The Game is Saturday at 12:30
NEW HAVEN, Conn. – A matchup of a 7-2 team against a squad with the opposite record would not typically fill a stadium of any size, unless the two teams were competing in The Game, one of college football's most storied rivalries. The 133rd football edition of Yale (2-7, 2-4 Ivy) vs. Harvard (7-2, 5-1) takes place this Saturday in front of a packed house at Harvard Stadium (30,323). The 12:30 kick airs live on CNBC TV and on WELI (960 AM).
SERIES
The Bulldogs lead 65-59-8, but the Crimson have taken nine straight. Yale is 28-27-5 at Boston (25-26-3 in Harvard Stadium), 30-31-3 at home and 7-1-0 at neutral sites. There have been 55 shutouts since the first meeting in 1875, and the Elis are 28-20-7 in those contests. This Saturday is the 30th time The Game has Ivy title implications for at least one squad, and Yale is 11-17-1 in those contests. Yale is 2-5-1 when both teams are chasing the title during The Game.
LAST MEETING
Yale wide receiver Chris Williams-Lopez caught 13 passes for 169 yards and a touchdown against the nation's third-ranked defense, but his career day was not enough, as Yale fell to Harvard 38-19 in front of 52,126 at the Bowl in 2015. QB Morgan Roberts connected with Williams-Lopez to polish off a 10-play, 75-yard drive that ended with a 28-yard touchdown pass, the first of the receiver's career. Harvard came up with a pair of unanswered touchdowns to go up 14-7, but the Bulldogs stayed within striking distance. A strong Yale defense came up with several key third-down stops. LB Darius Manora halted a run attempt short of a first late in the opening quarter. Jason Alessi broke up a pass attempt and Spencer Rymiszewski intercepted a pass midway through the second.
THE ELIS
Yale, which could finish at high as fourth, is currently fifth in the Ivy standings with a 2-4 mark. The Bulldogs, who are fourth in the league in rushing offense, have lost two games since earning a road win at Columbia on Oct. 28. For a second straight year injuries have impacted the lineup. Yale has had 23 different starters on offense and 18 on the defense (41 overall). The offensive starters have included 4 tailbacks, 3 quarterbacks and 3 left tackles
CRIMSON
Harvard, which was ranked among the top 25 teams in both FCS polls, was alone in first place with a perfect record until getting tripped up last weekend at Penn, 27-14. The Cantabs, who still control their own destiny, tied the game, 14-14, with 3:23 to play. However, Penn scored two late touchdowns to get the win at Franklin Field. Joe Viviano went 23-of-39 for 216 yards and had one TD pass, while running back Charlie Booker had 15 carries for 62 yards. Raishaun McGhee, Tobe Ezeokoli and Luke Hutton made four tackles apiece, and the Crimson defense finished with 5.0 tackles for a loss while holding Penn to only 284 yards of total offense.
YH CONNECTIONS
Yale sophomore LB Quintin Herbert, who had his first start last week and racked up nine tackles for a second straight game, attended LaSalle High in Cincinnati. His school's biggest rival was St. Xavier, the school of Harvard captain and linebacker Sean Ahern. Yale sophomore WR Kyle Marcinick and Harvard's DT Miles McCollum were teammates at Dublin Coffman High in Ohio for two years. They do speed training together in the off-season along with Harvard DE John Pirrmann, a Dublin native who has been best friends with Marcinick since elementary school. Eli sophomore DE Kyle Mullen, who is fifth in the Ivy with six sacks, and Harvard HB Anthony Firsker were football and basketball teammates at Manalapan High in New Jersey.
ELECTION YEARS
Yale is 19-12-1 against Harvard in Novembers of U.S. Presidential elections. There is even better historical news for the Bulldogs; When a republican is victorious, Yale has won 14 of 19 games. The last time there was a combination of Yale winning at Boston and a republican winning the election was in 2000. That was the combination of George W. Bush '68 and Yale's 34-24 decision.
