And with that, the first half of the season is in the books. Harvard is still perfect, 5-0, still unchallenged as the top team in Ivy League football.
If the first five games are any indication, that likely won’t change in the second five. Within the Ancient Eight, it looks like the Crimson is in a league of its own for the second straight season.
But a rather large question still looms: Just how good is this team? Put another way, could this go down as the most dominant Harvard team of the modern era?
205 points in five games—the most since the Harrison administration, when Harvard was playing teams like Phillips Exeter. That’s more than the 9-1 team from a year ago that broke the modern-era points record, more than Ryan Fitzpatrick’s 10-0 2004 team.
Meanwhile, the Crimson is allowing just 13.4 points a game and outscoring opponents by a laughable 27.6 margin. Only one other Ivy team has averaged more than 27.6 points, period, forget margin of victory.
Of course, five games does not a season make. But facing a quintet of league foes who look increasingly vulnerable to end the season (save Princeton, the surprise of the league), Harvard has the opportunity to make the answer to that question: yes.
—Staff writer Robert S. Samuels can be reached at robertsamuels@college.harvard.edu.
—Follow him on Twitter @bobbysamuels.