Ivy Champs x 2

Ah, the perfect one-handed bounce pass for the uncontested layup.

This past Saturday afternoon at Jadwin Gym, late in the third quarter, Kaitlyn Chen and Madison St. Rose executed it to perfection.

Chen dribbled with her left hand on the right side of the court, heading back to the middle. St. Rose cut perfectly behind the Penn player who was guarding her. 

Without flinching, Chen threw a one-handed bounce pass. St. Rose caught it in stride. Layup. 

This is TigerBlog's favorite Princeton Basketball play. More than any other, even "chin" and "center-forward," this one captures the beauty of what became known as the "Princeton Offense." It takes timing. It takes two people completely on the same page. 

And it takes the courage to throw the pass, which is all-or-nothing. If it goes wrong, it usually goes very wrong.

You know who threw that pass better than anyone TB has ever seen try it? That would be Mitch Henderson, back when he was a player in the 1990s. Now he's the Princeton men's head coach, and this past Saturday was a big day for him as well.

Before his team ever took the court at the Palestra Saturday night against Penn, Brown had come back to defeat Yale in overtime in New Haven. The result of that game? Princeton clinched at least a share of the Ivy title and the No. 1 seed in the upcoming Ivy League tournament.

Also, Henderson made a little bit of his own history, becoming the first one to win three straight Ivy League men's basketball championships as both a player (1996-98) and a head coach (the last three).

His team then went out and put a huge punctuation mark on things, blasting Penn 105-83 behind 32 points from Caden Pierce and 23 from Zach Martini. That makes Princeton your outright Ivy League men's basketball champion for 2024, and nothing that happens from here on will change that. 

The 105 points? That's the first time Princeton has ever gone over 100 against the Quakers.

The win itself? That's the 10 straight for the Tigers against the Quakers. More than that, it continued one of the most amazing statistical achievements in Princeton history. 

Mitch Henderson as a player lost his first four games against Penn and then won five straight. As the Tiger head coach, he is now 21-4, pushing the total to 26-8, and 26-4 in the last 30. That's remarkable. Penn leads the series 122-97 in games Henderson has not played in or coached.

The Princeton women went into their game knowing that a win would give them at least a share of another Ivy League championship. Beyond that, interestingly, a win would also set up another game against Penn six days later, in the Ivy League semifinals. 

The Princeton women took down Penn 72-55, after the Quakers had put up a strong fight into the third quarter. The Tigers finished the game on a 35-19 run, and Kaitlyn Chen came up three rebounds shy of a triple-double, as she finished with 19 points, 11 assists and seven boards.

When it was over, they were 13-1 in the league, tied with Columbia for the championship for the second straight year and winner of an Ivy title for the sixth straight year.

Because Princeton and Columbia split and were 12-0 against everyone else, the last tiebreaker for the league seedings was NET ranking. It wasn't official until yesterday, but Princeton was too far ahead of Columbia to be caught, and so it will be No. 1 Princeton against No. 4 Penn at 4:30 Friday in one semifinal and No. 2 Columbia against No. 3 Harvard at 7:30 in the other.

The two winners will meet at 5 Saturday for the league's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament. Keep in mind the tournament will be played on Columbia's home court, Levien Gym.

For the men, the top seed is also Princeton, who will play No. 4 Brown at 11 am Saturday, followed by the other semifinal between Yale and Cornell at 2. The winners play Sunday at noon for the automatic NCAA bid.

Brown, by the way, hasn't lost since it did so against Princeton in Jadwin on Feb. 16. Since then, the Bears have gone 6-0, beating every other team in the league once, which means Cornell and Yale.  

The Ivy League tournament won't be easy for either team, or any of the eight teams who gather in New York City. That's how it's supposed to be. 

At the same time, that's two Ivy basketball championships on one Saturday for the Tigers. That's something that will never be taken for granted. 

On to New York City ...