LAST WEEK AT THE BOWL
The score didn't indicate this, but Yale's 31-3 loss at home to Princeton last week included a fine Bulldog defensive showing. Considering the depth of the vaunted Tigers offense, the Elis hung tough for three quarters before breaking down. Big plays by the Yale defense kept the Elis within striking distance through the first 45 minutes of play. The home team broke up five passes, picked off another, registered four tackles for lost yardage and hurried the Tigers' two-quarterback system all day, which helped the Blue remain two scores back until 10:17 left in the final quarter. Defensive back Foyesade Oluokun, one of 25 Yale seniors playing his home finale, led all players with a dozen solo tackles and 14 overall. He was a great example of the team's determination despite being down in the second half; eight of those stops came in the fourth quarter. Yale junior safety Hayden Carlson had the game's only interception, a 36-yard return in the first half that set up Alex Galland's 24-yard field goal to make it 7-3.
RED ZONE
Yale has led the nation in red zone efficiency all season, but its perfect mark was blemished at Brown. The Elis have been inside the opponent 20-yard line 26 times this fall and have put points on the board in all but one. Yale converted its only opportunity vs. Princeton.
DISCIPLINE
The Bulldogs are No. 2 in the nation for fewest penalties with 39, which is the best in the Ivy League. The season high for Yale was eight at Brown. The Elis had just three last week.
YALE-HARVARD MEMORIES
The YH series has seen its share of special moments, firsts and freaky plays. Here are some of the most memorable meetings:
1881: Yale tries the first on-side kick ever in football during a scoreless tie
1946: Elis overcome a 14-0 Harvard lead to win 27-14
1952: Yale student manager Charlie Yeager catches a PAT pass in a 41-14 Eli win at Cambridge
1968: QB Frank Champi completes a TD pass and a conversion play with no time left as Harvard gains a 29-29 draw at Cambridge and shares the Ivy crown with Yale
1972: Yale overcomes a 17-0 first half deficit to win 28-17
1974: QB Milt Holt scored on a 1-yard run with 0:15 left in a 21-16 victory that gave Harvard a share of the Ivy title with Yale
1975: Mike Lynch's 26-yard FG with 0:33 left gave Crimson a 10-7 win and sole possession of the Ivy title
1977: Mike Sullivan's 6 5-yard TD run out of punt formation ignites Yale in a 24-7 win at the Bowl
1995: Crimson Eion Hu scores from 2 yards out with :29 left in a 22-21 win
1999: WR Eric Johnson (21-244) scoops up a Joe Walland (42-67, 437) pass with :29 left to send Yale to a 24-21 win and an Ivy title
2005: Clifton Dawson ends the longest game in Ivy history in the 3rd OT with a two-yard run to give Harvard a 30-24 win at the Bowl
IT STARTED HERE
The Game is responsible for a number of original events: Yale performed the first on-side kick against Harvard in 1881; Harvard's flying wedge was first seen in the 1892 contest; the first game in the Bowl was the 1914 meeting; the first crowd at an American sporting event over 80,000 was the 1920 game at the Bowl; and the first triple OT Ivy game happened in 2005 at Yale.
RAWLINGS
Baptism under fire is exactly what Kurt Rawlings has experienced heading into his third career start. Rawlings, the son of a high school coach, completed 18 passes last week against Princeton, but his most athletic moves were used to avoid defenders as he tried to find receivers. Rawlings made his first career start at Brown in week eight and completed 20 of 46 passes for 252 yards. The Bel Air, Md., native became the first freshman to throw a TD pass for Yale since Eric Williams in 2012 with an impressive three quarters at Columbia the week before. He used his arm and legs to ignite the Blue to 24 points in the second quarter with three TD passes and some key runs. Rawlings earned Ivy League Rookie of the Week honors for that performance.
OFFENSIVE YOUTH
Six freshmen started on offense last week, including two receivers, two offensive linemen, the quarterback and the tailback. Rookies have started at seven different positions overall.
LAMAR
The plan was to have three veteran backs handling the carries this fall with a talented newcomer getting touches on kickoffs. That plan didn't last long due to injuries. Freshman tailback Alan Lamar, leads Yale with 500 yards and four TDs. The day he got his first collegiate snaps in the backfield, he ran 23 times for 180 yards and touchdowns of seven and 43 yards on Oct. 8 in a win over Dartmouth. The Parade All-American from Mississippi finished five yards shy of Robert Carr's freshman school rushing record of 185 yards against Dartmouth on Oct. 7, 2007. Lamar earned STATS FCS (national) Rookie of the Week and Ivy co-Rookie of the Week for his Oct. 8 performance. Lamar got his first start vs. Penn and ran for 118 yards while catching a pass for a TD.
