Soccer Blanks Princeton,1-0; Carrillo Tallies Lone Score

The big question for Harvard before it took the field for Saturday's women's soccer team against Princeton was one of character: did the Crimson have it. or didn't it?

Three days earlier, the squad had faced the University of Connecticut and lost, 4-2, for its first defeat of the season. Now the Princeton Tigers had arrived in town with their number-four national ranking, and the booters were being asked to pick themselves up by their bootstraps, step into center ring and tame the big cats from New Jersey.

They did exactly that.

The Crimson welcomed its opponents to the big tent known as Harvard by confidently dominating Princeton for a 1-0 victory that was, as they say, nowhere near as close as it sounds. By beating the Tigers to the ball and establishing their passing lanes, the Harvard booters so controlled the flow of the game that Princeton rarely was able to break out of its end of the field by the second half.

"We responded well," coach Bob Scalise said. "We were down after the UConn game, and I had to tell the team, 'Look, you lost a game, but you're still a good team.' We came out today and played loose and relaxed. Looking good against a good team is what it's all about."

The victory is sure to raise the booters' own national ranking of ten, and it puts them in control of the Ivy standings with a 3-0 record. The win increases the team's overall record to 9-1.

Those among the large crowd at the Business School field Saturday who believed that history repeats itself had little reason to be optimistic about Harvard's chances. Last year Princeton hosted a Crimson squad that carried an identical 8-1 record with an identical loss to UConn and sent the booters back to Cambridge to lick the wounds of a 4-1 mauling. This year, however, Scalise and the team were determined to be prepared.

Pumped

True to prediction, Princeton came out pumped--"they wanted to beat us bad," Scalise said--with an intensity that wasn't limited to just the playing field. Coach Bob Malekoff established an early pattern of loudly berating the officials, and at one point in the half, a Tiger partisan contributed, "We can't get beat by Harvard; they're our worst people to lose to."

The Crimson came out in the first half and filled its role admirably as well. Strong mid-field support, especially from seniors Inga Larson and Cat Ferrante and freshman Jenny Greeley helped establish the Tiger threats. The Crimson outshot Princeton, 12-6.

The second half of the game saw Scalise's game plan going into effect, as Princeton became ragged from chasing Harvard passes and gave Crimson forwards Kelly Landry and Alycia Carrillo valuable time to handle the ball.

At 12:30 of the half Carrillo took advantage of a heaven-sent opportunity. Charging a back pass from Tiger fullback Gloria Hammond to goalie Kelly O'Dell, Carrillo found herself all alone in front of the net when the ball slipped through O'Dell's grasp. She forcefully knocked the ball into the open goal for the game's only score.