Ivy League Sports

Expansion in the 1990s raised the number of sports in Harvard’s already strong program to a total of 20, a number that, in combination with the men’s sports, gives Harvard the most extensive intercollegiate athletic program in the country. The expansion in women’s programs followed the recommendations of the 1993 “Report on the Status of Women’s Athletics,” which generated a three-year plan for women’s sports, elevating golf to the varsity level and increasing the level of support for other programs. Harvard women’s teams responded to the increase in resources and achieved considerable success during the decade, taking a combined 28 Ivy League championships in nine sports.

The lacrosse team, under head coach Carole Kleinfelder, was a force in the Ivy League in the early part of the decade. The 1990 team successfully extended its undefeated League winning streak to a record 21, going back to 1986, and won the NCAA championship, becoming the first Ivy team to claim a women’s NCAA title in a team sport. The Crimson extended its Ivy League championship streak to seven seasons in 1993, a stretch that nearly paralleled a Harvard run of NCAA tournament bids from 1988 to 1994 and championship game appearances in 1989, 1990, and 1992.

In basketball, coach Kathy Delaney-Smith’s squad began the decade with its first sole possession of the Ivy League title, taken in the 1990-91 season (two earlier championships had been shared with Dartmouth). The 1995-96 team also won the Ivy title and, seeded 14th in the NCAA’s Mideast Region, made Harvard’s first of three consecutive appearances in the NCAA tournament. The 1996-97 title team was notable as the first women’s basketball team in the Ivy League to go undefeated in conference play since double round-robin play began in 1982-83; the 1997-98 team also set a new standard with 26 consecutive conference wins, surpassing Brown’s 21-game winning streak.

The most important game in the basketball team’s history — indeed, one of the biggest upsets in college basketball history — occurred on March 13, 1998, when West Regional number 16-seed Harvard met number one-seed Stanford on the Cardinal’s home court, in the Crimson’s first-ever national television appearance. A crowd of 5,137 frenzied fans gathered to watch Stanford extend its 59-game home winning streak, but with less than three minutes remaining in the game, the Cardinal was up by only three points. Then, Harvard star Allison Feaster ignited a 9-2 run that featured key baskets by Lisa Kowal and Suzie Miller. With its 71-67 win, Harvard became the first Ivy League school to win a game in the NCAA women’s tournament in seven total appearances. It also marked the first victory for a number-16 seed against a top-seeded foe in either the men’s or women’s NCAA tournament. Following a second-round loss to eventual national semifinalist Arkansas, Feaster, who scored 35 points in the Stanford game, concluded her glorious career at Harvard with numerous accolades, leading the nation in scoring with an average of 28.5 points per game. She was the first Ivy League player to achieve that distinction. (Story, page 33)

After several highlights in the 1980s, the soccer program was rejuvenated in the mid-1990s under head coach Tim Wheaton. In 1994, the team went to the NCAA tournament for the first time in a decade, and it won the Ivy League title the following autumn for the first time since 1981. The program also notched the Ivy title in 1996 by defeating Dartmouth in a close match, a victory that carried with it an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament. An early-season loss to Yale in 1997 snapped Harvard’s 22-match, four-season Ivy winning streak, but the team won its third straight Ivy title that fall. At the NCAA tournament, the Crimson achieved its first victory in four postseason meetings with the University of Massachusetts and went on to defeat George Mason University in a double-overtime game in the next round, on a goal by Ivy Player of the Year Naomi Miller at the 131:23 mark. The dream season ended the following weekend with a 1-0 loss at eventual national champion North Carolina.

The swimming and diving team claimed the EWSL title in 1991 over 26 teams — an especially satisfying victory because Princeton had won the Ivy League title that year in dual meet action. Harvard won its second straight EWSL championship in 1992, and went on to share the League titles in 1992, 1995, and 1996. A major transition occurred during this decade when Maura Costin-Scalise, who had headed the program since 1984, retired in 1997. Costin-Scalise’s teams had won seven Ivy titles and four ECAC championships, and her 1988 team placed 17th at the NCAA championships, the best in the program’s history. Her successor was Stephanie Wriede, who had been an All-America swimmer on Costin-Scalise’s teams earlier in the decade and, as both a swimmer and assistant coach, had credited much of her success to her coach’s influence.

Harvard’s squash team dominated the Ivy League during the 1990s, winning the Ivy title in 1990 and every subsequent year except 1991 and 1998. Beginning in 1992, the team did not lose a single League squash match for six consecutive seasons. The team also claimed the Howe Cup in 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, and 1997 and the WISRA team national championship in 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, and 1996. In 1992, on the same day, Jordanna Fraiberg and her brother, Jeremy, became the first brother and sister to win national intercollegiate squash titles; when Jordanna won her second individual title in 1994, she became the first woman in Harvard history to win two national singles titles.

Harvard’s track and field team achieved its greatest success early in the decade with its first Heptagonal outdoor championship in 1990. At that meet, Meredith Rainey won the 400- and 800-meter races; Cathy Griffin won the shot put and discus; Stacey Caldwell seized the javelin title; Suzanne Jones won the 5,000-meter race; and each of these athletes won second and third places in other events. Rainey’s win in the 800-meter race at the 1989 NCAA outdoor championships had made her the first woman Ivy League student-athlete to win an individual track title. She won the same race in the 1990 NCAA indoor championships and was one of six student-athletes tapped from around the nation by the NCAA for its most distinguished award, the NCAA Top VI.

The tennis team, which had won numerous Ivy League championships in the 1980s, began the new decade with a record eighth straight Ivy championship, sharing the title with Princeton. The team also garnered Ivy championships in 1992, 1995, 1996, 1998, and 1999, going to the NCAA tournament in the latter three years. Harvard’s best finish came in 1996, when, seeded second in the eight-team East Regional, the Crimson defeated Virginia Tech in the first round and Cornell in the second, but fell in the regional final to top-seeded William and Mary.

Among the competitors from various sports were numerous Olympic athletes. A. J. Mleczko, Angela Ruggiero, and Sandra Whyte were three of the U.S. women’s ice hockey gold medalists from the 1998 Olympic Winter Games in Nagano, playing on a team coached by Harvard alum and former Harvard men’s ice hockey assistant coach Ben Smith. (Story, page 123) The Crimson’s Jen Botterill starred for the Canadian silver medalists and, along with Mleczko and Ruggiero, returned from the memorable trip to Japan to make a little more history in Cambridge. Harvard finished the 1998-99 campaign with a 33-1 record, losing only to Brown early in the season, and capturing the Beanpot (Boston-area), Ivy, ECAC regular-season, ECAC tournament, and AWCHA national championships. The final game of the season ended in a heart-wrenching 6-5 overtime victory against traditional powerhouse New Hampshire in the AWCHA championship game.

Besides the trio of ice hockey stars, other Olympians of the period included Radcliffe rowers Serena Eddy-Moulton, twin sisters Betsy and Mary McCagg, Alison Townley, and Anna Seaton, all of whom competed in the 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games, with Seaton’s taking a bronze medal in pair oared shell with coxswain. Harvard track and field athlete Meredith Rainey and yacht team member Julia Trotman also competed in those Games, and Trotman won a bronze medal in the Europe single-handed dinghy. Rainey again competed in the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games, as did Radcliffe rowers Lindsay Burns, Betsy and Mary McCagg, and Cecile Tucker, with Burns taking a silver medal in lightweight double sculls.