Women Return With Ivy Championship to Boot

The following question came from the Crimson Sport Cube's SAT (Successful Athletic Teams) booklet:

1. The Harvard women's soccer team (fill in the blank)

a. ...is so tough that it held triple practice sessions this fall.

b. ...has a "kickline" whose speed and precision make the Radio City Rockettes look like high school cheerloaders.

c. ...has a defense system that is so strong it violates the Salt II agreement.

d. ...is the defending Ivy League champion.

e. ...is all the above and much more.

If you selected the correct answer, "e", you win a full length poster of captains Ellen Hart, Julie Brynteson and Stephie Baum; if you chose a different response you have to settle for one of coach Bob Scalise.

Bob's bevy of booters finished the 1978 season with a 13-1 record and the Ivy League crown; and they had such a good time doing it that about 18 players, including the entire forward line, have returned to form the bulwark of this year's squad.

The front line of Sue St. Louis, Ellen Hart, Cat Ferrante and Julie Brynteson, all of whom received All-Ivy recognition last year, make up the "gang of four" which could terrorize a team more than a Chinese invasion.

As a freshman, St. Louis led the team in goals, scoring 17 times. To dispel any comments about beginner's luck, she came back the next year with 20 goals and the top scorer's title again. It would be no surprise to anyone if she repeated the performance this fall.

"Sue amazes me. She's such an exceptional athlete," Scalise said in an interview last year. "She's very gifted and fast. She's determined. She does what is very difficult for a coach to get than straight-up set blocking, to hold off the opposition.

Overall, Harvard's season resembles one grand "IF." If the team avoids injury, if St. John can deliver some passing, if the lines fill out the holes, if the players absorb the Multiflex--then there may be some success.

Even Restic is plagued with "its." "If our defense can get the job done, and if we can develop a kicking game it will take the pressure off our offense," he said. That will help.

In the wings, Joe Restic harbors one intangible, his "13th man." No. 12, Restic says, is the substitute who is sure to come off the bench sometime during the year and give the team a certain spark that leads to victory. But No. 13, Restic says, is spirit, the one asset this Harvard team has in abundance.

Again with an "if," Restic says, "We can't get down, because if we lose our spirity it's going to be a long, hard year."

Amen, Joe