Ivy Football Preview | No quarterback, no end in sight

Already losers of 16 straight, Dartmouth will be without quarterback Alex Jenny this weekend after the senior dislocated his right (throwing) elbow last week in a 38-7 loss to Yale.

Throw in the fact the Big Green (0-4, 0-2 Ivy) must travel to Worcester, Mass., to face No. 25 Holy Cross (4-1), and it’s safe to say loss number 17 will come tomorrow after the teams kick off at Fitton Field at 1 p.m.

“We were knocked for a bit of a loop when Alex went down last week, no doubt,” Big Green coach Buddy Teevens told Dartmouth Athletics. “It certainly deflated us, and it showed in the result.”

With a critical Patriot League matchup against No. 17 Colgate next week, this game might sound like a classic trap situation for Holy Cross. But considering the Crusaders were upset last week by an Ivy team — Brown beat them 34-31 on a last-second field goal — and it’s Homecoming, they certainly aren’t overlooking their Ancient Eight opponent.

Historically, the series has been very close, as the teams are tied 34-34-4 all-time. However, Holy Cross has dominated the series recently, winning each of the last five. Teevens, who also was Dartmouth coach from 1987 to 1991 before he was rehired in 2005, is 0-9 all-time versus the Crusaders.

Princeton at Brown

The last time an Ivy Champion football team finished with two losses was in 1982 when Dartmouth, Harvard and Penn split the title (no two-loss team has ever won the League outright).

So when Princeton (1-3, 0-1) and Brown (2-2, 0-1) play tomorrow, they’ll both try to avoid the death knell that is the dreaded second conference loss.

Not only will a win keep these teams’ Ivy championship hopes alive, but a victory could even indicate that a championship is to come. Both squads have had big wins over the other in each team’s last Ivy championship year: Last year the Bears won 31-10 and in 2006 the Tigers won 17-3.

Lafayette at Harvard

If Lafayette played in the Ivies instead of the Patriot League, then its road game at Harvard tomorrow would be billed as the Ivy game of the year.

Both teams have just a single loss to top 30 teams (Harvard lost, 27-20, to No. 25 Holy Cross; Lafayette lost, 19-13, to Liberty, which currently is receiving the most votes after Holy Cross).

But more importantly, neither team has lost to an Ancient Eight squad. Harvard (3-1, 2-0) has gone 2-0 against Brown and Cornell, while Lafayette (4-1) has won all three of its “Ivy” games (Penn, Yale, Columbia).

A win could very well vault either team into the top 25, as the Crimson received the 28th-most votes in the most recent poll, while Lafayette was 32nd.

The Leopards went 3-0 against Ivy teams in 1982, but they’ve never gone 4-0 in a single season. And if recent history is an indication that accomplishment will remain out of reach: Lafayette has lost six straight to the Crimson.

Yale at Lehigh

If Harvard and Lafayette are playing a huge game, then the other half of “The Game” and “The Rivalry”— Yale and Lehigh, respectively — are playing a relatively unimportant game.

The Bulldogs (2-2, 1-1) might have a .500 record but the two wins were over winless teams, 0-6 Georgetown and 0-4 Dartmouth. Lehigh (1-4) has struggled in its own right, with its only win also coming against the lowly Hoyas (though it won 27-0 at home while Yale won 31-10 in Washington).

Though the series started in 1890, these teams haven’t played often, with Yale ahead 14-5. However, the Bulldogs have never won at Goodman Stadium.

Fordham at Cornell

As Fordham makes the four-hour drive from New York City to Ithaca, N.Y. tomorrow, the teams will celebrate the 100th anniversary of their first meeting in 1909 with Cornell.

Yet despite the centennial anniversary, the two teams have played a whopping total of six games.

Cornell (2-2, 1-1) leads the all-time series 4-2 and will be hosting the Rams (2-3) on Homecoming. The Big Red are 5-2 all-time against Patriot League teams on Homecoming, though they’ve never faced the Rams on that day.

Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.