The Battle Of Cayuga Blu

The Battle of Cayuga Blu went to the team on the second floor. 

From check-in on Thursday until check-out yesterday, the Princeton and Penn men's lacrosse teams shared the same hotel, the Cayuga Blu, located across the parking lot from the Ithaca Mall. Both teams were at Cornell for the Ivy League tournament, and it turned out that the hotel — which came to be nicknamed "Big Blu" — was the only landing spot either could find.

The hotel has two floors. Penn was on the first floor. Princeton was on the second. Almost nobody else was in the hotel, except for a vinyl record fair held Saturday.

Both teams took their meals on the first floor, separated by about 20 yards of hallway. At first, it was mildly amusing, since Princeton played Yale and Penn played Cornell in Friday's semifinals. 

Then, when both teams won those games, they were now going to face each other in yesterday's final. That meant a lot of close proximity for two teams about to play against each other in the biggest game of the year, and it was certainly an interesting dynamic. 

Princeton was going through its pregame scouting meeting Saturday night, and Penn's players were walking right by in the hallway. That's not something that happens a lot.

Now, TigerBlog offers a few words about the Cayuga Blu Hotel. It's an older hotel without a ton of amenities, and there was a boiler issue yesterday that left both teams without hot water. At the same time, it makes up for any negatives it might have with the welcoming warmth of the staff, especially Kimberly, who owns it with her husband. 

TB asked Kimberly if she'd be able to come to the game yesterday, and she said she'd watch it but couldn't leave the hotel. When TB asked her which teams she was rooting for, she said "you of course." Then he asked her if she said the same thing to Penn, and she said yes and laughed.  

In fact, she had hung on the marquee by the road "Good Luck Ivy League," a diplomatic gesture of neutrality. 

In the end, the Cayuga Blu became a rallying cry for Princeton, a literal one, for that matter, as the Tigers broke their huddle by yelling "Cayuga Blu" in unison. There was also a bit of grit to the place, the good kind, the kind that can give you an edge if you embrace it, and the Tigers clearly did. 

Yesterday morning, there was the unlikely sight of four buses lined up in the same hotel parking lot, getting ready to carry the two rivals over to Schoellkopf Field. TigerBlog can't remember ever seeing something like that before.

And so, at 1 yesterday afternoon, the two teams who had shared a hotel for three nights now shared the same field. At stake was the Ivy League's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament, and the team on the second floor defeated the team on the first floor 18-11. 

Like Princeton's 14-10 win over Yale in the semifinals, this one was close at halftime and then not as close after that. The Tigers led 8-7 at the break after Penn had scored three goals in the final two minutes of the second quarter, and it was 10-4 Tigers after that.

Between the two games, Princeton outscored its opponents 13-12 in the first half and 19-9 in the second.

The Most Outstanding Player of the tournament was sophomore face-off man Andrew McMeekin, whose two game totals were almost shocking: 38 for 60, with 28 groundballs and three caused turnovers, as well as a massive goal against Yale Friday night. 

The final was also a showcase for Coulter Mackesy, Princeton's junior attackman. It wasn't so much a showcase of his skill, though he did put up three goals and four assists while being guarded by a can't miss first-team All-American defenseman.

No, it was more his toughness. He absorbed hit after hit, check after check, all with his 5-10, 170-pound frame, and yet his tenacity and relentlessness never wavered. Whenever Princeton needed a big play, Mackesy was there to make it. 

Then again, so was everyone else on the team. It's hard to single anyone out, because this was a total team effort, just like it has been the last three weeks. 

If you recall, Princeton lost to Brown back on April 13 to dig itself a deep hole as far as even making the Ivy tournament in the first place. With their backs to the walls, the Tigers had to regroup, and do so quickly. First, there were the two regular season finales, which became a 15-10 win over Penn and a 15-8 win over Yale to get into the Ivy tournament.

Then it was the tournament itself, where Princeton repeated its two wins, just in reverse order. It was the second straight year that Princeton has won the Ivy tournament, and the Tigers are now headed back to the NCAA tournament for the third straight year, including reaching the 2022 Final Four.

Princeton's buses rolled back into town just in time for the Selection Show. In fact, the Tigers had to sprint out to the football stadium to see who their opponent would be (Maryland), where (at Maryland) and when (Saturday, 7:30). As the team headed across the track, it encountered the women's team, who had just seen that it would be playing Drexel at Boston College in its own tournament.

And now it's time for the Tigers to get back to work. There will be no staying at the Cayuga Blu this time, but make no mistake, the Tigers will be taking some that Cayuga Blu experience with them to College Park.