A flea-flicker gone awry under heavy defensive pressure caused no problem. Slipping two tacklers and avoiding a third, the hero of the Crimson’s first four victories dove just short of a first down—15-yard change of fortune.

But once again it was the little things, the small changes of fortune, that did not go his way.

Lofting a beautiful fourth-down pass to Byrnes along the sideline, Fitzpatrick seemed to have regained his touch. But the ball skidded off Byrnes’ hands and fell harmlessly to the ground.

Under normal circumstances that would not have been ideal, but Fitzpatrick would have had more time. But by changing quarterbacks as frequently as Murphy had, there was no continuity and no flow. For both quarterbacks, what time they had been given could have amounted to so much more.

Still, Fitzpatrick, trying to carry the team on his shoulders, would not relent.

Running quarterback keepers, absorbing hits, trying to will the ball into his receivers’ hands, the strain on the normally easy-going Fitzpatrick was obvious.

“I came in, trying to bring the team back,” Fitzpatrick said. “I think my biggest problem was I was thinking I could bring the team back in one play every time.”

But despite his exhaustion, Harvard’s savior seemed ready to resurrect the Crimson’s chances for victory at any moment.

Fitzpatrick nailed Byrnes in stride coming across the middle of the field and Byrnes was off to the races. And just like that, Harvard was within seven.

But another Dartmouth touchdown returned him to square one and this time, the lack of clock drove him not to the pinnacle of his game, but to failure.

Three straight possessions. Three straight turnovers.

Like Schires, Fitzpatrick was forced to try to make something from nothing, and each time, for the first time, he failed.

On fourth-and-10, with the kicking game incapable of scoring points or trapping Dartmouth deep, Fitzpatrick took off and snuck through the defense for a first down. But diving for more, the ball popped out of his hands and the Big Green recovered.

The team needed points. You could see it in the way he carried himself. Fitzpatrick took it all on himself to deliver them.

“I was trying to hit those home run balls,” Fitzpatrick said.

The perfect pass would have done it, but Fitzpatrick—the immortal, unstoppable comeback king—simply didn’t have enough time, given his rust, to deliver.

Throwing down the field, you could almost see him telling the ball to find the holes that weren’t there. But those passes—which wouldn’t have been thrown if not for Harvard’s desperation—found only white jerseys as interceptions ended each of the last two drives.

And Ryan Fitzpatrick found only defeat where there should have been victory, if only he’d been given a little bit more time.

—Staff writer Timothy J. McGinn can be reached at mcginn@fas.harvard.edu.