Harvard's Problems In Spotlight

Can 60 Minutes be far behind? Chris Dufresne of the Los Angeles Times prowled the Harvard campus recently and filed a story that began this way:

The team captain, an all-league linebacker, is kicked off the team and charged with domestic assault after allegedly breaking into his girlfriend's dorm room.

The quarterback is suspended five games for violating team rules, but details of his transgression are kept secret by the school.

A senior running back is dismissed because of actions the coach calls "disgusting" during an annual preseason "Skit Night."

These are only a few of the story lines generated by a single football team during the last year, incidents that seem to go hand-in-hand nowadays with big-time college sports.

Except never before has the team been Harvard, one of the world's most prestigious universities.

The Los Angeles Times story, by the way, included this back-hand slap at Dartmouth, delivered by Harvard alum and former NFL punter Pat McInally.

McInally says Harvard football was different in the 1970s.

"If you won too many titles, it was a negative," he said. "Then you were becoming Dartmouth."

Sean Barker of the New Haven Register quotes Yale coach Jack Siedlecki on the emphasis he put this week on stopping Mike Fritz from making plays outside of the pocket this afternoon:

"We're going to face the quarterback, rush the quarterback and contain the quarterback. We're not going to spin around and lose him. That's my first priority."

Be sure to check out Sean's fine blog, Portal 31, for additional coverage of the game.

I saw something I don't think I've ever seen before in a Harvard Crimson blog: a prediction that a football team is going to score 11 points. The prediction: Yale 23-11.

The Journal and Courier, which covers Purdue, has a story about Boilermakers defensive backs coach Lou Anarumo, a former Harvard assistant. He says: "At Harvard you're dealing with kids who literally are rocket scientists sometimes." But he goes on to say that while the players are highly motivated, intelligence doesn't always carry over to the field.

A subscriber sent along a link to this AP story about North Dakota taking the NCAA to court over its Fighting Sioux nickname. Got to admit, the North Dakota folks make the NCAA look a little foolish regarding what it portrays as selective enforcement of its "mascot" rules. From the story:

The North Dakota lawsuit says UND does not have a mascot and points out that that Florida State has a "stereotypical Native American" riding a horse.

"During every home football game, the mascot rides onto the football field and throws a flaming spear or lance into the ground at midfield," the state's lawsuit says. "The FSU marching band, called the 'Chiefs,' perform and lead the student body in what is called the 'war chant,' accompanied by a chopping motion often referred to as the 'tomahawk chop.'"