Sitting in Second, Crimson Guns For No. 1

Given the tumultuous weekend for what were the nation’s top two teams, Harvard hoped its two wins over No. 10 Brown would boost the team into the nation’s top spot.

Instead, the Crimson has to settle for second…for now.

Harvard coach Katey Stone speculated on national rankings following the team’s dramatic 4-3 overtime victory over the Bears on Saturday and prior to the poll’s release, but did not dwell on the issue.

“It doesn’t matter, but I imagine that we should be [No. 1] because we only have two losses and everyone else has four or more, but I don’t really care, I really don’t,” Stone said. “We’re going to take care of business and get ourselves ready for St. Lawrence because they’re playing great hockey right now.”

Stone is preparing the team to be focused and not suffer the same lesson Dartmouth learned this weekend. After dropping two games to then-No. 5 St. Lawrence–3-0 and 3-2, respectively—Dartmouth fell two spots from its perch as best in the nation, while the Saints climbed up to No. 4.

Meanwhile, Minnesota bumped up one place to the top spot after splitting a series with then-No. 4 Wisconsin, who has since moved down to No. 5.

The Crimson boasts the nation’s best record with only two losses—as well as the best winning percentage at .8913—so one might well ask, why the snub?

There is one very good explanation: many still feel that Harvard needs to prove itself. Though the Crimson is 5-2-1 against the top ten teams in the nation, the squad is just 1-2-1 against the nation’s top eight teams.

The poll that better reveals this fact is the Pairwise Rankings (PWR), composed by U.S. College Hockey Online (USCHO).

This poll uses methods similar to those of the NCAA selections committee and has accurately predicted the competitors for the Frozen Four in each of the past four years.

The PWR ranks above-.500 teams based on their performance against common opponents, against one another, and against other above-average schools, as well as the results of their last 16 games and each team’s Rating Percentage Index (RPI).

The RPI, another complicated statistical tool used to decide who’s tops in women’s college hockey, considers a team’s winning percentage, that of its opponents, and the winning percentage of its opponents’ opponents.

In the most recent PWR poll, Harvard ranks second behind Minnesota. Both schools have a PWR of 15, but Minnesota boasts an RPI rank of 1 to Harvard’s 4 because of the Crimson’s poor record against the few top teams they have played.

Compared to Minnesota–who is 7-3 against the top eight–Harvard has a ways to go in proving they are the nation’s best.

The Golden Gophers have beaten Dartmouth once and Wisconsin three times, whereas the Crimson has yet to beat any one of the other top five teams in the country.

Harvard will get this chance this weekend, however, with a momentous two-game doubleheader against ECAC rival St. Lawrence, currently No. 1 in the league. A series sweep would propel the Crimson into first place in the league as well as secure its position for No. 1 in the nation.

“This upcoming stretch of our season is definitely going to make or break what’s going to happen in the postseason and we’re really looking forward to it,” said junior winger Nicole Corriero. “We’re up to this challenge. We’ve got 21 competitors who are looking forward to these teams who are going to bring a solid game every night.”

The shuffling of the nation’s top teams and the emergence of schools such as St. Lawrence and Wisconsin onto the scene is a far cry from the days when the top four teams of Minnesota, Minnesota-Duluth, Harvard and Dartmouth were more or less set in stone

“I think this is probably the first year where eight teams truly would have been a great thing,” Stone said, in reference to next year’s expansion to a Frozen Eight format. “Last year everybody wants it, but this year, truly you could get it.”

This past weekend validates Stone’s words. By comparison, last season when college hockey coaches around the country voted to reformat the playoffs to include four more teams, the top four teams were set apart from the rest of the pack.

But this season, more than ever, a larger playoff system would be the ideal way to avoid the controversy of leaving teams out of the title chase, as happened to Harvard in 2000, one year after capturing the national championship.

Nevertheless, the Crimson continues to look towards the remainder of this regular season to secure its place in the Frozen Four.”Bottom line is that everyone is in control of their own destiny for the most part, so we need to take care of our own business,” Stone said.

This weekend’s series against St. Lawrence will be one very large step in determining whether or not Harvard is destined to be the nation’s top team in 2004.

—Staff writer John R. Hein can be reached at hein@fas.harvard.edu.