Happy Birthday Coach

It's July 10.

What better day can there be to talk Princeton men's basketball? 

Pete Carril was born on this day in 1930. He celebrated 92 of these birthdays before he passed away last summer.

Does TigerBlog need to even say anything about Carril at this point? Okay, how about this:

When TB first started doing this blog every day back in 2009, he wasn't quite sure what he would do when he got to the summers. Would he write three times a week? Take the summer off? Instead, he decided to power through and come up with some sort of content every day. 

His theory was that if he couldn't think of anything at all, there were always funny Pete Carril stories he could tell. As it turns out, there will always be something about Princeton Athletics to write, and so it never came to that. On the other hand, there are a lot of great Carril stories that TB and others have, so maybe you'd like one to celebrate his birthday.

Princeton was flying to play in one of the in-season tournaments that it used to go to each December. On this particular trip, Bill Carmody sat on the aisle, Carril sat in the middle, an older gentleman sat at the window and TB sat behind the older gentleman. As the trip went along, Carril started working on a crossword puzzle. 

As Carril continued to fill in the answers, the older gentleman started to chip in. "Fifteen down is such-and-such." "Thirty-two across is this." 

With each answer, Carril would groan at him, half to grudgingly say thanks and half to express a bit of displeasure. Finally, he'd had enough. The next time the old man started to give an answer, Carril cut him off briskly and said "Yo Pops, when I want your help, I'll ask for it."

Happy birthday, Coach.

As TB said, it's a good day to talk about Tiger men's basketball.

If you've been on goprincetontigers.com of late, you noticed the summer edition of "Hard Cuts," the team's longtime video series. It's a special series on the "March of the Tigers," as in how amazing Princeton's March of 2023 was.

The first episode recaps some of the highs and lows of the season leading up to the Ivy League tournament opening round win over Penn. There are great highlights and interviews throughout the seven-minute piece.

The story is told really well. It does a great job of taking you back to those moments, and for wanting to see what's next. What Princeton fan wouldn't want to see it all again?

If you missed it the first time, here's a spoiler warning: It's a happy story.

One of the best moments is when Xaivian Lee knocks down a big three-pointer against the Quakers. He is interviewed, as are his teammates. The moment is captured in video and in stills.

Lee was a freshman a year ago, playing in all 32 games while averaging five points and two rebounds, along with 28 assists and 16 steals in 12 minutes per night. All of those numbers figure to go up as his career goes along, but his numbers don't really define him. He's one of those instant-energy guys off the bench, and his impact on the court is unmissable.

His skills were on display recently in the U19 World Championships in Hungary, where he played for Canada.  

In fact, Lee led the Canadian team in scoring, averaging 14.1 per game as his team finished seventh. His scoring average ranked him 14th in the tournament, and he also led Canada with 3.1 assists per game while also pulling down 3.3 rebounds.

Lastly, the NBA's Las Vegas Summer League is in full swing this week. Tosan Evbuomwan, who was the leader of the Princeton team that had that great March, is with the Detroit Pistons team there. 

And there you have some Princeton men's basketball for your Monday. Of course, it's not just any Monday.

It's Pete Carril's 93rd birthday. Again, happy birthday, Coach.