The men's lacrosse team will travel to Philadelphia this weekend to battle the University of Pennsylvania Quakers in their first Ivy League matchup of the season.
The Big Green, riding a two-game losing streak, are looking to establish their presence in the Ivy standings and get back on track in the early part of the season.
Penn (4-3, 1-1 Ivy), meanwhile, is coming off a series of wins over Lafayette College and Cornell University. The latter victory over the Big Red ended a 17-game Ivy losing streak for the Quakers.
"Penn's a good team," said Dartmouth Coach Tim Nelson, "and they're playing as well as they've played in a decade, so we're going to have to play real hard and real tough."
The Quakers are well into their season already and sitting firmly in the middle of the Ivy pack, so they are definitely looking to improve their record against a young Big Green squad which has had far less outdoor practice time.
But history plays in the favor of Dartmouth. The Big Green are undefeated in their last three meetings, including a convincing 21-14 win last year.
In that game, Dartmouth had 10 goals in the third quarter and Scott Hapgood '97 had a staggering seven goals on the day.
This year, Hapgood is once again dominating the scoring for the Big Green, with 13 goals so far. He and fellow senior Brian Merritt have combined for 24 of Dartmouth's 41 goals, and Merritt has an additional nine assists to lead the team with 20 points.
But ultimately, the key to a Dartmouth victory will be restraining the Penn offense, particularly the attack. The Quaker offense is top heavy and built around their attackmen, who have accounted for almost three-quarters of Penn's scoring.
Penn's senior attackman Jon Cusson leads the Ivy League in scoring with 37 points (15 goals, 22 assists) in seven games, while Pete Janney, a freshman attackman, has 24 points (20 goals, four assists) overall and won last week's Ivy League Rookie of the Week honors.
Nelson said Dartmouth needs to keep the ball away from Penn's high-powered offense if the Big Green want to win the game. "We need to contain those guys and win the battle at midfield," he said.
