The Academy Awards Sunday night featured nearly four hours of the usual narcissism and celebrity worship, mixed with a misunderstanding of what actual talent, intellect, humor and humility are all about.
No, mostly what it was was good-looking people wearing expensive clothes remarking on how great they are and how what they do requires them to be so much greater than everyone else, rather than just getting that one lucky break that hundreds of others who are just as talented never got.
There was one glaring exception, though. TigerBlog hopes the moral of the story here is obvious, though he doubts it is.
Lady Gaga was, in a word, incredible, and was from the first note she struck of "The Sound of Music" all the way through to the end of her performance. And then it only got better, when Julie Andrews came out on stage.
Lady Gaga, maybe more than anyone, has associated the visual with the audio part of her performances, at least to this point. The big thing from her has always been what costume she's going to wear, how much skin she's going to reveal, what tattoo she has next. Her music was mostly an extension of that, not something that could stand on its own.
Her Oscar performance?
It stands on its own. It's been 50 years since "The Sound of Music" won Best Picture, and Lady Gaga brought it all back right into the moment. It was astonishing how good she was.
And what's the moral? There's no substitute for real, genuine, "I-can-do-this-and-not-everybody-else-can" talent. And that's what Lady Gaga had on display during the show, with a voice that she has kept hidden under a wig or outrageous outfit.
As for the rest of the show? TigerBlog saw "American Sniper" and "The Imitation Game." He didn't see "Birdman," so he can't say for sure if that was better than the other two, so he'll just say it this way: If "Birdman" is better than the other two, then it has to be really, really, really good.
Why is TigerBlog so anti-movie star? He's not, really. It's just that he values substance, and there's a real lack of it on display at the Academy Awards.
Coaching, like acting, is a profession where the most successful aren't necessarily the most talented. Some are the products of a no-lose system. Some benefit from having a unique player or players who carry their team - sort of like coaching Tom Brady or Michael Jordan.
Maybe they're the best coaches. Maybe there are any number of people who could coach those teams and win. And if you're one of those coaches, would you risk your reputation as being one of the greats of all time to take on a genuine challenge someplace else?
And this brings us to the big news in the Ivy League today.
Ordinarily, TigerBlog likes to stay away from commenting on specific things that are going on at the other league schools. Today it's a little different. You can't write about Ivy League athletics without mentioning Al Bagnoli, whose hire as the new head football coach at Columbia University was officially announced yesterday, several days after it became public.
When Princeton last saw Bagnoli, it was November. TigerBlog remembers it well, as he made a PA announcement congratulating Bagnoli on his fine career as Penn's coach, including his 17-6 record against Princeton.
And now, Bagnoli is taking over at Columbia. This is fascinating on 100 different levels.
With very few exceptions, Columbia has struggled since well before TB has been following Ivy League football. The current Lions have had back-to-back 0-10 seasons, and they will bring a 21-game losing streak into 2015.
And who will be leading them? One of the greatest football coaches in Ivy history, a man who won nine league championships at Penn, six of which came during perfect 7-0 league seasons.
Let's start with Columbia's perspective.
This seems like a perfect hire for the Lions. They're getting genuine buzz around their program. Hey, what Ivy fan doesn't want to see how Bagnoli will do? TigerBlog is interested in what happens.
On top of that, Columbia is getting a coach who clearly knows what he's doing. Yes, Penn hasn't been great the last few years. And yes, Bagnoli is 62.
On the other hand, maybe a new assignment reenergizes him.
Columbia has nothing to lose with this hire. The program has struggled under coach after coach, all of whom seemed promising when they came in. No Columbia fan can say that the school isn't making a commitment to try to turn it around now.
What about from Bagnoli's perspective?
TigerBlog's initial thought was why would he want this? Yes, the money is probably good, though TB doubts it's as much as he's read in some places. Who knows though. That's a private matter for Columbia University.
Just from a coaching standpoint though, what if Bagnoli goes there and doesn't turn the program around. Does that ruin some of his legacy, which as of now is as one of the league's all-time best?
What didn't dawn on TB is that perhaps Bagnoli doesn't care about that. Maybe coaches don't think in those terms.
Maybe all he's thinking is that he's the one who can get it done. Maybe that's what coaches - successful ones - think. That "I'm" the one who can get it done there.
If he does, then that settles it. Bagnoli is the greatest Ivy football coach ever.
Either way, it's fascinating.
His first Ivy game next year will be Oct. 1 at home, against Princeton. The Tigers are coached by TB's favorite Ivy football coach, Bob Surace.
TigerBlog goes to Surace for a lot of his perspectives on how coaches think and what goes through their minds. He's learned a lot from Surace on this subject.
Now Surace goes from coaching against Bagnoli at Penn to coaching against him at Columbia. It's a weird dynamic, one that doesn't come up too often.
When was the last time a coach went from being a proven, consistent winner over nearly a quarter-century to another school in the same league, let alone one that has struggled like Columbia has? TB can't think of any.
TB will be rooting for Princeton to beat Columbia of course, but that doesn't mean that he isn't going to be following what Bagnoli does with the Lions. And wondering where that program will be in three or four years. And what it means for the coach's legacy.
No matter, though, it's good for Ivy football in general. It certainly makes it more interesting.
Honestly, TB has no idea what to expect from any of this. He wouldn't even begin to guess whether he'll win big, or not win at all.
The best he can do is wish Bagnoli luck. At least in his final six Ivy games.
Showing posts with label football. Show all posts
Showing posts with label football. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 24, 2015
Thursday, December 18, 2014
$8 Million For A Coach?
TigerBlog will now compare two football coaches.
Coach A has won 63% of his games the last two seasons and has not won a championship.
