The last time CU and Harvard tangled, Ben Mathiasmeier sealed the win with an overtime INT
Harvard Crimson (5-2) at Columbia Lions (5-2)
Kickoff: 1:05 PM
Gametime Weather Forecast: 51 degrees and mostly sunny
The Line: Harvard is favored by 9 points
TV/Radio: The Game is available on ESPN+
Leading Storylines
1) Both teams are reeling a bit after Harvard lost two heartbreakers in a row and the Lions dropped a game they feel they should have won last week. Emotional states and player focus can sometimes be overestimated in football compared to talent on the field, but it feels like the stronger emotional team will have an edge.
2) Columbia finally broke a 15-game losing streak to the Crimson in 2019, and now the Lions will try to beat Harvard twice in a row for the first time since 1995-1996. If CU can achieve that there may be no clearer sign of the decline of Crimson football in recent years. As Big Green Alert's Bruce Wood has reminded me, the 5th year seniors at Columbia already have more career wins than their 5th year counterparts at Harvard. That's really an amazing stat for those of us who have followed Ivy football for a long time.
3) Columbia starting QB Joe Green may or may not have been offered a spot on the Harvard football team in 2018; it depends on whom you ask. But he was definitely offered by Columbia and Green may want to show the Crimson what they missed as they struggle to find a starting QB who can make them a consistent contender. With Charlie Dean apparently out again, Harvard is listing junior Luke Emge as the starter over erratic 5th year senior Jake Smith.
3 Columbia Players to Watch
Senior RB Dante Miller may be the focus of the CU offense again, as his outside running style seems ideal against a Crimson defense that is enormous and frightening up the middle.
Sophomore QB Joe Green will face a very dangerous defense and pass rush. If he can keep his almost perfect no turnover record intact in this game, it will be impressive.
Junior LB Scott Valentas will need to play well to contain Harvard's formidable rushing attack.
3 Harvard Players to Watch
Junior QB Luke Emge didn't look all that great against Dartmouth last week. Can he prove he's earned the start in this game?
Junior RB Aaron Shampklin may be the best rusher in the Ivies and his running mate, sophomore Aiden Bourguet, is also extremely dangerous.
Massive freshman DT Thor Griffith is possibly the most fearsome D-lineman in the Ivies.
16 comments:
Wasn't counting on this:)
OUCH!
Worst performance by a Columbia team in all three phases in a very long time; I was worried by a letdown after the Yale game and my worst fears were realized.
This was “2017 2.0”
You go to New Haven with a chance to seriously close in on a title.
You lose a game you could have easily won, because for some inexplicable reason you are flat.
Then the downward spiral continues with a beat down by Harvard
Even in “lean” years teams got psyched to beat Harvard.
The mantra was,”The alumni want you to beat Princeton. The coaches want you to beat Dartmouth. You want to beat Harvard.”
How does one team regress so completely after such a stunning masterpiece; in Hanover; on television? Was that not enough of a momentum builder?
They were sluggish last week; comatose this week.
To get shutout by 35 in the first half. When was the last time that happened at home?
This team is vastly better than that. How does one explain the repeat of the 2017 disaster?
The key was failing to punch it in from the 6 in the first quarter, followed by a missed FG which completely deflated our guys. So our red zone offens ringside the 10 is just not very good.
Pardon the typos-meant to say our red zone inside the 10 offense is poor.
We also had some other issues- we did not have a few starters on defense and one of our sub DBs was picked on all day. Plus our punter shanked a few instead of flipping fliers position which he did regularly two years ago. And our WRs did not win the 50/50 contests; we have several good WRs but not a true #1 like Wainwright. But it comes down to line play—there is where we lost the game/
Meant flipping field position
To Throwback:
Your post above is apposite: You make all the right comments and ask all the right questions.
I can only add my own take on Columbia's sudden, inexplicable collapse.
I first sensed the beginning of it as the third quarter of this season's Yale game began, the first half of which Columbia dominated. I don't have to remind anybody of Columbia's unbelievable, crushing, shut-out win over Penn. Columbia was in the process of beating Yale badly, then the beginning of this terrible collapse.
