Icemen Bomb Princeton, 10-0, at Bright... ...But Tiger Hoopsters Take Revenge, 66-50

With 3:45 remaining last night, the fans at Bright Career started to chant, "We want Cornell! We Want Cornell!" They had had enough of this assemble of chippers and diggers called Princeton. And, at that point, Princeton had certainly had enough with the Harvard hockey fans and the Harvard hockey team.

For last night with 3:36 remaining the Crimson icemen had tortured the Tigers and especially their goaltender, Ron David to the tune of 10-0, the Crimson's widest margin of victory since an 11-1 eviction of Dartmouth in the opening game of the season.

Playoff Race

Most important, the win keeps Harvard (now 9-8-2 ECAC) hot on the trail of Yale (10-8-1) and Cornell (10-8-1) in the race for first place in the Ivy Division and the guaranteed home ice playoff berth that goes with it. Cornell defeated Dartmouth last night, 5-4, in Hanover to keep pace with the Elis and stay half a game ahead of the Crimson.

The Big Red comes to Cambridge tonight for a 7:30 game at Bright in another must-win game for Harvard if it is to have any chance of making the playoffs.

Hat Trick

In last night's disintegration of the Tigers, freshman center Scott Fusco led the charge with his second hat trick of the season, running his team-leading goal total to 15 Bobby Starbuck and Greg Chalmers added two goals apiece for the Crimson, while Wade Lau turned aside 21 Tiger shots in recording the second shutout of his Harvard career and the first during a regular season game. Lau shut out Boston College in last year's Beanpot final.

The 10-0 was in the largest margin of victors for Harvard in a shutout since Brian Petrovek, in 1977, a 10-0 win over St. Lawrence. And it's the first shutout win against Princeton since Harvard Sports Information Director Joe Bertagna was in the nets to stop the Tigers 9-0 in 1972.

Slow Start

Harvard dominated from the start, keeping Dennis semi-busy, but without any real good chances.

Until the 7:34 mark that is.

Mark Fusco picked up the pack at the blueline and the loose a screamer that Dennis managed to get his stick in front of but couldn't latch on to. The rebound bounced nicely out to the stick of Chalmers, who gently backhanded it into on open met for a 1-0 Crimson lead and the game-winning goal.

The reset was rather academic. A Ken Code slapshot deflected off a tangle-comprised of Crimson forward Jim Turner and Tiger defensemen Rob Sheuer and past a bewildered Dennis. Turner got the credit for the goal, at 9:22, and Harvard closed out the first period with a 2-0 lead.

Experimental

In period two, the Crimson exhibited some nifty logarithmic expansion, turning the two-goal margin into 6-0 and see-you-tomorrow-night. The Scott Fusco-Greg Olson-Turner line led the change, accounting for three of the four goals.

From then on, it was have fun, pad the scoring totals, and "We want Cornell."

And believe it, they--they being the Harvard hockey fans and the Harvard hockey team--really do.

THE NOTEBOOK. The star of the game, as selected by the Cambridge media Scott Fusco, Lau and Starbuck Scott Fusco's previous hat trick came in that opening slaughter of Dartmouth.