GAME OF THE YEAR: Long Day's Journey into Night

For 122 years, it had become a signature event of New England sports. Everything that could have happened, did—an unforgettable Crimson 29-29 “win” in 1968, the purported strangling of real bulldogs by Harvard coaches, the Crimson’s first of six national championships 116 years ago.

Its reputation had preceded it—the action on the field had begun to gain a secondary relevance.

Apparently, someone forgot to tell that to the 2005 Harvard football team.

In a series that had offered everything imaginable since its inception in 1875, the now-annual year-end football game between Harvard and Yale achieved new heights in 2005. It lived up to its nickname: “The Game.”

The Game was more than the fifth straight win for either team in series history. Or the first triple-overtime contest in Ivy League football history.

No, Harvard’s 30-24 victory over the Bulldogs in front of a bipartisan crowd of 53,213 at the Yale Bowl in New Haven, Conn. was a game that will be remembered for a limitless number of reasons.

“It was obviously a great way to end our season, but more importantly, I think it was one of the great games in Harvard history, maybe on par with the 29-29 tie in 1968,” Crimson coach Tim Murphy said. “I know for us it had a kind of surreal feeling at the end with darkness falling and the students taking the field. It’s a game that none of us who were there will ever forget.”

If not for junior running back Clifton Dawson’s two-yard touchdown scamper on the second possession of the third overtime, it may have turned out to be the series’ second tie. As the sun set over southern Connecticut and a stadium without lights, the possibility that the game would be called due to darkness was almost fitting.

Almost fitting for a game with nine turnovers—four during the extra frames—an 18-point second-half comeback, and ample opportunities for each team to claim victory.

Almost. But considering Harvard’s resiliency—from sophomore Steve Williams’ 18-yard interception return for a touchdown to sophomore quarterback Liam O’Hagan’s 22-yard touchdown strike to freshman Alex Breaux to junior defensive tackle Mike Berg’s first career interception in overtime—fate made a Crimson victory seemingly inevitable.

“I think it illustrates the great intangibles our kids have,” Murphy said. “They play hard all the time and they never give up, and it really was a tribute to our senior class.”

It was a senior class that never lost to Yale, the second consecutive graduating class to have accomplished the feat.

“As a senior you’re always going to remember the Harvard-Yale game for the rest of your life, and a triple-overtime victory, you can’t beat that,” captain Erik Grimm said. “Winning all four years is a huge accomplishment for the senior class.”

It was also a huge accomplishment considering the circumstances. A Brown win that same day against conference doormat Columbia, a virtual certainty, meant no share of an Ivy title for the Crimson. In the big picture, Harvard could look forward only to a second-place-tie with Princeton and some big bragging rights.

“There was definitely the exhilaration of beating Yale,” Grimm said. “That day and that weekend, that’s kind of all you thought about, going out on top, having a big victory like that, going out on top over Yale.”

Few thought that Harvard’s earlier extra-frame triumph of 2005, a double-overtime thriller over eventual champion Brown in the team’s home-opener at Harvard Stadium, could be topped in terms of excitement. The Game, after all, is much more than its name suggests. It’s an event, one that starts before and ends after the game itself.

But this year, it was the nearly four hours of action on the field that made the 2006 edition historic.

“I’m so happy to be a part of this,” Grimm said after the win. “I’m just proud of our team.”

—Staff writer Malcom A. Glenn can be reached at mglenn@fas.harvard.edu.