Football: Harvard 24, Lafayette 14

The Harvard football team beat Lafayette to run its 2014 record to 5-0.

Paul Stanton Jr. ’16 (number 29) rumbled for 102 yards--43 coming on a blast up the middle that pushed the Crimson lead to 17-0 at halftime.
Ben Braunecker ’16 beat Lafayette defensive back Matt Smalley to haul in a pass from quarterback Scott Hosch--then hauled Smalley across the goal to give the Crimson a 24-0 bulge.
Linebacker Eric Medes ’16 (number 49), with nine tackles, and defensive lineman Dan Moody ’16 (number 98), whose two tackles included a sack, led a host of Harvardians who continually surrounded Lafayette ballcarriers and did not let the Leopards offense get on the board until the fourth quarter.
One on one: Harvard wide receiver Andrew Fischer ’16 proved ultra-elusive to his opposite number, Jared Roberts. Fischer had 237 all-purpose yards and his 78-yard second-quarter touchdown reception is the eighth longest scoring pass in Crimson history.

There were 7,177 people at the Stadium on Saturday to watch the football game between Harvard and Lafayette. This was only about 193,000 fewer, give or take 100,000,  than the throng lining the banks of the nearby Charles River to view the Head of the Charles regatta. Picking up on the theme of the day, the Crimson footballers encountered some choppy waters near the finish of a workmanlike 24-14 victory over the plucky Leopards.

The win completed an undefeated half-season for Harvard, which is now 5-0. It also was the Crimson’s eleventh straight nonconference victory, and will be its last in 2014; the five remaining games are all Ivy League contests. “It’s hard to be undefeated at this time of year, so mission accomplished,” said Harvard coach Tim Murphy afterward. That said, “the only thing we are completely happy with is our effort,” he added. “We have to play better to reach our goal”—an eighth Ivy title during Murphy’s 21-year tenure.

If the Crimson doesn’t lift its game next week at Princeton or the following week at Dartmouth, it probably will be playing only for pride in the final three weeks. Against Lafayette, big plays allowed Harvard to build a 17-0 halftime lead and a 24-7 margin at the end of the third quarter. Nonetheless, overall the Leopards, using the superb all-around play of back Ross Scheuerman (78 yards rushing, eight receptions, and one touchdown),  outgained the Crimson, 440 yards to 367. Six times, the Harvard offense went three downs and out, and it converted only three of 16 third-down chances. Harvard committed seven penalties, including three holding calls whistled on All-Ivy center Nick Easton ’15 and a dead-ball foul on linebacker Eric Medes ’16. Quarterback Scott Hosch ’16, playing in place of nominal first-stringer Connor Hempel ’15  for the fourth game in a row, was hit-and-miss, going 11-for 24 for 203 yards and two touchdowns—three, actually, if you count the pick-six he threw to Lafayette defensive back Phillip Parham. Had the Leopards’ Ryan Gralish not missed two makeable field goals, this one might have been a nail-biter.

The fact that Harvard wasn’t really challenged was due (again) to its defense, which in the first half kept the Leopards caged. Captain Norman Hayes ’15 set the tone early by coming up from his free safety position to (in today’s parlance) “blow up” Lafayette receiver Justin Adams on a slant pass. Later, the captain nailed Scheuerman for an eight-yard loss. For the game, Hayes had four tackles; his secondary mates, juniors Sean Ahern and Scott Peters, had eight and seven stops, respectively. Junior linebackers Medes and Jake Lindsey led the D with nine tackles, while classmate Matt Koran added eight. And the sackmeister, defensive end Zack Hodges ’15, twice nailed Leopards quarterbacks to push his Crimson career sacks record to 24. In the words of defensive lineman Dan Moody ’16,  who had a sack of his own, Hodges’s mere presence opens things up for his mates by “creating paranoia in the backfield.”

Harvard took the lead in the first quarter. Culminating a 14-play, 61-yard drive in which the Crimson twice converted on fourth down, Andrew Flesher ’15 booted a 24-yard field goal—making the game the 163rd straight in which Harvard has scored: a new Ivy record.

In the second quarter came the game’s biggest play, courtesy of Harvard’s quicksilver receiver Anthony Fischer ’16. From the Harvard 22 on third down-and-20, the Crimson lined up in a formation featuring two tight ends, Ben Braunecker ’16 and Anthony Firkser ’17. At the snap, the movement of the Harvard offensive line seemed to indicate a play to the right. Instead, Hosch fired a slant pass to the left sideline and Fischer, who plucked it and took a jab step toward the boundary. In front of him were his two blockers—Braunecker and Firkser, sealing the Lafayette defenders. “My main goal was just to work the first down,” Fischer said afterward.  He got that and then some, racing all the way down the sideline to the end zone. It was one of Fischer’s six catches (to go along with two scintillating second-half kickoff returns)—and the eighth-longest touchdown pass in Crimson history.  (And of those, possibly the shortest in the air.) For Lafayette, it was unforgivable.  “Our guys exchanged wrong,” Leopards coach Frank Tavani said glumly, after the game. Flesher added the point after: 10-0 Crimson.