LITTLE IMPACT IS BIG
Senior TE Sebastian Little has caught three passes over the last two games. Those receptions were important for a young offense, but the Cheshire, Conn., native has been helping his team and the New Haven community without touching the football. Little, a semifinalist for the National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame's 2016 William V. Campbell Trophy, has earned three varsity letters and has been among the team leaders in community outreach. He is the co-founder of Next Future Leaders (NFL), a student activities coordinator for Earn While You Learn, a member of the Mandi Schwartz Marrow Drive Commit-tee and team ambassador for Team IMPACT. Little has 44 career catches including the game-winning TD against Cornell in 2015.
MR. EVERYTHING
Dale Harris has played corner, tailback and special teams this fall. His performance at Fordham on Oct. 15 was probably the top individual highlight of the 2016 Yale season. He started at corner while playing special teams and making a few runs at tailback when needed. Then Candler Rich, the only other healthy runner at the time with experience, got injured in the second quarter. Harris stepped up and ran for 4 TDs and a two-point conversion while totaling 136 yards. He also finished with an important catch and three solo tackles in one of the most versatile performances in the long history of Yale football. Against Penn, he led the team with eight solos and 12 overall tackles. The Brooklandville, Md., native has 239 rushing yards (4.5 average), four TDs and 26 points while totaling 29-10-39 on defense.
CAPTAIN MANORA
The team selected linebacker Darius Manora as its 2016 captain during a vote last November. Manora, a senior from Alexandria, Va., has 210 career tackles and has played in all 39 games. His most productive day as a Bulldog was 8 solos and 14 total tackles against Princeton in 2014, while his biggest play was plucking a Brown lateral pass – a flee flicker - out of the air and running it back for a score that same fall.
ALESSI
Junior defensive back Jason Alessi is Yale's Mr. Versatility, and he is the only player in school history to return two punts for TDs at 80 yards or more. He had an 80-yarder (4thd longest at Yale) at home against Columbia last year and then notched an 82-yard play (3rd longest) against Lehigh at the Bowl on Oct. 1, which is the longest punt return in the league this fall. He is currently 23rd in the FCS with a 10.6 return average. In addition to starting on defense and seeing time on multiple special teams, Alessi is a standout member of the Yale lacrosse team, which has won consecutive Ivy League Tournament titles. On the gridiron, the Bloomfield Hills, Mich., native had a career-high five solos and eight overall tackles at Maine last fall and finished the year with 39 stops. Aessi, who has four career interceptions, is the only current Yale male two-sport (non-track) regular.
CARLSON
Hayden Carlson (Glen Ellyn, Ill.), a junior safety, led the Ivy League in 2015 with 92 total tackles and a 9.2 average. He leads the Ivy (8th in FCS) this fall with 6.3 solos per game while his 57 solos, 88 total stops, four interceptions and two fumble recoveries lead the Blue. He began 2016 with a game and career-high 14 tackles and set up scores with an interception (48-yard return) and a fumble recovery against Colgate. He had eight stops, a fumble recovery and a solo tackle on a fake field goal attempt at Cornell. Carlson, whose interception against Dartmouth clinched the win on Oct. 8, has started every game this fall.
THE ORIGINAL PLAN
If not for injuries, Yale would have a three-man rotation of experience and big days at tailback this fall. Senior Candler Rich (Newnan, Ga.) has a 5.4 average on 34 carries. Rich began 2015 as the top running back but missed most of the year with an injury. He averaged 7.5 per carry as a backup in 2014, which included a 202-yard day on 17 runs at Columbia. Senior Dale Harris (Brooklandville, Md.) volunteered to move from defense last fall when injuries ravaged the backfield. He started the first two weeks of 2016 (missed week three with injury) and then played mostly on defense. A three-year starter at cornerback, Harris ran for 177 yards (71-yard TD) at Princeton last November. Deshawn Salter, who has had a pair of monster days against Lehigh in 2015 and 2016, is the other part of the veteran rotation.
BULLDOG BITES
Dale Harris' 26 points and four TDs vs. Fordham are still the best in the Ivy this fall… Alan Lamar is third in the Ivy with 500 rushing yards and fourth with a 62.5 average…Alex Galland is third in the league with eight field goals… The Elis have 155 pass receptions this fall. The receivers responsible for 101 of them are back next fall. Yale could also have its top three runners back in the fold for 2017... Junior QB Rafe Chapple, who started the first two games of 2016, has been unable to practice the last five weeks with a shoulder injury.
