Squash Team Hosts Cornell; Crimson Is Heavy Favorite

Harvard's varsity squash team returns to action today when it hosts Cornell in an Ivy League match at 2 p.m. on the Hemenway Courts. The Crimson has been inactive since extending its unbeaten string to five games with a 9-0 victory over Williams on January 15.

Today's match with Cornell should offer less excitement to the Crimson squad than a typical afternoon of intramural challenges.

The Big Red has never attracted squash players to its freshman class, and the sport is not heavily emphasized by the athletic department. Cornell traditionally faces challenging matches with Rochester, Colgate and Syracuse and receives humiliating losses at the hands of Ivy opponents.

This year, the Big Red does not even have an individual star to spice up the team routs. Cornell topped Rochester, 6-3, but has been shut out by Penn. Yale, Princeton and Army, Army was a 9-0 victim of Harvard back in December.

The Crimson has maintained the momentum it built in December and January. The team is healthy, and several members of the squad played in individual tournaments at Plainfield and Atlantic City, N.J., during the exam break.

Lesser Challenges

Harvard will face lesser challenges from Cornell and Princeton this week before preparing for the national championship at Detroit, February 19, and for the team match with Penn that should determine the intercollegiate champion.

Peter Briggs, number one on the Crimson squad, now ranks as the top player in collegiate competition to date. Williams number one, who lost to Briggs, beat Penn's Palmer Page in their January match.