HARVARD HIGH: POINT MEN FOR THE PLAYOFFS : ANDY BELL : Running Back Rings In With Surprising Year

Harvard High honor student Andy Bell, who ran neck-and-neck with Crespi’s Russell White for the Valley-area’s regular-season rushing title, is grit, grades and grace all rolled into a 5-11, 170-pound package.

Bell, who finished 85 yards behind White, has gained 1,680 yards and scored 20 touchdowns on 215 carries through 11 games and is a real college prospect--for an Ivy League school. His small stature has left him a step short. But is he disappointed that major football colleges aren’t ringing his bell? Not really.

“I’ve been trying not to let football become a means to an end,” Bell said. “I don’t want it to become my stepping stone into college. I want to play football. And if it helps me as a result, that would be great.”

More concerned about a high school championship than a college career, Bell doesn’t have long-range goals beyond two weeks. Harvard (10-1) has advanced to the quarterfinal round of the Desert-Mountain Conference playoffs, and tonight plays Orange at El Modena High.

While Bell has known few personal failures, having rushed for more than 100 yards in 10 of 11 games and twice breaking the 200-yard mark this season, he fears failure for the team, remembering all too well last year’s 39-17 loss to Leuzinger in the final.

“I just visualize a stunning loss and then how awful it would feel not to be able to practice one more time with the coaches,” Bell said. “It would be a letdown for all the time that they put in--an underachievement on the grand scale. I suppose we’d be letting ourselves down as well. But I can deal with my own failure.

“I don’t think the coaches should have to atone for our underachievement.”

Bell, however, already has achieved more than his coaches imagined.

“We thought he would be an above-average back, but we didn’t think he would have a great season like he’s had,” Harvard Coach Gary Thran said.

Realizing his importance to the team, would Bell automatically blame himself for a Harvard loss?

“I put a lot of pressure on myself to perform,” Bell said. “In this situation it would depend on the game itself. I would have a gut feeling coming off on how I performed, and whether or not I hindered our winning or helped our losing.”

Bell was sidelined in last season’s first two playoff games with appendicitis. Two weeks ago he suffered a hip-pointer injury in practice but didn’t let it keep him from scoring the winning touchdown last week in Harvard’s 20-14 first-round playoff victory over Notre Dame of Riverside.

“We have a little bit of a monkey on our back about winning the final game,” said Bell, who gained 159 yards against Notre Dame. “I think there’s a lot of pressure because of what we did last year. Going to the CIF finals with a team made up primarily of juniors, the first thing we heard coming into this season was ‘CIF finals again.’ ”

Harvard is seeded second in this season’s conference playoffs. Saracen quarterback Mike Patterson deserves some of the credit for Harvard’s success. Although he threw for only 683 yards, he rushed for 411 yards.

“He has done a great job of running the option,” Thran said. “Mike will run it 10 yards and pitch it and Andy will run it 50.”

Patterson’s enthusiasm for Harvard’s one-dimensional offense is tempered.

“If they’re going to key on our run that could be dangerous,” Patterson said. “But because Andy is a good back, he’s still able to have good games even when defenses key in on him. We’re definitely going to have to open up. We’ve worked on passing the last week and we’re trying to get the timing down.”

Patterson’s relationship with Bell has been close.

“Andy’s not the type to take his success and show it off at all,” Patterson said. “He’s a pretty modest guy. It’s just a team effort. That’s the way we treat him and that’s the way he expects to be treated.”

Bell’s importance to the team is twofold. Besides his abilities as an offensive weapon, his status as a marked man has handcuffed opposing defenses, creating scoring opportunities for several other Saracens. Hard running Alex Huh, who shares the backfield with Bell, has gained 679 yards and scored eight touchdowns.

Said Bell, “It’s not difficult to see that we’re a running team and that I’ve gained a lot of yards. They’re probably going to have certain defenses designed to stop that. So I’m not looking for 100-yard games or great yards-per-carry averages.

“I’m thinking more along the lines that if teams spend most of their energies trying to stop me, some of the unsung heroes are going to shine. And that’s only right.”