MOORE
Sophomore Tre Moore, who became the third black quarterback to start a game for Yale on Oct. 1, was the starter for five games (3 through 7). He did a great job of leading his team in a comeback attempt at Fordham with 102 rushing yards. Against Lehigh, he ran for two (14, 12 yards) TDs and threw for another (63-yarder) in his initial collegiate start. He was more efficient (21-33, 174) in relief at Cornell in week two, but he produced more points in his first start (Lehigh). Rufus Moore III, nicknamed Tre (the third), came to Yale from John Burroughs School in St. Louis, Mo, where he was a teammate of Eli defensive standout Foyesade Oluokun. He has played in six games this season after not getting any varsity snaps in 2015.
MAKING GAINES
Senior WR Myles Gaines (Tallahassee, Fla.), who had a career-high nine catches for 106 yards against Dartmouth and is second on the team with 22 catches, is determined to change the way America—and maybe even the rest of the world—gets its nutrients by studying food policy and sustainable farming options. An environmental studies turned political science major, Gaines, who has 45 career catches over 21 (injuries the last 2 years) varsity games, hopes to combine these disciplines and work on the policy end of providing sustainable food, especially to black communities. He served as a Lazarus 2016 Summer Intern through the Yale Sustainable Food Program in New Haven after working at an oyster farm that practiced sustainable harvesting.
KICKING
Sophomore Alex Galland (Bakersfield, Calif.) has taken over the field goal and extra-point kicking. He has gone 2-for-2 on field goals in three different games this fall and is and is now 8-for-10 in 2016 with a long of 38 yards at Cornell. Galland earned Ivy Special Teams Player of the Week after a field goal and nine punts in tough conditions at Columbia on Oct. 28. Senior Bryan Holmes (Holland, Mich.), an All-Ivy placekicker last fall, has done some punting and kickoffs this season, while junior Blake Horn (Davie, Fla.) has also been used on kickoffs.
UP FRONT
There has been a lot of shuffling of players on the offensive line due to injuries, and the following Bulldogs have gotten starts at dif-ferent times: freshmen LG Dieter Eiselen (Stellenbosch, South Africa) and LT Sterling Strother (Moraga, Calif.), juniors C Karl Mar-back (Birmingham, Mich.) and OG Jeho Chang (Suwanee, Ga.), and seniors LT Khalid Cannon (Gadsden, Ala.), RT Beau Iverson (Lakewood, Wash.) and RG Mason Friedline (Seattle, Wash.).
ROCKET MAN
Karl Marback (Birmingham, Mich.), a junior center who is a biomedical engineering major, is a member of the Yale Undergraduate Aerospace Association (YUAA). As a sophomore, he helped build a rocket that climbed to 10,000 feet and collected microbes from the air to learn more about what is living in the atmosphere. That rocket was launched twice, first in Maryland and again in Utah for the Intercollegiate Rocket Engineering Competition (IREC). The Yale entry took second place for payload design. Marback, who came over from the defense in 2015, is playing center for the first time as a Bulldog.
BULLDOG CAPTAINS, COACHES
It's very rare to have an ex-Yale football captain on the coaching staff, but the Elis have two. Paul Rice '10 (outside LB, special teams), who joined Tony Reno's staff in February of 2013, became the first captain to return as a "full-time" or "primary" coach since Albie Booth in the late 1930s. Chandler Henley '07 (TEs), who led the Elis to a 2006 Ivy title as captain, came back to New Haven last spring.
YALE'S COLLEGE COACHES
One hundred and nine Yale graduates – far more than any other school - have become head coaches in college football. Six Yale grads currently serve on college coaching staffs, including Paul Rice and Chandler Henley. Bob Shoop '88 is defensive coordinator at the University of Tennessee. Dartmouth has Kyle Metzler '02, the running game and recruiting coordinator (OT, TE focus), while Josh Grizzard '12 is a graduate assistant (QB, quality control) at Duke. Matt Coombs '08 is a quality control GA at Boise State.
