The Harvard Crimson men's lacrosse team represents

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

National Collegiate Athletic Association The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...

(NCAA) Division I men's

lacrosse Lacrosse is a team sport played with a lacrosse stick and a lacrosse ball. It is the oldest organized sport in North America, with its origins with the indigenous people of North America as early as the 12th century. The game was extensively ...

. Harvard competes as a member of the

Ivy League The Ivy League is an American collegiate athletic conference comprising eight private research universities in the Northeastern United States. The term ''Ivy League'' is typically used beyond the sports context to refer to the eight schools ...

and plays its home games at Cumnock Turf and

Harvard Stadium Harvard Stadium is a U-shaped college football stadium in the northeast United States, located in the Allston neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts. The stadium is owned and operated by Harvard University and is home to the Harvard Crimson footba ...

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 U.S. census was 118,403, making it the fourth most populous city in the state, behind Boston, ...

.2010 Quick Facts
Harvard University, 2010, retrieved May 31, 2010.

History

Harvard fielded its first lacrosse team in 1878, and the following year, joined the United States National Amateur Lacrosse Association alongside

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then-Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, the ...

and nine club teams. In 1881, Harvard defeated

Princeton Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the nine ...

to win the first intercollegiate lacrosse tournament. David G. Pietramala, Bob Scott, ''Lacrosse: Technique and Tradition'', p. 12, Baltimore:

JHU Press The Johns Hopkins University Press (also referred to as JHU Press or JHUP) is the publishing division of Johns Hopkins University. It was founded in 1878 and is the oldest continuously running university press in the United States. The press publi ...

, 2006, . In 1882, the Intercollegiate Lacrosse Association was formed, and the following season also inducted the newly established Yale lacrosse team. Harvard and Princeton dominated the league throughout the 1880s, and the Crimson claimed the title in 1882, 1885, 1886, and 1887. The United States Intercollegiate Lacrosse League (USILL) was formed in 1905, divided into a Northern Division and Southern Division. Championships were awarded in each division based on record and

strength of schedule In sports, strength of schedule (SOS) refers to the difficulty or ease of a team's/person's opponent as compared to other teams/persons. This is especially important if teams in a league do not play each other the same number of times. Computation ...

. Harvard was named the Northern Division champions six consecutive seasons from 1908 to 1913, and again in 1915. In 1941, Navy refused to play the integrated Harvard team, so its athletic director ordered home its one black player rather than forfeit the game. The Crimson secured the Ivy League championship with the best league record in 1964*, 1980*, 1990* and 2014* (* denotes title shared with at least one other team). In

1971 * The year 1971 had three partial solar eclipses ( February 25, July 22 and August 20) and two total lunar eclipses (February 10, and August 6). The world population increased by 2.1% this year, the highest increase in history. Events Ja ...

, the NCAA established the national championship tournament. Harvard made its first appearance in

1980 Events January * January 4 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter proclaims a grain embargo against the USSR with the support of the European Commission. * January 6 – Global Positioning System time epoch begins at 00:00 UTC. * January 9 – ...

, when it lost in the first round to

Johns Hopkins Johns Hopkins (May 19, 1795 – December 24, 1873) was an American merchant, investor, and philanthropist. Born on a plantation, he left his home to start a career at the age of 17, and settled in Baltimore, Maryland where he remained for most ...

, 16–12. The Crimson returned to the event in

1988 File:1988 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The oil platform Piper Alpha explodes and collapses in the North Sea, killing 165 workers; The USS Vincennes (CG-49) mistakenly shoots down Iran Air Flight 655; Australia celebrates its Australian ...

and were edged, 10–9, by

Navy A navy, naval force, or maritime force is the branch of a nation's armed forces principally designated for naval warfare, naval and amphibious warfare; namely, lake-borne, riverine, littoral zone, littoral, or ocean-borne combat operations and ...

in the opening round. In

1990 File:1990 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1990 FIFA World Cup is played in Italy; The Human Genome Project is launched; Voyager I takes the famous Pale Blue Dot image- speaking on the fragility of Humankind, humanity on Earth, Astroph ...

, Harvard won its first NCAA tournament game when it defeated Notre Dame, 9–3. In the quarterfinals, the Crimson were beaten handily, 18–3, by

North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and So ...

. Harvard returned to the quarterfinals in

1996 File:1996 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: A Centennial Olympic Park bombing, bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, set off by a radical Anti-abortion violence, anti-abortionist; The center fuel tank explodes on TWA Flight 8 ...

, after beating

Hofstra Hofstra University is a private university in Hempstead, New York. It is Long Island's largest private university. Hofstra originated in 1935 as an extension of New York University (NYU) under the name Nassau College – Hofstra Memorial of New ...

, 15–12, and then fell to eventual national runners-up

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

, 23–12. It was a decade before the Crimson again reached the tournament. They were beaten in the

2006 File:2006 Events Collage V1.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2006 Winter Olympics open in Turin; Twitter is founded and launched by Jack Dorsey; The Nintendo Wii is released; Montenegro 2006 Montenegrin independence referendum, votes to declare ...

first round by

Syracuse Syracuse may refer to: Places Italy *Syracuse, Sicily, or spelled as ''Siracusa'' *Province of Syracuse United States *Syracuse, New York **East Syracuse, New York **North Syracuse, New York *Syracuse, Indiana * Syracuse, Kansas *Syracuse, Miss ...

, 11–4.Official 2008 NCAA Men's and Women's Lacrosse Record Book
(PDF),

, retrieved May 30, 2010.

Head coaches

* ''Unknown'' (1881–1902) * McConaghy (1903) * ''Unknown'' (1904–1909) * E. A. Menary (1910) * ''Unknown'' (1911–1916) * ''No team'' (1917–1918) * Michael H. Cochrane (1919) *

Paul Gustafson Paul may refer to: *Paul (given name), a given name (includes a list of people with that name) *Paul (surname), a list of people People Christianity * Paul the Apostle (AD c.5–c.64/65), also known as Saul of Tarsus or Saint Paul, early Chri ...

(1920–1923) * ''Unknown'' (1924) * Irving Lydecker (1925–1926) *

Talbot Hunter Talbot Talmage Hunter (October 9, 1884 – November 9, 1928) was a Canadian college hockey, lacrosse, and soccer coach. He served as a coach at Cornell University, Yale University, the United States Military Academy at West Point, and Harvard Univ ...

(1927) *

& H. W. Jeffers (1928) * Madison Sayles and E. F. Gamache (1929) * Madison Sayles (1930–1932) * Robert Poole (1933–1935) * Neil Stahley (1936–1939) *

John Witherspoon John Witherspoon (February 5, 1723 – November 15, 1794) was a Scottish-American Presbyterian minister, educator, farmer, slaveholder, and a Founding Father of the United States. Witherspoon embraced the concepts of Scottish common sense reali ...

(1940–1941) * Benjamin R. Martin (1942–1943) * ''No team'' (1944–1946) * Robert Maddux (1947–1948) * J. Bruce Munro (1949–1974) * Bob Scalise (1975–1987) * Scott Anderson (1988–2007) * John Tillman (2008–2010) * Chris Wojcik (2011–19) * Gerry Byrne (2019-present)

Season results

The following is a list of Harvard's results by season as an NCAA Division I program: {, class="wikitable" , - align="center" †NCAA canceled 2020 collegiate activities due to the COVID-19 virus.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Harvard Crimson Men's Lacrosse Lacrosse teams in Massachusetts