LAFAYETTE (0-4, 0-1 Patriot) at COLUMBIA (2-1, 1-0)
As Lafayette coach Frank Tavani said after the Leopards’ loss to Harvard last week, “It doesn’t get any easier, because Columbia is absolutely blowing Princeton off the field right now.”
Lafayette heads to New York to take on a Lions team that—on the strength of five Sean Brackett touchdowns—did in fact annihilate the Tigers last Saturday. Yes, that same Princeton team that beat the Leopards in double overtime two weeks ago. Columbia > Princeton > Lafayette. Easy math.
Prediction: Columbia 28, Lafayette 17.
YALE (2-1, 1-0 Ivy) at DARTMOUTH (2-1, 0-1 Ivy)
Last year, we mercilessly mocked Dartmouth for its seeming inability to play a decent game of football. When the Big Green started the season 2-0, it won over some believers (including me, who boldly picked the squad to finish fourth in the conference in our preseason supplement). But after taking the Quakers to overtime last week, the message should be pretty clear: Dartmouth is officially on the rise.
The Big Green matches up pretty well with Yale. Both teams feature a balanced offense spearheaded by a pair of juniors. Dartmouth has the slight edge on the ground with junior tailback Nick Schwieger (tops in the Ivy League at 144 yards per game), while Bulldog quarterback Patrick Witt has the advantage in the air (averaging 290 yards per game).
This one could be close, but the Big Green is a second-half team—it’s outscored its opponents, 62-14, after halftime this season—and Yale’s only two wins came against teams that went a combined 2-19 in 2009. Look for Dartmouth to cement its place as a team to watch in the Ancient Eight.
Prediction: Dartmouth 27, Yale 21.
CORNELL (1-2, 0-1 Ivy) at HARVARD (2-1, 0-1 Ivy)
Cornell is this year’s Dartmouth—a football team that most Texas high school squads could probably take down. A meeting with the hapless Big Red is exactly what Harvard needs to even its Ivy record. In Ithaca last year, senior Gino Gordon and sophomore Treavor Scales ran right through the Cornell defense, spearheading a 251-yard, four-touchdown Crimson rushing performance.
With Gordon coming off a monster 170-yard, two-TD game at Lafayette last week, all signs point to Harvard demolishing the Big Red once again. The most interesting question at this point is whether or not the senior can top that 74-yard run to the endzone.
Prediction: Harvard 31, Cornell 7.
—Staff writer Kate Leist can be reached at kleist@fas.harvard.edu.