Why did it happen and continue through yesterday's debacle? I cannot answer this question.
It hurts like hell that Harvard's slaughter of our team reminded me--for the first time in a long time--of Columbia's decades-long football ineptitude. I just don't get it. I feel so sorry for all involved with Columbia football, especially the players.
This question must be answered, but it will take someone wiser than I to do it.
TOD HOWARD HAWKS
I agree w Old Lion - our DL was really poor all day. And yes, we have some decent receivers but the difference in playmaking between theirs and ours was large. Harvard’s WRs made tons of plays. Won every jump ball.
In my comments above, I underscored Columbia's incredible shutout win over Penn. My mistake. The shutout win was over Dartmouth.
TOD HOWARD HAWKS
I haven't seen the Harvard game yet (not sure I want to, but I'm a glutton for punishment, so I probably will sometime this week), but credit where credit is due. Roar Lion said Harvard was much better than we were, which was a statement I took issue with. As many of you may recall, I predicted a Columbia win against the Crimson, and I was dead wrong. I'm willing to acknowledge when I'm wrong, and this was definitely one of those times. I hope we can win our last two to finish 7-3, but I'm starting to think we might go 6-4 (by beating Brown and then losing to Cornell). To end up 7-3 wouldn't be too bad, but 6-4 seems like a real underachievement, especially after how we played against Dartmouth.
It's interesting to note that we seem to have become a solidly mid-tier team in the Ivies under Coach Bagnoli. We're definitely no longer the doormat, but we're not yet able to beat the top four teams (viz., HDYPrin) on any kind of consistent basis. We're able to pick off some wins against the likes of Penn, Brown, and Cornell, but with the exception of that one 8-2 season, that seems to be where most of our wins come from, and we tend to be in that 5-5/6-4/7-3 range. It's definitely a step in the right direction and worlds better than where we were during the Mangurian nightmare, but the question is whether we can make the jump to the upper echelon. Only time will tell, I suppose.
There is nothing wrong with being 7-3! Tough schedule this year with PDY on the road and fact is, we don't have top of the league talent. Harvard was clearly faster and stronger than us, no shame in admitting that. What is frustrating though is that this group put up virtually no fight on Saturday. How do you not get up for playing Harvard?
So we don't have 9-1 talent, but we we do have a better football program than Brown or Cornell. Do the kids show up and fight for their season these last two weeks or do they feel sorry for themselves? Will be an interesting test of character.
Gents, I fully get it. “Half of something, is better than all of nothing”. Yes, Columbia Football is in a better place than it was a decade ago, or even under the person who was envisioned to be the Messiah, the late Bill Campbell.
But do our athletes work less hard than those of the perennial powerhouses?
In fact, quite the contrary. It is infinitely more difficult to play football at Columbia than any other of the “Ancient Eight”.
No one else’s facility is a thirty minute bus ride from campus. Our athletes sacrifice much more. They deserve to be able to compete for a title. And more frequently, than four times in half a century.
If 5-5 and 6-4 is the result of beating the likes of Marist. That is mediocrity, not excellence. Why settle for that?
(Marist has an undergraduate enrollment of 5,400. Not that long ago, New York City high schools like Erasmus Hall and DeWitt Clinton had 5,000 students.)
Has this coach proven that whatever ailments have plagued the program for decades are not curable? Death by hanging may be preferable to death by stoning, but both options are unpalatable. Settling for 5-5 or 6-4 every year just seems a cop out
If we are good enough to beat Dartmouth soundly on the road at night then we are good enough to have put out a better product than we saw last Saturday. We were not ready to play and had insufficient depth especially at DB to compete. Remember, Dartmouth beat this Harvard team. So something went wrong beginning with the second half of the Yale game and carrying over until the Harvard game. I just don’t know what it is.
It’s team psychology. Good results in the face of adversity builds the confidence to do it again. This is the last hurdle for Columbia. Things still snowball when something goes wrong.
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