Batsmens' Bats Spring to Life Against MIT

The cold weather is back.

And so are the Crimson bats.

It was a windy and rainy day down the river at MIT, but the Harvard baseball team (7-15 overall, 2-6 EIBL) pounded out eight runs against the Engineers to come away with its third straight victory, 8-3 yesterday.

"Hopefully, we can get a little winning streak going now," rightfielder Ted Decareau said.

With no dugouts at MIT's baseball field, the Crimson could have been done in by the cold, but two home runs and five shutout innings from starter Sean Johnston carried Harvard to victory.

Decareau was the hitting star for the Crimson, going 3-for-5. He got Harvard on the scoreboard in the second--singling, reaching second on a fielder's choice, stealing third and scoring on a Dan Scanlan sacrifice fly.

Decareau did more damage in the Crimson's four-run fourth inning, cranking a two-run homer that plated Marcel Durand in front of him. Shortstop Dave O'Connell's two-run single extended the lead to 5-0.

MIT chipped away at Harvard's advantage, touching Crimson hurler Ray Derocher for three runs in his two innings of relief. But Harvard received three insurance runs from an unlikely source of power. Second baseman Jim Mrowka launched a three-run dinger in the eighth inning to drive in O'Connell and Tim Hurley and put the game away. Todd Forman pitched two innings of shutout ball to close for the Crimson.

"We were swinging the bat real well," Decareau said. "We could have scored another 10 runs the way we were hitting."

The Crimson might have scored another 10 runs had it not been for the outstanding play of MIT's centerfielder, who robbed Scanlan and first basemen Nick Del Vecchio of home runs. Conjuring up images of the outfielder in "The Natural" running through the wall to catch Roy Hobbs' blast, the MIT centerfielder fell over the collapsible fence to snag Del Vecchio's shot, one of his 10 putouts on the day.

THE NOTEBOOK: Harvard will try to extend its modest two-game EIBL winning streak when it hits the road this weekend to meet up with Army Saturday and Columbia Sunday...Captain Tom Konjoyan--who missed yesterday's action because of an injury caused by fouling a ball off his left ankle against Penn last Sunday--will be available to play this weekend.