Ivy Tournament to Open Today

On the first day, Harvard rested.

At least, that's the plan as the women's hockey team, an opening-round bye securely in hand, heads down to Providence for the Fourth Annual Ivy League Championships, which gets underway tonight at Brown's Meehan Arena.

The Crimson, seeded second behind three-time tournament winner Cornell (9-3-1 overall, 2-0-1 in the Ivies), will play on Saturday afternoon the winner of tonight's clash between Princeton and Brown. Dartmouth faces Yale in the other firstround contest.

Having won six of their last eight games, Joe Bertagna's skaters now possess an even 6-6-1 intercollegiate record (2-1-1 Ivy League) and a three-game winning streak, their longest of the season. Are they not psyched?

"There's just no question about it," freshman center Firkins "Furry" Reed said this week.

"We can hold our own or better against any team there--everyone's looking forward to it," she added.

Captain Alison Bell, a defenseman, was also optimistic: "We are totally psyched for this tournament--we plan on winning it."

One key factor in determining Harvard's chances this weekend will be the play of Tania Huber, the team's leading scorer with 14 goals and 8 assists for 22 points. Huber missed last Saturday's 4-3 victory over Wesleyan with a minor neck injury, but is expected to be back in action tomorrow afternoon.

Huber's linemates on the "Green Line" are Sara Fischer (5-14-19) and Meg Streeter (4-4-8). The "Blue Line" will be led by Lauren Norton (7-9-16), who admirably filled the offensive gap left by Huber's brief absence by contributing two goals and two assists against Wesleyan; Sue Yunick and Reed complete the combination.

If the seedings prove accurate, Harvard will need strong defensive efforts from Bell, Anna Jones and Julie Starr Sunday afternoon against the explosive Big Red, whose wins include routs of Potsdam (9-1), Oswego (14-0 and 9-0) and Ivy rival Dartmouth (8-1). Cheryl Hines (25-24) and Cindy Warren (23-36) pace the Cornell attack with 49 points apiece.

"When the season started, we were just hoping to be competitive in this tournament," Crimson coach Bertagna said; "now we're hoping to do a lot better than that."