Brown Tops Aquawomen On Fourth Period Surge

It took them all of two games to meet their match.

Yesterday afternoon in its second ever varsity game, the Harvard women's water polo team ran into archrival Brown at the IAB, and despite the momentum that came from its 22-0 masacre of BC in game one on Wednesday, the Crimson stumbled in the fourth quarter and dropped a tough 13-9 decision to the Bruins.

But in the early going yesterday, things looked very good for the fledgling Crimson.

Really good, in fact until Brown showed up, over an hour late. And really good for the first half, which ended with the aquawomen ahead, 6-5.

Fairly good through the third period, in which the Crimson fell behind by a goal Good again when 16-seconds into the fourth quarter Kelly Withy reknotted everything at eight.

And after the Bruins went up again, Cathy Ysrael took advantage of a man-up situation to close the gap to zero one more times, this one with just 4:21 left.

But Harvard's first ever victory over Brown--which it had met many times before as a club team--had to wait, as the Bruins jumped past the worn out Crimson with three goals in less than two minutes.

Ysrael led the Harvard attack, with four scores. The Bruins countered with the best polo player that the Crimson will face this year--Suzie Janzen, who notched five tallies and dominated inside play at both ends of the pool.

Ultimately, the more experienced Brown team was better able to protect its lead than the Crimson, which never quite put the Bruins away when it had the chances.

"You can't count on fast breaks to protect a lead." Harvard Coach Steve Pike said, "Once you get ahead you've got to control the ball."

Pike was confident that with time and game experience the Crimson's problems would disappear.

"They're [the problems] things they've worked on heard about and tried, but haven't had to do in a game, he said.

The Crimson play was not without bright spots. The aquawomen played stingy defense all day, and except for problems defending against Brown drivers, were very aggressive in their own end. And on offense, the key, too was aggressive attacking.

On Tuesday, the team travels to Providence to take on the Bruins again. Despite the fact that the Crimson will undoubtedly find Smith Swimming Center faster than the Bruins found the IAB. Harvard will try to use yesterday's experience to notch its first-ever win over Brown in what will only be its third-ever varsity game.

THE NOTEBOOK: Despite the late change from Blodgett to the IAB and the delayed start, the contest drew a vocal crowd of over 60...In addition to Ysrael, other Crimson scorers were Withy, who had two. Martha Wood, who had six against B.C., Kristan Johnson and Allison Greis...The team has a long history, but was given varsity status earlier this winter by the Athletic Department...Brown is the reigning Eastern water polo powerhouse--neither Harvard's men or women has beaten the Bruins in the memory of anyone now associated with the sport.