Singing (the Blues) in the Rain

"He maketh his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust."--Matthew, 5:45.

"When you have weather like that, it drastically affects your game-plan."--Harvard football Coach Joe Restic.

"Very rainy," read the weather report at the Stadium for Saturday's Harvard-Massachusetts football game, "Very wet, very dismal."

That, if anything, was an understatement. Cambridge awoke Saturday morning to a steady drizzle which turned, by game-time, into a steady rain. At times during the contest, the precipitation bordered on a downpour. On the increasingly swampy field, 22 wet, muddy and generally unhappy football players slogged it out in a meaningless non-conference game.

The tone of the contest was set early--on Mass's first two possessions--when the Minutemen managed to fumble on three consecutive plays, losing the ball to the Crimson on the third.

Harvard didn't cash in on that opportunity, but Mass soon did themselves one better: this time the Minutemen fumbled three times on two plays.

On first down, UMass QB Tim Bryant fumbled the snap and was forced to fall on the ball for a loss. On the next play, Bryant tried to pitch to tailback Kevin Smellie but was hit and tossed wildly. The ball bounced right to the running back, who picked it up and promptly fumbled again. The Crimson again recovered.

"They were having a hard time holding onto the ball today," Crimson linebacker Scott Collins said. "We didn't force many fumbles today."

The official final statistics listed UMass with eight fumbles and the Crimson with two, but these numbers are probably too conservative, and don't count numerous juggled snaps and dropped passes.

"Into each life some rain must fall, some days must be dark and dreary."--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

The game was awash with sloppy play, passes that flew over receivers' heads, and receivers who fell down on pass routes.

The rain-crazed Mass kickoff unit got so disoriented at one point that it lined up on the wrong end of the field--at the Harvard 35--after the Minutemen scored a touchdown. Fortunately the officials noticed the problem, and the teams were squared away. It was just one of those days....

"The situation wasn't perfect," Harvard receiver Neil Phillips said. "Your footing wasn't perfect, the throws weren't going to be perfect; things were just going to go wrong. You had to adjust to that out there."

Darkness descended quickly from the cloudy autumn skies. Most of the crowd couldn't see Harvard's last play--a Hail Mary pass to the corner of the endzone--because of the gloom that had engulfed the Stadium.

"Fools have the wit to keep themselves out of the rain,"--Henry Buttes, Dyets Drie Dinner IV.

The official attendance Saturday was listed at 1250. That was probably a generous estimate: the brave soaked crowd at the cavernous Stadium was best described as miniscule.

It was, however, certainly the brightest-colored crowd in recent memory. Aside from the solid red and crimson blocks of the two bands, specks of yellow, blue, maroon and green raincoats, umbrellas and coverings dotted the stands.

A number of spectators watched the game from their cars in the parking lot, peering around the scoreboard to catch glimpses of the action and following along on the radio.

Among the unlucky souls without shelter were the Harvard cheerleaders, who nonetheless managed to remain peppy. At halftime, two of the male Crimson cheerleaders got the bright idea of creating a slidding pit out of the sidelines.

With running starts, the two took turns hurling themselves through the muck. They would emerge, caked with dirt and grass but grinning wildly, and dive through the mud again.

"The quality of mercy is not strain'd, it droppeth as the gentle rain from the heaven upon the place beneath."--Shakespeare, Merchant of Venice.

Crimson Captain Collins was a sight for sore eyes after the game. His face was covered by mud and pieces of grass, and his uniform was completely soaked through. He had played his second consecutive out-standing game, 20 times bringing down an enemy ballcarrier. Right now, though, he looked extremely uncomfortable.

"The rain didn't have a huge effect on the field until the fourth quarter," he was saying. "By that time the field was just a swamp."

The game analyzed, Harvard's captain turned and started trudging to the lockerroom, saying softly as he went: "Right now, I'm just miserable."