By JOHN P. WISE
One Great Season

NEW HAVEN, Conn. -- Yale came out in attack mode and stayed in control for three-plus quarters on a delightful November afternoon, but arch-rival Harvard used some late-game heroics to squash any hopes of an Ivy League upset and claimed a thrilling 14-10 win Saturday.

The host team raced to an early 10-0 lead that stood up until midway through the final quarter, but the Crimson got a pair of touchdown passes from quarterback Collier Winters to silence the crowd at Yale Bowl and escape with its third straight win in the rivalry, which is the oldest-continuing and third-most-played in all of college football. Saturday's meeting was the 126th all-time between the teams.

Yale coach Tom Williams could get the Bill Belichick treatment on sports talk radio this week, as his call for a fake punt on 4th-and-long in his own territory late in the game failed and gave Harvard excellent field position, setting up the winners' go-ahead touchdown with 92 seconds left. Yale's final desperation drive ended with Harvard's John Takamura intercepted Yale quarterback Patrick Witt with less than a minute remaining.

The visiting players gave coach Tim Murphy the Gatorade bath as the final seconds ticked down. The Crimson finish with a 7-3 mark overall and 6-1 in the Ivy League. Harvard lost to Penn last week, and the Quakers clinched the conference crown with an easy defeat of Cornell Saturday to complete a perfect 7-0 mark in league play.

Yale, despite hearty cheering from the fan (pictured, above) who told me to "go ahead and take (his) fucking picture, asshole," closes its season at 4-6 and 2-5.