"Open House"

We move into 1975, a highly significant year for this series, and the Marshallverse generally.   But this episode feels a lot like one of the '74 episodes, with Potsie and Richie planning a late-night poker party while Howard and Marion are out of town and Joanie is at a sleepover.  The arrival of three nineteen-ish coeds, and the dilemma of how the two seventeen-year-olds can attract them, with the resolution that they can't but it's OK, because they can lie about it, also feels very early-seasons.

Some notes:

• Potsie admitting he's never had all those makeout dates is somewhat of a new wrinkle, but eventually (by Season Four I think) Potsie would be far more innocent than the original version.
• Richie is looking for a girl with a good personality, a cute face, and a cute "build."  Fonzie wants a girl who's stacked and can ride a Harley.
• Why does that girl go riding on Fonzie's motorcycle after he tells her right to her face that she wouldn't be his first choice?  Is he that attractive?  Does she appreciate his honesty?  Or does she just really like motorcycles?
• Patricia Wilson is a nameless Carhop here and would be Paulette Barker later.
• Joanne Prather, who plays Ruth (the one who "sleeps in the raw") would by decade's end be Janet, the girlfriend and later wife of David, the firstborn on Eight Is Enough.
• I did not recognize 21-year-old Amy Irving as Olivia, a role she'd reprise later that year.
• Screenwriter Bill James has hardly any other IMDB credits.