Football looks to Rebound Against Fordham

After a bitterly disappointing trip to the backwoods of New York last week, the Harvard football team wants a completely different ambiance tomorrow when it travels to the Bronx to face the Fordham Rams.

Luckily for the Crimson (2-2, 1-1 Ivy), the Rams (0-5, 0-3 Patriot) have been an under-whelming team at best this season. Fordham has averaged only 12 points per game while allowing their opponents 40 points per outing. So it's no surprise that the Rams have started the season winless.

Harvard will look to dominate all phases of the game offensively. On the ground, the Rams have allowed 263 yards per game, and through the air they have given up 310 yards per contest.

The Crimson passing attack should be able to exploit a Fordham defense that has been far from spectacular. Opposing quarterbacks have gone 78-of-139 for eight touchdowns and 913 yards this season against the Rams.

Harvard senior quarterback Brad Wilford, who completed 17-of-30 passes for 183 yards against Cornell, should be excited to attack the Rams' passing defense.

An area of concern for the offense is the health of wide receiver Terence Patterson who caught 6 passes for 77 yards against Cornell.

"[Patterson] hurt his shoulder in last week's game," Wilford said. "He didn't practice until [Thursday] this week. He's fine and he will be in the lineup."

When Patterson and the other Crimson receivers get open, Wilford should be standing untouched in the pocket due to the emergence of the offensive line. The line has steadily improved its ability to pass protect this season.

"I think that the offensive line really played well against Cornell," Coach Tim Murphy said.

Although its performance was fairly solid against Cornell, the game was marred by numerous penalties for the offensive line. The line's inexperience explains much of the problem and the Crimson looks for the penalties to decrease against the Rams.

Additionally, Fordham's anemic pass rush--which has managed only 4 sacks all season--should pose no threat to Wilford and the offensive line.

Although Harvard should be able to throw with ease against the Rams, the Crimson will strive for a balanced offensive attack.

"We're not going to look to only one aspect of our offense," Murphy said. "We're going to look to be balanced and give them lots of different looks offensively."

Indeed, it may be difficult to decide which aspect of the Fordham defense to attack. Although the Rams have given up 182 yards per game through the air, they've also yielded over 250 yards on the ground per game to go along with a disappointing 6.1 yards per rushing attempt.

The Crimson ground attack, which leads the Ivy League in rushing offense with 202 yards per game, will look to up that average against the Rams.

Senior tailback Chris Menick, who ran for 115 yards against Cornell, and junior tailback Chuck Nwokocha, who added 110 yards against the Big Red, will carry the bulk of the load again against Fordham.

Meanwhile, on defense, Harvard should be able to force Fordham into a one-dimensional attack.

"Their offensive line really isn't mature enough to run the ball," Murphy said. "So they'll probably look to pass against us."

Fordham may also be persuaded to pass by looking at the film of Harvard's past two games. In each of its past two contests the Crimson has been victimized through the air in the final minutes of the game.

"We have to prove that we can stop the pass at crunch time," Murphy said. "And we have to get to the quarterback."

Cornell scored fourteen points last Saturday in the final four minutes of the game against Harvard. Big Red quarterback Ricky Rahne was almost wholly responsible for that comeback, with two scoring passes in the final four minutes.

The week before, Colgate's quarterback Ryan Vena led his team to a win over Harvard by directing his offense on a game-winning 69-yard drive--most of those yards coming through the air--in the final two minutes. The drive culminated in a game-winning 33-yard field goal.

Nevertheless, Harvard has the top passing efficiency defense in the Ivy League, allowing only 4 touchdowns and picking off opposing quarterbacks 9 times.

Fordham uses two quarterbacks, junior Matt Georgia and sophomore Mark Carney. Carney takes the majority of the snaps and averages 148 yards passing per game.

Georgia averages only 66 yards per game but he hasn't been used nearly as much as Carney has been.

No matter which quarterback has been behind center for the Rams, the offensive line has been unable to protect him. Fordham quarterbacks have been sacked 21 times this season.

Harvard's senior-laden defensive front should be able to make both Ram quarterbacks experience long afternoons. The Crimson's defensive line should be able to exploit Fordham's lack of experience on the offensive line.

The defensive line's advantage should be enhanced by Fordham's inability to run the football. The Rams only average 63 yards per game on the ground.

This imbalance in the Fordham offense will allow the Harvard defensive line to focus on putting pressure on the passer.

A major concern for the Crimson is that the players won't be emotionally ready and take this game for granted.

"We've had some decent practices this week but nothing great," Murphy said. "It hasn't been up to the standard it should be."

Football is indeed a game of emotion and the Crimson can't afford to think that it can roll over any teams especially coming off of two straight losses.

If Harvard comes out mentally prepared for the contest, which is likely following the heartbreaking losses of the past two weeks, this game looks to be just as much of a mismatch on the field as it is on paper.