And Women's Lacrosse Makes 10

Tess D'Orsi was flying down the left side. Elizabeth George was flying down the right side.

The Princeton women's lacrosse team was flying towards an Ivy League championship. Princeton was flying towards its 10th Ivy title - and 12th overall title - of the academic year.

A day in Ithaca that started out with snow showers and an excruciating loss for the Tiger men's lacrosse team didn't end too badly.

The Princeton women's lacrosse team defeated Cornell 18-15 to win its sixth straight Ivy League championship and earn the No. 1 seed in this weekend's Ivy League tournament. Of the 33 goals in the game, none was prettier than this one:

GOAL! Elizabeth George has a set of wheels and she hits the top left corner!https://t.co/MnLAZh32ns pic.twitter.com/YAHaC8Ajgv

— Princeton WLAX (@princetonwlax) April 27, 2019

TigerBlog was in the press box at Schoellkopf Field watching both ends of the doubleheader. The goal that George scored seemed preordained as she sprinted down the field, even before D'Orsi got her the ball perfectly. And when Elizabeth George is coming at you full speed, you don't have much of a chance to do anything about it.

While that goal seemed inevitable, this sixth-straight championship did not.

Princeton won its Ivy opener back on March 2 over Columbia 19-1 and then jumped out to a 9-2 lead in 12 minutes against Brown in its second Ivy game three weeks later. From there, the wheels came off, Brown battled back and Princeton left Sherrerd Field shocked by a 12-11 defeat.

The road to an Ivy title at that point was going to be anything but smooth.

The good news for the Tigers was that they knew on that day that if they won their last five, they'd have that sixth straight championship. The bad news was that to do so, Princeton was going to have to win on the road at Dartmouth, at Penn, home against Harvard, at Yale and lastly at Cornell.

Given that Dartmouth and Penn are Top 20 teams and that Cornell is a fierce rival, this was not going to be easy. And it wasn't. Maybe that makes this one especially sweet.

In fact, Princeton would win all five of those games. Of those five wins, three would be by two goals and one would be by three. No, this wasn't easy.

Princeton first needed a great play by Kyla Sears on a loose ball and then feed to Kathryn Hallett for the late game-winner in a 14-12 win at Dartmouth. Then there was the matter of the three non-releaseable two-minute yellow cards in the final eight minutes, including two that overlapped, which led to the game-winning goal by George while the Tigers were still down a player in a 13-11 win.

Then it was 14-12 over Harvard. Then 19-4 over Yale. And finally Saturday, it was Cornell, and the need to win once again away. As it turned out, the need to win on the home field of the other three teams in the Ivy League tournament.

Princeton did so, running out to a nine-goal lead in the second half and then having to hold off a furious charge by the Big Red. When it was over, it was the sixth-straight title and 15th in program history, all led by head coach Chris Sailer.

Next up is the Ivy League tournament at Columbia, where Princeton will be matched again with Cornell, the fourth seed, Friday at 5, after Dartmouth and Penn play at 2.

For Princeton, it was also Ivy League championship No. 10 for the 2018-19 academic year. It's always a goal for the Tigers to reach double figures in an academic year, and now it's happened again.

It's also the 12th team championship, as two other Princeton teams who compete in non-Ivy leagues also won this year. For the complete list you have:
fall Ivy champs - football, men's cross country, men's soccer, women's soccer
winter Ivy champs - women's basketball, women's hockey, men's indoor track and field
spring (so far) - women's tennis, men's golf, women's lacrosse

There have also been championships for men's water polo and men's volleyball.

If you're looking for a really good measure of sustained athletic success, it's this: Princeton has now reached double figures in Ivy championships in 26 different academic years. Harvard has done it 10 times. No other Ivy team has ever done it.

Congratulations to all of Princeton's champions for this academic year.

And to the women's lacrosse team.

That one was not easy. 

Princeton has now reached double figures in