Two days after it was supposed to kick off its Ivy League season, the Harvard baseball team unofficially extended its spring break yesterday with a doubleheader in New York City against Columbia.

Two wins proved quite the souvenir after the Crimson out-scored the Lions (3-16, 1-5 Ivy) by a total of 18-6.

Before an undefeated conference record, though, came confusion.

Originally, Harvard was scheduled to play Columbia on Saturday, but rain postponed the match-up until the next day, moving Sunday’s two-game set against Penn to tomorrow. The Crimson ended up driving back to Cambridge on Saturday night before waking up the next morning, only to find out that it had to then drive all the way back south to Andy Coakley field.

In a word, said junior Lance Salsgiver: “annoying.”

Harvard (9-6, 2-0 Ivy), however, showed no worse for the wear.

HARVARD 13, COLUMBIA 3

Up until the sixth inning, Columbia starter Brendan Quinn kept the Crimson in check. Unfortunately for him, he was pitching the second game of an Ivy double-header, and not the first.

Taking advantage of all nine of its innings, Harvard shattered a 3-3 deadlock on a sixth-inning Matt Vance RBI single before piling it all on, notching nine runsover the seventh, eight, and ninth frames for a 13-3 victory and a Crimson sweep on the day.

For Harvard, eight players individually recorded two or more hits, with the first six batters in the line-up going a collective 14-28. Notably, sophomore Brendan Byrne did his part by slugging his first career home run.

“The thing about our team is that once a couple guys get going, everyone starts to feed off their energy and gets confident,” Salsgiver said. “It’s kind of a snowball effect. Once a few of us started getting hits, everyone jumped on the wagon.”

Starting off strong for the second straight game, the Crimson scored three runs in the first inning before being temporarily flummoxed by Quinn, who tempted the Harvard offense with a bevy of changeups and curveballs down in the strike zone.

“We stopped waiting for our own pitches,” Salsgiver said. “Finally, he started making mistakes, leaving the ball up.”

Crimson pitching, on the other hand, kept the Lions comparatively quiet, as senior starter Mike Morgalis went six innings, fanning six while being tagged for just three runs despite walking five and giving up seven hits.