Another quick strike came right before halftime. With 2:13 left, Harvard took the ball at its own 24. Hosch found Braunecker in a seam of the defense for 21 yards to move the ball to the Lafayette 43. On the next play, running back Paul Stanton Jr. ’16 blew through an enormous hole and simply ran straight to the end zone. Flesher’s point after touchdown gave Harvard a 17-0 halftime lead. (Stanton would finish with 102 yards on 17 carries.)

The Crimson stretched its margin in the third quarter when Hosch and Braunecker hooked up for a 31-yard touchdown, with the tight end making  a beautiful double move (first out, then upfield) that beat defensive back Matt Smalley. Another Flesher point after followed.

The 24-point margin appeared safe, but then Hosch made his biggest blooper. From the Harvard 29, he fired out to the right flat. Parham jumped the route and trotted in with a clear path to the goal. Suddenly it was 24-7. It bade to become even more of a ballgame when Lafayette went on an 82-yard drive. When that bogged down, Gralish tried a chip-shot 26-yard field goal. Wide right. Harvard had dodged a bullet. In the fourth quarter, Lafayette scored the game’s final touchdown with 6:05 remaining, on a 20-yard, needle-threading pass from Blake Searfoss to Scheuerman. The Leopards had carried the play for much of the second half, but time just ran out on them.

Whew! Five down, five to go. Now we may perhaps to begin.

 

Weekend roundup

Yale 45, Colgate 31
Penn 31, Columbia 7
Dartmouth 24, Holy Cross 21
Lehigh 31, Cornell 14
Princeton 27, Brown 16

 

Coming up: Next Saturday, Harvard returns to Ivy League play at Princeton. Kickoff: 1 p.m. (The game will be telecast on ESPN3.) The schools were Ivy co-champions last year; this season, the Tigers are 3-2 and, like Harvard and Dartmouth, 2-0 in Ivy play. Princeton leads the overall series 54-45-7, but Harvard holds a 29-27-2 edge since the founding of the Ivy League in 1956.

Pregame thoughts, some sobering:

  • Both teams come in with statistical superlatives. Among Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) teams, Harvard is third in scoring defense (11.2 points per game). Princeton is first in rushing defense (61 yards per game), Harvard fifth (83.2). The Crimson has allowed the FCS's fewest first downs (88); Princeton is fifth (95). Both teams are opportunistic. Princeton is third in red-zone offense, having scored 95.5 percent of the time it has gotten inside the opponent's 20; Harvard is sixth (94.1 percent). But one comparison should set off alarms in Cambridge: The Tigers have the FCS's third-fewest penalty yards per game (37.40); the Crimson, with 67.40 yards per game, is eighty-second.
  • In Bob Surace’s four seasons as coach of his alma mater, Harvard has not stopped the Tigers offense. The Crimson won the first two years, 45-28 and 56-39, and lost the next two, 39-34 and 51-48 (triple overtime).
  • In quarterback Quinn Epperly (the 2013 Ivy League Offensive Player of the Year),  the Tigers have one of the most shiver-inducing foes in Crimson history. Two years ago, he capped one of Princeton’s greatest comebacks ever—from 24 points down with less than 12 minutes remaining—by tossing a 36-yard touchdown pass to Roman Wilson with 13 seconds left. That game was also, quite simply, among Harvard’s ghastliest defeats, arguably the obverse of “Harvard Beats Yale, 29-29.” But Epperly topped himself last year in the 3 OT epic at the Stadium, running for 86 yards and completing 37 passes in 50 attempts for six touchdowns—with no interceptions.
  • Epperly did not play against Brown on Saturday, a victim of turf toe (strain to the ligaments around the big toe joint). Dropoff? Did someone say dropoff? Senior Connor Michelson stepped in and went 33 of 45, passing for 367 yards and two TDs.
  • While Hosch has done well, he has not demonstrated that he can match the best of Hempel. Murphy hedged as to whether Hempel (25 of 47 and 4 TDs against Princeton last year) will be available for the Tigers; even if he is, he will have to shake off rust.
  • The more Epperly (and/or Michelson) is on the field, the worse Harvard’s chance. Besides a huge effort from the defense, the Crimson needs ball control, meaning a big game from ground-pounding running backs Stanton and/or Andrew Casten ’16.

 To win, it’s simple: Harvard will need to play its best game to date—and do it on the road. Because Princeton will not beat itself.

 

Score by quarters

Harvard                 3                14                7              0      24
Lafayette               0                  0               7              7       14                               

Attendance: 7,177

 

 

 

 

Read more articles by: Dick Friedman

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