder “Yes!” accompanied by a fist pump. Broadbent said the unusual display of emotion was an attempt to fire himself up before facing Trinity.

“I want to be able to carry a little of this momentum into that match,” Broadbent said. “I was trying to really steam right ahead and take this to Saturday.”

Hard-hitting junior No. 11 James Bullock and sophomore No. 21 Mike Blumberg also turned in commanding wins for the Crimson.

Blumberg appears to have rebounded from an early-season slump and has risen to No. 3 on Harvard’s ladder, behind Bullock and Broadbent.

“He’s just playing squash at an entirely different level than he was at the beginning of the year,” co-captain Dylan Patterson said. “He’s very light on his feet, so his movement is there, but [the question is] ‘Is his head there and is his racket there?’, which it is.”

Blumberg’s resurgence, along with the return of sophomore No. 26 Asher Hochberg from a sore back, couldn’t have come at a better time for the Crimson, which hosts the undefeated Bantams on Saturday.

Hochberg, who played at No. 5, should compete against Trinity despite not yet being 100 percent.

Hochberg’s determination is not surprising. Every Crimson player acknowledges the importance of this matchup. Even before yesterday, they had been meeting to focus on playing within themselves when they take on Trinity.

“Everyone’s been looking forward to it all year,” Broadbent said. “This is it.”

—Staff writer Alan G. Ginsberg can be reached at aginsber@fas.harvard.edu.