Can't Get R-E-S-P-E-C-T

The Harvard women's tennis team is the Rodney Dangerfield of the national collegiate circuit. It keeps winning, but no one has given the Crimson its deserved recognition.

Even though Harvard has convincingly won three games in a row, the team dropped two spots in the Volvc Tennis rankings, falling to number 25 in the national standings.

The doubles team of Co-Captain Kristin Bland and Jamie Henikoff jumped all the way to number 39 on the Volvo doubles rankings.

Harvard will host two big matches this weekend at Beren Tennis Center. The Crimson will host Brown today and Yale tomorrow. The Bruins should give the Crimson a nice tune-up before the match against Yale tomorrow. Harvard and Yale are the only two undefeated teams left in the league. A league title assures a team of a bid to the NCAA Tournament.

Harvard has also won 29 consecutive Ivy matches. The squad is 33-1 since the 1983 Ivy season. Harvard has gone three matches without losing a set in singles competition and has lost only one set in doubles competition during that stretch.

Yale (15-4) has won nine straight matches. The Elis recorded two big Ivy wins over Penn, 7-2, and Columbia, 5-4, last weekend.

The Harvard men's tennis team will travel to Brown today and Yale tomorrow. If Harvard has any realistic chance of winning the Ivy title, it will have to defeat Brown and Yale. The Crimson is second place behind first-place Princeton.

Not Lax-adaisical: The Harvard women's lacrosse team (7-2 overall, 4-0 Ivy) has lit up the scoreboard this season. In its seven victories, the Crimson has outscored opponents, 82-24. In four Ivy games, Harvard has cashed in 46 times, as opposed to 14 goals from opponents.

Harvard travels to New Haven tomorrow to face Yale, before closing its Ivy slate against Dartmouth Tuesday in Hanover.

Horse-Sense: The Harvard equestrian team competed in its last horse show of the season in Middlebury, Vt., last weekend.

Sophomore Cindy Green won both jumping and equitation in her class, and she placed second in the show via a ride-off with two Tufts riders, Peter Wylde and Stephanie Guerlain. Green, the captain of the equestrian team, will be traveling to the regional tournament. She gained enough points in her competition to move into the intermediate class.

The regionals will be held in New London, N.H., on the campus of Colby-Sawyer College.

If Green wins, she will go to the IHSA (Intercollegiate Horse Show Association) championships in Laurenberg, N.C. during the weekend of May 7.

Other performances came from junior Bridget Bailey, who placed second novice equitation. Junior Marijo Laborde placed fourth in the beginning walk-trot-canter class, while sophomore Ulrike Drees won the beginning walk-trot competition.

Honors: Harvard's Aron Allen and Penn's Doug Smidt were named the Eastern Intercollegiate Baseball League Players of the Week. Aron hit .833 with 10 hits in 12 plate apperances. The third baseman slugged two home runs, two triples, and a double. In Harvard's 15-7 win over Brown, Allen was two-for-four with a grand slam and a triple, knocking in four runs. Allen finished the weekend with another four-ribbie performance against Yale, cracking a solo home run and knocking in three runs on a pair of singles.

Smidt, a powerful lefthander, notched his second Player of the Week nod this season. The Quaker hurler went the distance, allowing six hits, three runs, two walks and striking out 11, while leading Penn to a 4-3 victory over Cornell. He raised his EIBL record to 4-0 in five starts.

In other EIBL news, Columbia's sweep over Army is its first EIBL sweep since April 26, 1986, when the Lions swept Dartmouth.

A coaching milestone was reached this weekend by an EIBL field general. Navy's Joe Duff won his 500th game in the Midshipmen's 1-0 victory over Princeton on Saturday. Duff's record now stands at 501-240-11.

Quote of the Week: "First we took the wind out of their sails. After that, we stormed the ship and overtook them with our hands."--Netman Rob Soni describing how the Crimson defeated Navy.

Contributors: Alvar J. Mattei, Julio Varela.