Lost Some . . .
Dartmouth's centennial football season ended on a disappointing note at Princeton's Palmer Stadium. The Big Green entered the season finale with an outside shot at a share of the Ivy League championship. Yale and Princeton dashed those hopes, however. Yale defeated Harvard, 14-0, to claim its second straight outright league title with a 6-1 record, and Princeton defeated Dartmouth, 27-24, to give Cornell a second-place finish in the league with a 5-1 mark. Dartmouth, Harvard, Brown, and Princeton tied for third with 4-3 records.
Against Princeton, Dartmouth held the lead only once for 45 seconds during the fourth quarter. But the Big Green, still mindful of the previous week's 28-24 comefrom-behind thriller against Brown, drove for what would have been a winning touchdown late in the game. The Green got as far as the Tigers' 23-yard line with 12 seconds remaining only to have back-up quarterback Richard Stafford sacked on the final play of the game. Stafford, 'a sophomore, had replaced senior quarterback Jeff Kemp who was re-injured during the first half. Also hurt and through for the day before halftime was senior co-captain and linebacker Jerry Pierce, the inspirational leader of the Dartmouth defense.
Junior Tim Geibel kicked a 30-yard field goal, his seventh of the season, and senior Jeff Dufresne scored on a 20-yard run to account for Dartmouth's first-half scoring. Princeton increased its 13-10 first-half lead to 20-10 midway through the third period. But Stafford tossed a 15-yard touchdown pass to junior Shaun Teevens to cut the margin to 20-17. Dartmouth took its brief lead with 7:52 left in the fourth quarter when Dufresne hurtled into the end zone on a fourth-down play. The 24-20 lead held up for less than a minute. Princeton quarterback Mark Lockenmeyer threw a 54-yard touchdown pass to flanker Lew Leone for the game-winner. One bright spot in the game was the play of senior co-captain Dave Shula. The split end caught seven passes to give him 52 receptions for the year. That broke his reception mark of 49 set as a sophomore in 1978.
