For Football, It's Time for the Real Game to Begin

Let’s go through what we know first, and then we can talk about why none of it matters much.

1. The Harvard football team is your 2014 Ivy League champion. With a 34-24 win over Penn Saturday, the Crimson clinched a share of coach Tim Murphy’s eighth Ivy title and moved one game away from a perfect season.

2. Junior Paul Stanton’s 235 rushing yards in the game provided another historical moment this season. He carried the team and still managed to outrun Quaker defenders, finishing with the most rushing yards since 1997 and the most all-purpose yards in the Murphy era.

3. Harvard’s defense had its worst day of the year numerically, surrendering more points than it had in the three previous weeks combined, but it held when it needed to.

Late in the third quarter, Penn had driven to the Harvard 20-yard line, already up by seven. The shade was creeping across Franklin Field as the Crimson’s hopes of an undefeated season dimmed.

On second down, sophomore defensive end Miles McCollum was forced to play coverage against a no-huddle attack. He did so admirably, forcing an incompletion. Junior defensive back Chris Evans then perfectly defended a fade in the end zone, leading to a field goal attempt—which was blocked.

The Crimson did not allow another first down after that point while its offense scored three times to eviscerate what was a seven-point Quakers lead. The rest might be history.

But here is where we get to the “but.”

Week 10. Yale. The Game.

Three years ago, the Bulldogs reorganized their program with a single goal in mind: beating Harvard. They swiped Crimson coaches, recreated Murphy’s system—camo hats and all—and brought in transfers at quarterback and running back to speed up the recovery process.

Now, they are a game away from completing the plan. Yale enters Saturday 8-1, 5-1 in league play, with its lone loss coming by seven points to Dartmouth on a late touchdown.

But that was just a loss in a game—fractionally as significant as a potential loss in The Game.

I’m looking forward to asking Harvard players how they would feel sharing the championship with Yale during media availability Wednesday, though I bet I can already imagine what they will say.

I bet members of the 1974 and 1968 teams would have similar thoughts. Those are the only two years Harvard and Yale have split the title since 1956, though the Crimson lost neither of those Games.

On the other side, Yale entered The Game in 2007 looking to complete an unbeaten season, and Harvard won, 37-6, to steal the Ivy title outright (the Crimson has actually kept the Bulldogs from finishing unblemished the last four times they entered The Game 9-0).

Since then, Harvard has gone 59-11 and claimed four more championships while Yale went 37-22. The Crimson has also not lost in The Game since. That’s the kind of long-term impact these matchups can have when the stakes are as high as they will be Saturday.

But throw Harvard’s seven-game winning streak against the Bulldogs in the Charles River; it’s worthless now. If Yale wins Saturday, they will own the rivalry for at least a year.

Regardless of the reality, it will feel like a Crimson collapse and a Blue ascent to however many thousands pack the Stadium if the Elis emerge victorious this weekend. And they very well could.

Harvard enters The Game as a consensus favorite thanks to its unblemished record, No. 14 national ranking, and host status. But Yale has the talent—especially considering Crimson quarterback Conner Hempel remains a game-time decision.

Bulldogs quarterback Morgan Roberts leads the league in passing while running back Tyler Varga leads it in rushing. He has also scored 20 touchdowns in nine games. Both pro prospects, they could be the best two offensive players in the league. And before they compete against each other for Player of the Year honors, they will be on the same side against Harvard.

If the Crimson wins an eighth straight Game, it will cement this stretch as Harvard’s most dominant in the history of The Game.For that to come at the end of an undefeated season would only further ensure this group’s place in Crimson history. Beating back a revived Yale program would only be icing. Doing it with College GameDay on hand would be extra icing.

The Crimson knows this. The team danced on the Penn sideline, celebrating another Ivy title. But then everybody got back to business.

The players know their work is not complete. The job is not done. These Harvard players will always be champions. But Saturday, they have an opportunity to become more.

—Staff writer Jacob D.H. Feldman can be reached at jacob.feldman@thecrimson.com.