NFL STAFF
Two former Yale players are coaching in the NFL this fall. Pat Graham '01, a former Yale tight end and defensive lineman who won a Super Bowl ring in 2015 with the New England Patriots as a defensive assistant coach, worked seven seasons for Bill Belichick be-fore taking a new job this fall with the New York Giants. Graham earned an Ivy Championship ring in 1999. Michael McDaniel '05 is in his 10th NFL campaign and second as offensive assistant with Atlanta. He has worked with Cleveland, Houston. Denver and Washington. The Yalie with the longest NFL tenure (player/coach) in Ivy history is Dick Jauron '73, who played eight seasons be-tween two teams and then spent 32 years as a coach. His last was 2012 with Cleveland. Two former Elis are working for the Miami Dolphins: Max Napolitano '14 is a business analytics specialist while Grant Wallace '15 is a player personnel assistant. Brandon Etheridge '07, who had worked for the NFL Management Council, is now general counsel for the Baltimore Ravens.
2006
Ten years ago this fall, a team led by captain Chandler Henley (current Yale coach) went 8-2 and earned an Ivy League title. The final win came at Harvard, a 34-13 decision. Many members of that team were back to celebrate the title on Sept. 17 at the Bowl.
76ERS
The 40th reunion of Yale's 1976 Ivy League Championship gridiron squad took place as part of the Princeton weekend. The 76ers, captained by Vic Staffieri, won their last eight games, including a combined 60-14 score in victories over Princeton and Harvard, to finish 8-1.
SOUTHERN FLAVOR
Future Yale schedules include games with a new, Southern, flavor. One is in Georgia, the other Virginia. The Elis, who have a four-game series set with Mercer University, will play a school from Georgia (Macon) for the first time since playing the University of Georgia in 1929, the dedication game for Sanford Stadium. The Mercer Bears, a member of the Southern Conference, play at Yale on Oct. 13, 2018. The next meeting is Oct. 2, 2021 at Macon. The other two encounters come in 2022 (New Haven) and 2023 (Ma-con). The University of Richmond, a Colonial Athletic Conference and FCS power, is on Yale's schedule for 2019 (at Richmond) and 2020 (New Haven). The Bulldogs and Spiders have never met. The Elis have not played in Virginia since a game against Wil-liam & Mary at Norfolk in 1983.
892 or 893
Yale has 892 or 893 wins depending how you view things. The NCAA record books give the Bulldogs credit for games won on the field, which is 892. However, the Ivy League credits Yale with one more (893) victory from a 1997 (forfeit) game against Penn. Yale was the first to 800 wins but has been overtaken by schools playing a dozen or more games per year like Michigan and Notre Dame.
TUESDAYS AT MORY'S
Tony Reno, the Joel E. Smilow '54 Head Coach of Yale Football, and some of his players are at world famous Mory's (306 York Street) every Tuesday at noon for the Dick Galiette Yale Football Media Luncheon. This event is limited to media only. Please con-tact Yale Sports Publicity Director Steve Conn (steven.conn@yale.edu) if you would like to attend. Darius Manora, Robert Clemons, Rafe Chapple, Nick Crowle, Foyesade Oluokun, Tre Moore, Matthew Oplinger, Reed Klubnik, John Herubin, Mason Friedline, Sebastian Little, Alex Galland, Kurt Rawlings and Jason Alessi have taken part so far this fall.
BROADCASTING
You can listen to legendary coach Carm Cozza, Ron Vaccaro '04 and Steve Conn call the action of Yale Football this fall on ESPN Radio1300 (AM 1300) or News Radio 960 WELI (AM 960), as well as iHeart Radio, espnradio1300.com. You also saw some broadcasts on TV this season. Six (Colgate, Lehigh, Cornell, Dartmouth, Brown, Princeton) aired on the Ivy League Digital Network. Three games in 2016 were slated for the NBC family of networks (Penn, Columbia on NBCSN, Harvard on CNBC). In addition, One World Sports (OWS) aired two games from the Bowl this fall, Colgate and Lehigh, that were also on the ILDN, now available on Apple TV and Roku.
TEAM OF LEADERS
The 2016 Yale football team includes 40 high school football captains and 24 guys who were captains of other sports before com-ing to New Haven. There are also 37 National Honor Society members.
filed by Steve Conn, Yale Associate AD & Sports Publicity Director - steven.conn@yale.edu
