Harvard Still in the Hunt for the Ivy League Title

In the well-known book series, A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket, a trio of children undergoes ill-fated events following their parents’ death. There’s Violet, the oldest child who invents ways to get her two siblings out of trouble. There’s Klaus, the middle child who reads a lot. And there’s Sunny, a baby who enjoys biting things and somehow has really advanced problem-solving skills for an infant.

Before the death of their parents, things go swimmingly for the children. But afterwards, things often do not go the way of the Baudelaires. Behind all of their troubles is the evil Count Olaf, a tall guy with a unibrow whose lone goal in life is to disrupt the lives of the Baudelaires.

On the Sixth Saturday of the past two Ivy League football seasons, the Baudelaires’ parents die. Count Olaf comes to town. The lives of three children are ripped asunder. Or, as others might say, Harvard football faces what’s quickly becoming the most dreaded game of its season—Princeton.

Prior to last weekend, the Baudelaires’ lives—henceforth known as the Harvard football team—were mostly unblemished. Yes, there was that eternal issue of injuries plaguing the team—at kicker, at quarterback, at offensive line, and most recently at linebacker, but never before had it had a crippling effect. A 5-0 record evidenced this, as did a general level of confidence entering Saturday’s game.

But something about the arrival of the orange and black uniforms rings of Halloween arriving early in Cambridge—with the scary man behind the door, of course, being a tall, probably unibrowed (though the helmets made it difficult to verify) Princetonian. And on Saturday, there were a number of Count Olafs running around Harvard Stadium.

There were the obvious nemeses—Quinn Epperly and Roman Wilson, the QB-WR combo that had finished off Harvard in the shell-shocking 2012 upset, who appeared in a reincarnation of their last season selves to pull off more last-minute heroics and top Harvard in triple overtime.

There was Caraun Reid and the rest of the Tigers’ defensive line, which combined for seven sacks and made Conner Hempel’s life miserable.

And there was the head Count Olaf himself—coach Bob Surace, who created enemies out of both the Harvard football team and the TV announcers after taking no-huddle offense to the extreme and running plays every five seconds.

Harvard put forth a valiant effort. But even though Violet—let’s give this honor to the veteran Harvard defense—continually bailed out the offense in the second half and gave the team numerous opportunities to win, the versatile and well-oiled machine that was the Princeton offense eventually prevailed.

The suffocating Princeton D-line threw a number of blitzes at Klaus—quarterback Conner Hempel—who tried to read them, but with an inexperienced offensive line, there was little he could do to avoid a seven-man rush.

And Sunny—poor backup Andrew Flesher, the walk-on kicker who stepped in with David Mothander still sidelined—was asked to hit a 50-yard field goal to win the game in the waning seconds of regulation. It seemed almost inevitable that the ball would sail towards the uprights, have enough air behind it, and miss just wide left.

In the books, Violet, Klaus, and Sunny eventually survive the onslaught of Olaf. But on Saturday, Chapter one of the series of unfortunate events was too much for Harvard.

With the departure of Princeton, will the curse lift? Will the Baudelaires prevail? Only time will tell…

DARTMOUTH (3-3, 2-1 Ivy) AT HARVARD (5-1, 2-1 Ivy)

Dartmouth’s 56-0 victory over Columbia demonstrates just one thing: the Big Green has enough people on their roster to put together a football team. It seems that’s the only prerequisite these days to beat (re: completely demolish) the Lions.

So even though Dartmouth is coming into the weekend off of a lopsided win and Harvard may have some self-esteem issues after losing to Princeton and snapping a 15-game home streak, expect a tight game.

Because the Big Green lost to Holy Cross, a game that the Crimson also took to triple overtime—though this one ended with a W—I’m taking Harvard in a close one.

Prediction: Harvard 38, Dartmouth 34

COLUMBIA (0-6, 0-3 Ivy) AT YALE (3-3, 1-2 Ivy)

This game is being televised on the YES network, but if you’re looking for the answer to whether you should watch this game, it’s NO (also, please let me know if you have any idea a) what the YES network is and b) why they’re showing this game).

Yale’s lone Ivy win comes at the expense of one of the two Ivy teams without a single league win—Cornell. The other team with a grand total of zero Ancient Eight victories halfway through the season? Columbia.

This week’s matchup between last season’s bottom finishers may be made even less interesting by the absence of Yale tailback Tyler Varga (apparently so good he has his own tab on the Yale football website), who was injured two weeks ago, and starting quarterback Henry Furman.

But even if the Elis are without Furman and Varga come Saturday, it’s still Columbia, which through three games has been outscored by its Ivy opponents by 93 points.

Prediction: Yale 28, Columbia 7

CORNELL (1-5, 0-3 Ivy) AT PRINCETON (5-1, 3-0 Ivy)

If the Ivy League title race is the USS Enterprise, Princeton is Captain Kirk—in the driver’s seat, in control of its own destiny. With arguably its hardest game—Harvard— out of the way, winning out the season will give the Tigers the title for the first time since 2006.

But Princeton’s been in this position before—last year, the 2012 fourth-quarter meltdown of the Harvard football team gave the Tigers a 3-0 Ivy record.

They finished the season 4-3, tied for third in the league. Perhaps the shock of beating Harvard last year was too much to handle.

However, this year’s Princeton spaceship looks too polished to get tripped up by a Big Red asteroid again. It seems to have overcome its problem of slow starts, something that troubles Cornell. Jeff Mathews and—wait, just kidding, that’s Cornell’s entire team—his NFL-caliber arm won’t be enough to stop a rolling Tigers team back home at Princeton Stadium.

Prediction:  Princeton 52, Cornell 24

PENN (4-2, 3-0 Ivy) AT BROWN (4-2, 1-2 Ivy)

Despite an unbeaten league record, Penn’s playing like the dark horse that they were last season before swooping in to snatch the title in the penultimate game against none other than Harvard. Ivy record aside, their stats are wholly middling, but make no mistake—Penn may not have the flashy plays of Princeton or the (usually) explosive Harvard defensive, but obviously something about the grind-it-out mentality works.

QB Billy Ragone may be hurt for the Quakers, but out goes one veteran, in steps another 5th-year play-caller in Ryan Becker (seriously, where do they keep finding these guys?). If both are back, look for some exploitation of Brown’s secondary, which is 5th in the league in pass defense.

Penn will likely be looking at this as a stepping stone to the showdown of the Killer P’s—the following week’s matchup with Princeton—but don’t count out Brown to put up a fight.

Prediction: Penn 24, Brown 17

—Staff writer Samantha Lin can be reached at samantha.Lin@thecrimson.com. Follow her on twitter @linsamnity