2011 was a big year in Harvard athletics. Women’s soccer captured its third Ivy League championship in four years. The men’s basketball team took home a share of the Ancient Eight title and entered the nation’s Top 25, both firsts in program history. Football set a modern-era program record for points in a season, scoring 374 points en route to a 9-1 finish and a league crown. Four other teams—men’s fencing, men’s heavyweight and lightweight crew, and softball—also finished 2011 on top of the Ivy League standings.

There were a number of standout individual performances as well. Women’s fencer Alexandra Kiefer captured the NCAA Foil Individual title. Men’s basketball forward Keith Wright became just the second player in Harvard history to take home Ivy League Player of the Year honors. Women’s soccer and lacrosse captain Melanie Baskind was named to the First Team All-Ivy in two different sports and was selected as the Ivy League Player of the Year in soccer.

We at The Back Page have taken on the tall task of determining the best Harvard athlete of 2011. Here’s how it will go down: we’ve selected 16 standout Harvard athletes—eight male and eight female—and set up two single elimination brackets. Each round, Harvard’s finest will square off in head-to-head matchups. And based on their performances in 2011, we will determine who advances and who is eliminated until just one male and one female remain. Then, the two champs will square off to determine the top Harvard athlete of 2011.

After examining the matchup between Keith Wright and Matt Jones yesterday, we now turn to a faceoff between football’s Collier Winters and lacrosse’s Dean Gibbons. Check back next week to see the winners of the first-round matchups.

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2011 was a big year in Harvard athletics. Women’s soccer captured its third Ivy League championship in four years.  The men’s basketball team took home a share of the Ancient Eight title and entered the nation’s Top 25, both firsts in program history. Football set a modern-era program record for points in a season, scoring 374 points en route to a 9-1 finish and a league crown. Four other teams—men’s fencing, men’s heavyweight and lightweight crew, and softball—also finished 2011 on top of the Ivy League standings.

There were a number of standout individual performances as well. Women’s fencer Alexandra Kiefer captured the NCAA Foil Individual title. Men’s basketball forward Keith Wright became just the second player in Harvard history to take home Ivy League Player of the Year honors. Women’s soccer and lacrosse captain Melanie Baskind was named to the First Team All-Ivy in two different sports and was selected as the Ivy League Player of the Year in soccer.

We at The Back Page have taken on the tall task of determining the best Harvard athlete of 2011. Here’s how it will go down: we’ve selected 16 standout Harvard athletes—eight male and eight female—and set up two single elimination brackets. Each round, Harvard’s finest will square off in head-to-head matchups. And based on their performances in 2011, we will determine who advances and who is eliminated until just one male and one female remain. Then, the two champs will square off to determine the top Harvard athlete of 2011.

First up, we have football stalwart Josue Ortiz against top wrestler Walter Peppelman. Check back later this week to find out the winner of this first-round matchup.

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Nearly two months after the beginning of its search for a new head football coach, Penn State has selected New England Patriots offensive coordinator Bill O’Brien to replace Joe Paterno as the head football coach at Penn State University, ESPN.com has reported.

Like Harvard coach Tim Murphy, who was rumored to be a favorite for the job earlier in the process, O’Brien has Ivy League connections, having played and coached at Brown.

With 19 years of coaching experience at both the collegiate and professional level, O’Brien is the third consecutive Penn State coach to have Brown affiliations. Paterno also suited up for the Bears between 1946 and 1949, and his predecessor, Rip Engle, coached Paterno at Brown.

O’Brien’s selection marks the end of a wild search that began following the Jerry Sandusky scandal and Paterno’s subsequent dismissal. Murphy—known for his historic success on the field and his clean track record off of it—was almost immediately named as a favorite, with one betting site even giving the 18-year Crimson coach 4-1 odds of nabbing the post.

Yet throughout the process, Murphy insisted that Penn State never contacted him, a claim corroborated by Russ Rose, the Penn State women’s volleyball coach and a member of the six-person search committee. Recently, Murphy disappeared from any rumors and was replaced by many others, including Boise State coach Chris Petersen and O’Brien.

After Ryan Fitzpatrick ’05 and the Buffalo Bills captured a dramatic Week 3 victory over their divisional foe and frontrunner, the New England Patriots, the 3-0 Bills seemed poised to rewrite recent history and threaten the traditional AFC East powers.

The game featured a little “Fitzmagic.” With big plays and precision passing, Fitzpatrick led his team down the field for two scores in the fourth quarter en route to victory. Fitzpatrick’s play was bolstered by a stingy Bills’ defense, which forced four interceptions and returned one for a touchdown.

But as the game ended, so too did Buffalo’s good fortune. After splitting the next four, the Bills would fade back into obscurity, only mustering one more win all season (a Week 16 blowout over Tebow’s Denver Broncos).

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In our weekly feature, we at The Crimson track the successes (and potential failures) of some of Harvard’s most successful graduates not to use their Harvard degrees. While a tour through professional sports is not exactly a who’s who of Harvard alumni, a few athletes have taken their game to the next level. From Jeremy Lin to Ryan Fitzpatrick, the Crimson maintains a presence outside of the labs and law offices of the world.

In his final game of the 2011 NFL season, Buffalo Bills quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick ’05 gave a performance that mirrored his entire year.

After jumping out to a 21-0 lead at the end of the first quarter against the New England Patriots, Fitzpatrick and the Bills spiraled out of control, giving up 49 unanswered points and ending a once-promising season in embarrassing fashion.

“Fitzmagic” seemed to lose his magic after a first quarter in which he threw 12-for-15 and two touchdown passes. In three second quarter drives, Fitzpatrick failed to put points on the board. Meanwhile, Patriots quarterback Tom Brady brought his team back into the game, pulling New England within a touchdown by halftime.

The second half was all Brady, as the Patriots scored on all five of their second half possessions. While Brady’s 300th career touchdown pass put the game out of reach, Fitzpatrick ended his season with two consecutive interceptions.

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