The Red (9-4, 3-2) was fired up for its last two home games of the season, which were bittersweet for the four talented seniors on the team. The team played their first back-to-back games since opening weekend against Brown University (4-10, 0-5) on Saturday and Bucknell University (10-6) yesterday.

After consecutive losses and losing the last two Ivy games, the Red was inspired and tallied its highest goal total of the season, defeating the Bears, 7-3. Sophomore goalkeeper Alex Botte made her first start of the season in the transition period from her predecessor, first team All-Ivy Mel Jue. Botte made eight saves on the day, proving her ability to take over for a very talented goalkeeper.

Just a few months ago, Anthony Ambrosi probably couldn’t have guessed that his first touchdown as a varsity player would come out of the hands of Yale’s quarterback. The junior safety was the starting tailback as a freshman on the junior varsity squad and saw time on the special teams units as a sophomore, but knew an opportunity when he saw it.

This weekend, both the men’s and women’s track teams will be represented by competitors at the Bucknell Invitational and the Sea Ray Relays at the University of Tennessee.

Both squads are coming into this weekend after impressive showings at last weekend’s Penn Invitational. At Penn, the women’s team produced five event wins and more than 20 top-5 finishes. Lou Duesing, the head coach of the women’s team, thought that his athletes competed remarkably well in Philadelphia, particularly considering the challenging weather conditions.

LEWISBERG, Penn. — The football team’s grit was tested Saturday night as the Red defeated the Bison 21-20. Only ahead by one point after a Bucknell touchdown, senior co-captain Graham Rihn and the defense halted the Bison’s attempts with a PAT block and a defensive stop on the ensuing possession. In the past couple of seasons, head coach Jim Knowles ’87 wouldn’t have predicted his squad to fare so well on the road in that type of pressure situation.

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“We had some plays out there that didn’t go our way,” Knowles said. “In the past, we might have gone in the tank, but there was a resolve in the team to stick together”

With a 6 p.m. start time tomorrow, Cornell will be the last Ivy League team — and thus the last team in the nation — to get its football season under way. The Red will travel to Lewisberg, Penn., to take on Bucknell, a squad Cornell demolished, 38-14, last year.

With an early-season showdown with Ivy-favorite Yale looming next weekend, this will be the only tuneup Cornell gets before being thrown into the lion’s den against a team that felled the Red last year, 51-12.

Saturday was an ideal end to what was surely a long offseason for fans of Cornell football. With the weather hovering around 56 degrees and not a cloud in the sky, Cornell started its season with a statement — a 33-9 win over Bucknell that showcased the team’s strengths without revealing many weaknesses. Offensively, head coach Jim Knowles ’87 threw the kitchen sink at Bucknell’s textbook defensive schemes, and was rewarded with both big plays and steady drives. On defense, Cornell bent under the pressure of the Bison’s rush, but never broke, registering two red zone stops and allowing Bucknell to convert only 5-of-18 third downs.