SPORTS

First, I'd like to present my belated picks in the NCAA basketball championships. The finals will pit North Carolina against Marquette, with the atter emerging as the eventual winner. I had been promising to present my picks for a while, and I've finally been cornered into it. Also, I'll have to go with Wisconsin over Michigan in the NCAA hockey playoffs and the Boston Celtics over the Philadelphia 76ers in the quarterfinals for the NBA playoffs.

Second, I'd like to remind those of you who may have been sleeping during this past week what a great week it has been for sports in the Boston area. The red Sox won their first game, the Celts teased the Sixers and then beat them with a hoop at the buzzer, the Marathon was run, and the Bruins have been playing admirably in Los Angeles, even though they have to use roller skates to move. Locally, every Harvard team has been doing swell, and the weather has been beautiful. We all should go out and watch our intercollegiate representatives march toward triumph. Besides, it gives you a good excuse to sauce.

This weekend, Harvard sports are going to be male dominated. The women's teams will be away, visiting throughout New England, hopefully to come back with wins, or at least some good stories. The streaking baseball team will don uniforms and play Columbia Friday at 3 p.m., Penn, in a twinbill Saturday at 1 p.m. and Holy Cross Monday at 3 p.m. For the uninitiated, baseball games are ideal places to consume mass quantities(...of beer that is). During my spring trip throughout the country, I visited Duke and noted that students watch their baseball team while consuming large volumes of the golden elixir.

Saturday there's going to a lot of action on the Charles, the river that is the source of much of our drinking and cleaning water. After a team from Cypress Gardens does an early morning workout for the water skiing show, the Harvard crew teams will take over. Both the heavies and the lights will be in action. The heavies will battle the bumbling Bruins of Brown (abominable alliteration) with the frosh rowing at 9:30, the JV's at 11:15, and the varsity at noon. The races will determine who wins the Stein Cup.

The Biglin Bowl will be on the line when the lights row against MIT and Dartmouth. The Yardlings go at 9:15, the JV's at 10:30, and the varisty at 11:45.

The tennis team is going to have its hands full this weekend, playing three matches in four days. Friday, the Columbia tennis team will be hitching a ride with their baseball team to play the Crimson at 3 p.m. on the Palmer Dixon courts. Penn will be the racquetmen's opponent Saturday at 2 p.m. and Yale will be up Monday at 2 p.m.

The lacrosse team will be entertaining some gentlemen from Yale Saturday at 2 p.m. on the Business School field. Fans who wish to taunt opposing players must bring their own helmets.

Since it's the third week in April, baseball is again being played in Fenway Park. That also means that basketball and hockey are also being played at the Boston Garden. That's the price you have to pay when one city's teams are so good. There's even talk that there might be some exchanges of personnel between Boston's clubs, although we can't disclose the exact nature of these exchanges at this time.

If you don't catch the Sox this afternoon when they play Detroit, you're going to have to be satisfied with the tube. The Sox will be playing a weekend series against the Toronto Blue Jays, who have been giving the Yankees a lot of problems lately. The four games will be televised, as will the two games against Milwaukee Tuesday and Wednesday.

The Celts and the Sixers will be fighting it out in Boston Garden Friday night and Sunday afternoon. There are still tickets for both of these games. Tickets are $5.50 to $8.00.

I'm not going to say anything about the Bruins because this column is written years in advance and I don't know the Bruins schedule yet. There's a chance that they'll be playing at the Garden this weekend, but then again there's a chance that they won't be.

Book 'em Danna. Murder one.

Right Steve.

Be there. Aloha.