Welcome to May.
Welcome to postseason.
It starts at 11 this morning, at least Eastern time, when the men's tennis team plays SMU at the University of Texas in the opening round of the NCAA tournament. The host Longhorns will play Texas A&M-Corpus Christi in the second match, and the winners play Saturday in the second round.
Princeton and SMU are a combined 37-21 on the season. Of those 21 losses between them, eighteen have come to NCAA tournament teams.
Princeton is looking to get to the NCAA second round for the second year in a row, after beating St. John's last year in Round 1 before falling to Virginia.
The match is likely to be moved indoors due to rain in the forecast. You can follow the live stats HERE.
There is rain in the forecast for Ithaca as well, though there is no chance that the Ivy League tournament for men's lacrosse will be moving indoors. Funny thing about this forecast: There was no rain in it when TigerBlog was packing yesterday for the trip. There were cold temps, but no rain.
And so TB packed lots of sweatshirts and layers, though sadly no rain stuff. Maybe he should have simply assumed that the first weekend in May in Ithaca always requires being prepared for rain and cold, not just one or the other.
Hey, he's seen snow there for the Ivy lacrosse tournament. On Mothers' Day.
Rain or no rain, cold or no cold, it'll be Cornell and Harvard at 4 and then Princeton and Yale at 6:30. The winners meet Sunday at 1 for the Ivy League's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.
No matter what, Princeton and Cornell have already shared the 2026 Ivy championship. Also, both of those teams — and quite likely Harvard — are headed to the NCAA field when the bids are announced Sunday night.
All of those games can be seen on ESPNU.
Meanwhile, the forecast in New Haven is for clear skies and reasonably warm temps. The Princeton women will be there for their Ivy League tournament, which also begins today.
Game 1 will be between Yale and Brown, with the opening draw at 4. Princeton and Penn will then play at 7, with the winners to meet Sunday at noon for the automatic bid. Princeton and Penn played a great game the first time around, one that the Quakers won 10-9 in two overtimes.
The rematch will have huge NCAA implications, since the winner gets two prizes: a shot at the automatic bid and the chance to boost an at-large resume.
The postseason will be intense. The day before? That wasn't as intense, at least not while the two lacrosse teams waited outside Caldwell Field House for their departures. That was more of a party atmosphere.
The women, all in matching sweatsuits, sat between the field house and DeNunzio Pool, waiting for their food orders to arrive. TigerBlog congratulated Jami MacDonald on being the Ivy League Attacker of the Year.
The men's players, as they waited for their bus, played Hacky Sack. Even photographer Camryn Ley joined in, after looking like a kid at the playground who was hoping to get the attention of the big kids.
TB also showed the Ivy League Defenseman of the Year graphic to Jack Stahl, who was unanimously voted for the honor after a year that saw him also named the Division I Breakout Player of the Year in midseason by Inside Lacrosse.
Stahl stands 6-4 and says very little. He's Teddy Roosevelt's kind of player — talks softly and carries a big stick. That quote, by the way, is literally etched in stone at Class of 1952 Stadium.
TB wasn't expecting a huge reaction when Stahl saw the news, and, in keeping with his persona, there wasn't one, just a bit of a smile. TB could tell Stahl was happy, obviously.
Princeton had six first-team All-Ivy men's lacrosse player, tied for the second-most in program history. Only the 1997 team, with seven, had more — and that team went 15-0.
It was a day to be happy. It was still April, after all. Then the buses left, eventually arriving at their destinations. And then April turned to May.
And now it's time for postseason.
Now it's time to get serious.
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