Crimson Wrestlers Leave by Air for East Championships

The first Harvard wrestling team to travel by air left Logan Airport yesterday afternoon for Ithaca and the eastern intercollegiate championships. The tournament starts at 1 p.m. today in Cornell's Barton Hall.

Butch Jordan's aggregation, minus Dave Smith, arrived in Syracuse late yesterday afternoon and then took a bus for Ithaca. Smith's knee and elbow injuries kept him from making the trip, and Dave Coombs will fill his 128-pound position.

Another last minute switch occurred in the 165-pound class, where Tom Connors will replace Stan Thompson. Otherwise, there will be no changes in the lineup that faced Yale last week. Joe Kozol wrestles at 121, Bob Abboud at 136, Buddy King at 145, Rod Skinner at 155, Captain Bob Claflin at 175, and Howie Houston at heavyweight.

Harvard No Team Threat

As a team, Harvard is not expected to do much, for among the 16 schools converging on Ithaca today will be the class of the East. The highest rated teams are defending champion Lehigh, Penn State, Franklin and Marshall, and Syracuse. Navy, Cornell, and Princeton are ranked just behind the four leaders.

Last year at Bethlehem, Lehigh placed five of eight entries among the first three in their respective weights and of these five, four are back this year--two are champions and the other two runners-up. F & M boasts tremendous strength in the lightweight divisions and has two champs and a runner-up returning.

However, the many upsets and the lack of a consistent winner during the past wrestling season indicate that the tournament will be wide open with no one team a sure bot to take the championship. Cornell, Navy, Princeton, Penn State, and Syracuse are all strong at certain weights and any one of them may be able to place enough of their seeded men among the top three in their class and thus gain the title.

Harvard's best chance for an individual champion is, of course, Houston. The popular heavyweight has gone undefeated in his first year of varsity competition and his tremendous strength and quick reflexes have been complemented by a growing knowledge of wrestling technique.

If Houston comes home with the eastern heavyweight title, he will go on to the national championships. But he will have to stop some rugged opponents at Ithaca to win.

This afternoon's preliminary matches will be followed by the quarter-finals tonight, semi finals tomorrow afternoon, and finals tomorrow night. Scoring is on a 5-4-2-1 basis in each class.