The Last Time We Met on November 23rd...

Harvard travels to Yale Saturday for the 102nd edition of The Game.

The date will be Nov.23, 1985.

The last time Yale and Harvard got together on a Nov.23, the year was 1968.

And the outcome was miraculous.

Harvard scored 16 points in the final 42 seconds that year to manage a 29-29 tie in a contest many consider one of the greatest football games of all-time.

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Let's get right to the trivia question, which this week concerns the 1968 showdown. The two Harvard players who caught passes in the end zone in the waning seconds of that game both went on to become college head coaches.

One was Vic Gatto, who caught the final touchdown that cut the Yale lead to 29-27. He is now the head football coach at Davidson.

Name the other.

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The most dramatic Harvard-Yale game since 1968 took place 10 years ago, when the Crimson won its only undisputed Ivy League crown.

In that 1975 showdown, Harvard and Yale both took 5-1 league records into The Game. The Elis, riding a five-game winning streak, took an early 7-0 lead.

But the Crimson's Tom Winn scored on a two-yd. run midway through the third quarter. Mike Lynch's kick made it 7-7.

Lynch's big moment, though, came with just 33 seconds left to play. With the title on the line, Lynch angled a 26-yd. field goal through the uprights to-give Harvard a 10-7 victory and its only outright Ivy League crown.

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That 1975 Harvard win evened the series record for years ending in '5' at 4-4-1.

Elsewhere in The Game's Not That It Means Anything But File: of the 38 times Harvard has beaten Yale, it has scored first 34 times. Of the 55 times Yale has beaten Harvard, the Elis have scored first 46 times.

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Three reasons why Harvard (7-2 overall, 5-1 Ivy) will Probably beat Yale (3-4-1 overall, 2-3-1 Ivy):

In the past 10 years, the away team has won The Game seven times.

In the past 10 years, the team entering The Game with the better overall record has won on six of eight occasions.

In the past 10 years, the team entering The Game with the better Ivy record has won seven of nine times.

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There are four possibilities left in the Ivy League title race:

1) Harvard will win the title outright only if-it fares better than Penn (i.e., if Harvard wins, Pennties; Harvard wins, Penn loses; Harvard ties, Penn loses).

2) Penn will win the title outright if it has a better outcome than Harvard Saturday.

3) Penn and Harvard will tie for the crown if both teams have the same result in Saturday's games.

4) Penn, Harvard and Princeton will tie if Penn and Harvard lose and Princeton beats Cornell.

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Harvard might boast a 7-2 record, but its opponents hold the edge in first downs, yards passing, total offense and return yardage.

The reason lies in the fact that the Crimson's opponents have turned the ball over on fumbles or interceptions 15 more times than the Cantabs.

The includes a 12 ratio in the second halves of all games this year, and a 10 ratio in the second halves of the last four games.

All of which has led to an inordinate amount of fourth-quarter success for Harvard. The Crimson has held the ball 81 minutes (60 percent) in the fourth quarter this year.

It has outscored its opponents, 137-65, in the second half this year, and 80-38 in the final quarter.

One interesting note is that senior quarterback Brian White, who has thrown seven interceptions this season, has not thrown an interception in the fourth quarter.

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Checking this week's Saint's File: senior fullback Robert Santiago Saturday turned in his second straight 100-yd.-plus rushing game, marking the first time in his career that he's enjoyed back-to-back 100-yd. games.

Santiago now has cracked the 100-yd. barrier four times in his career, and Harvard is 4-0 in those games.

The Texas native is now fourth on the all-time Harvard rushing list with 1767 yards. He needs 59 yards to move past Dick Clasby '54 into third place and 123 yards to edge out Ted Demars '73 for second.

What's more, the Saint is in fifth place on the single-season rushing list with 765 yards this year. He can move past his 1984 total with 58 more yards and past Bobby Leo '67 and into third place with 63 yards.

* * * Answer to this week's trivia question: Brandeis baseball coach Pete Varney caught the tying two point conversion on the game's final play.

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THE NOTEBOOK'S NOTEBOOK: Harvard has scored in 38 consecutive games. If it scores Saturday, it will tie a team record for most consecutive games with a score...Harvard has never won its last three games under Joe Restic...Harvard's average margin of victory in every win other than Columbia has been eight points...Harvard, winner of three Straight, is looking for its first eight-win season since the 1968 team went 8-0-1...Yale has not won in its last four games this season...The Elis'Carm Cozza is looking for his 100th Ivy League win...Harvard has been outgained this season by four yards...In the series, Harvard and Yale each have won 34 times since 1908. There have beens five ties in that time...Harvard needs six sacks Saturday to tie the school record of 34 set in 1982...Lee Oldenburg leads the team in pass break-ups with 12. Ken-Tarczy is second with 10...Senior kicker Rob Steinberg has moved into fourth place on the Harvard career kicking points list. He has 90 points and needs eight more to move past former NFLer Rich Szaro '71 into third...As a punter, Steinberg has dropped 15 punts inside the 20 and five inside the 10...Santiago has gained three times as much rushing yardage as anyone on the team...White is in third place on the all-time Harvard passing yardage list. He needs 40 yards to pass freshman Coach Joe Kubacki '77 for second place...Harvard picked up just 38 yards rushing last year in The Game.

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THE PICKS: Harvard over Yale, Penn over Dartmouth, Princeton over Cornell, Brown over Columbia.

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The Football Notebook Appears Every Tuesday in The Harvard Crimson.