Harvard looks to avoid island loss

If Harvard’s game at Columbia tomorrow could be summed up by a movie title, it would be “Escape from New York.”

Sure New York hasn’t been turned into a maximum security prison, and Kurt Russell won’t be in attendance (Kate Hudson only likes one New York team), but the Crimson are hoping to escape Baker Field still undefeated in the Ivy League with co-leader Penn coming up to Boston next Saturday.

Save for a 24-21 victory over Brown, Harvard (5-2, 4-0 Ivy) has torn up the Ivy League, winning by an average margin of 24.33 points in its other three League games.

The Lions (2-5, 1-3) looked to be contenders early in the season after a couple of impressive wins, but are now on a four-game losing streak and yet again will not finish with an overall record above .500 (they last did so in 1996).

Last week the Lions had a 12-point lead against Yale in the fourth quarter before giving up two scores to lose, 23-22. But they were without seven starters due to injury.

One missing starter was quarterback M. A. Olawale, a dual-threat option. However, he should be back this week and Harvard coach Tim Murphy knows he’s a key player for Columbia.

“M.A. Olawale is the Ivy League equivalent of Tim Tebow, so you have to be assignment-oriented,” Murphy said during the Ivy football teleconference. “We know they can throw the ball but we’ve got to stop the run.”

Brown (4-3, 2-2 Ivy) at Yale (4-3, 2-2)

Brown travels to Yale tomorrow in a battle of the two two-loss teams in the Ivy League.

So naturally the Bulldogs should get a boost from playing at home in the Yale Bowl, right?

Actually, in the last 13 of the these teams’ 113 matchups the away team has won 10 times, including last year’s 13-3 Yale upset in Providence, R.I.

That was the only loss for the Bears last year in conference play, and forced them to settle for a split championship with Harvard.

This year the stakes are significantly lower, as neither team has a realistic shot at the title (it would take Harvard and Penn to both lose twice in their remaining three games for either the Bears or Bulldogs to grab a share of the crown).

These teams are trending in different directions: Brown lost an overtime game against Penn last week, while Yale came back to squeak out a one-point victory over Columbia in New York.

Cornell (2-5, 1-3) at Dartmouth (1-6, 1-3)

Cornell might be on a five-game losing streak — the longest current skid in the Ivies — but it just might get the best possible medicine this weekend: a game with lowly Dartmouth.

The Big Green clearly have performed the worst of any Ivy League team, as they’re the only one-win squad. Also, before an upset of Columbia, they had lost 17 in a row.

Ironically, since the bottom four teams in the League all have a 1-3 conference record (Columbia and Princeton in addition to these two), the winner of the this game will be guaranteed to at least be tied for fourth.

But if Dartmouth wants to jump up four spots in the rankings, they’ll have to find a suitable replacement for standout running back Nick Schwieger. The sophomore broke his hand against Harvard last week, and will miss the rest of the season. Even after missing nearly three quarters against Harvard, he still leads the League with 89.4 rushing yards per game.

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