Yay-Ger

Ranchi, in the state of Jharkhand, is located in the Southeast part of the country of India.

In fact, if you wanted to drive from New Dehli, that would take an entire day. Ranchi is much closer to the Bay of Bengal and, for that matter, the Indian border with Bangladesh than it is with the Indian capital city.

Temperatures this week in Ranchi run into the mid-70s each day, with lows in the mid-50s. It's an ancient city, with archeological discoveries that date back more than 3,000 years. 

There's a 10-hour time difference between there and the East Coast of the United States, which meant it was 6:30 am in Princeton yesterday when the United States women's national field hockey team took on New Zealand from Ranchi.

TigerBlog was up and watching. It wasn't quite like the time he set his alarm for 3 am to watch the 2018 World Lacrosse Championship final from Israel, but it was still early to be watching a game.

It wasn't just any game, though. It was game that the U.S. needed to win to keep its Olympic hopes alive. 

And, after 60 dramatic minutes, the dream very much was still in play, as the U.S. defeated New Zealand 1-0. The goal? It was scored by Princeton's own Beth Yeager, who was making her 39th appearance with the national team.

Ranchi is one of two sites for the final Olympic field hockey qualifying, with the other in Valencia, Spain. Each of the two tournaments had eight teams in two four-team pools, and the top three in each will earn spots in the upcoming Summer Games in Paris, where they will be joined by the six countries that have already qualified via winning their continental championship (Argentina, Australia, the Netherlands, China, South Africa) or by being the host country (France). 

The U.S. team was in a group with New Zealand, Italy and the host team, India. Field hockey is huge in India, for both men and women, and the men's national team has won 12 Olympic medals, eight of them gold.

The U.S. started out with a 1-0 win over India, followed by a 2-0 win over Italy. India defeated New Zealand 3-1 in its second game, and New Zealand had defeated Italy 3-0. 

To keep playing for an Olympic spot, a team needed to first reach the semifinals. If you read through all of the tiebreakers — and you know TigerBlog did — then you knew that a New Zealand could still advance ahead of the Americans and that it was possible, should India defeat Italy (it did, 5-1) and New Zealand beat the Americans by two that there would be a shootout to determine who took the group's second spot.

Can you imagine the pressure in that? 

Instead, the U.S. team, with Yeager's goal in the second quarter on a penalty corner, won the game, finishing 3-0 and taking the top seed in the group. 

Up next is the semifinals tomorrow. There are four teams who are still playing, and three of them will advance to Paris. All it takes is one more win, which is hardly a given for any of the four.

The Americans will play Japan in the first semifinal, at 6 am. Germany will play India at 9. The winners meet Friday at 9, but the other game, the third-place game at 6, will have all the drama. It will be tough to get this close to the Games and not be able to be there.  

Yeager is a two-time Ivy League Offensive Player of the Year and two-time first-team All-American. She'll be back in Princeton this coming year as a junior. 

This year, though, has seen her log a lot of air miles. She and the U.S. team played in the Pan Am Games last fall, where Argentina won in the final 2-1 on a goal in the final two minutes. Had the U.S. won that final, this trip to India wouldn't have been necessary.

Now she's spent the last 10 days or so in India. She still has a few more to go.

It's been an incredible journey for her no matter what happens from here. And her international career figures to have a few more Olympic cycles still remaining.

Still, she and her U.S. teammates are on the verge right now, needing one win in two games to get there. 

TB will be up and watching tomorrow morning. This is a story that he hopes has a red, white and blue ending, with a little orange and black mixed in.