Coach B has won 65% of his games the last two seasons and has won a championship.
Both coaches were on the offensive side of the ball as players.
Coach A's team has averaged 319.2 yards per game and 21.9 points per game since the start of the 2013 season.
Coach B's team has averaged 458.2 yards per game and 24.1 points per game since the start of the 2013 season.
So if Coach A is worth more than $8 million per year, how much must Coach B be worth?
Coach A is San Francisco 49ers coach Jim Harbaugh, who apparently has been offered a six-year, $49 million contract to leave his current position and become the head coach at his alma mater, the University of Michigan.
Coach B is Princeton coach Bob Surace. TigerBlog has no idea how much Surace makes, but his sense is it's a bit less than $8 million per year.
So if Harbaugh gets his big payday, shouldn't Surace? TB will mention this to Ford Family Director of Athletics Mollie Marcoux next time he sees her and see what she thinks.
Meanwhile, back at Harbaugh, TigerBlog supposes the University of Michigan can do whatever it wants with its money. And clearly, even for a really strong state school like Michigan, a winning football team is a huge plus in terms of everything else that goes on there.
After all, ask any person about Michigan, and what's the first response you get going to be? The Big House, Michigan's football stadium, which seats nearly 110,000 fans.
Of course, the Wolverines went 5-7 this year and averaged "only" 104,909 fans.
It didn't help that head coach Brady Hoke completely mishandled a concussion to his quarterback and sounded like something from the 1980s or so when he said something along the lines of "he's a tough kid; he wanted to be out there."
And it didn't help that Hoke was 0-3 against Ohio State.
Maybe, maybe Hoke could have survived two of those three things. But all three? No way.
And so the Wolverines need a new coach, and why not Harbaugh?
TigerBlog wonders if there is some metric that can measure whether or not paying a coach that much is worth it to a school. Does having such a high-profile coach trickle down directly to wins and losses, annual giving, ticket sales, increased student applications, a higher baseline of academic success from those students?
Certainly the woods are full of high profile, highly paid coaches who didn't win.
And what exactly is Michigan buying with such a highly paid coach? Any guarantees? Is there another coach out there who doesn't the Harbaugh name, would work cheaply - say, $1 million a year? - and still be able to win at Michigan?
TigerBlog is always fascinated by this. There is a perception that school or pro teams have to throw truckloads of money at big-name coaches because they have some proven formula that guarantees wins. TB laughs at that. There are high school coaches out there who are better actual coaches than NFL coaches. Jim Harbaugh knows this.
The reality is that there are very few "super-coaches," ones who could go anywhere and win. Nick Saban wins big at Alabama? Gee, stunning. How about coaching the bottom team in the SEC and then winning there? That would impress TigerBlog.
What if Michigan could play in alternate universes, with Harbaugh as coach in one and Bob Surace as coach in the other. Suppose this could go on for five years. Would anyone bet that Harbaugh would automatically be more successful?
So what are you paying for? And what are you getting back?
One thing you get back is scorn from those at your university who aren't on board with the idea that the football coach makes 50-100 times what a good teacher makes. On the pro level, at least, TB does admit that the modern player probably wouldn't respect a coach who makes a fraction of what the players make.
TigerBlog has said this a billion times, but one of his favorite things about Princeton is that that dynamic does not exist here. The football coach, the basketball coach, no coach is bigger than the University itself.
The result is that you don't have a football coach or basketball coach who is so empowered as to feel above everything else that happens in the athletic department. Fortunately, Princeton has been blessed with coaches in those positions through the years who have understood just that.
The current group - Surace, Mitch Henderson, Courtney Banghart - certainly get it. More than that, they embrace it.
TigerBlog still wouldn't pay them $8 million a year though - or any coach, for that matter.
Especially in college.
Coach A has won 63% of his games the last two seasons and has not won a championship.
Coach B has won 65% of his games the last two seasons and has won a championship.
Both coaches were on the offensive side of the ball as players.
Coach A's team has averaged 319.2 yards per game and 21.9 points per game since the start of the 2013 season.
Coach B's team has averaged 458.2 yards per game and 24.1 points per game since the start of the 2013 season.
So if Coach A is worth more than $8 million per year, how much must Coach B be worth?
Coach A is San Francisco 49ers coach Jim Harbaugh, who apparently has been offered a six-year, $49 million contract to leave his current position and become the head coach at his alma mater, the University of Michigan.
Coach B is Princeton coach Bob Surace. TigerBlog has no idea how much Surace makes, but his sense is it's a bit less than $8 million per year.
So if Harbaugh gets his big payday, shouldn't Surace? TB will mention this to Ford Family Director of Athletics Mollie Marcoux next time he sees her and see what she thinks.
Meanwhile, back at Harbaugh, TigerBlog supposes the University of Michigan can do whatever it wants with its money. And clearly, even for a really strong state school like Michigan, a winning football team is a huge plus in terms of everything else that goes on there.
After all, ask any person about Michigan, and what's the first response you get going to be? The Big House, Michigan's football stadium, which seats nearly 110,000 fans.
Of course, the Wolverines went 5-7 this year and averaged "only" 104,909 fans.
It didn't help that head coach Brady Hoke completely mishandled a concussion to his quarterback and sounded like something from the 1980s or so when he said something along the lines of "he's a tough kid; he wanted to be out there."
And it didn't help that Hoke was 0-3 against Ohio State.
Maybe, maybe Hoke could have survived two of those three things. But all three? No way.
And so the Wolverines need a new coach, and why not Harbaugh?
TigerBlog wonders if there is some metric that can measure whether or not paying a coach that much is worth it to a school. Does having such a high-profile coach trickle down directly to wins and losses, annual giving, ticket sales, increased student applications, a higher baseline of academic success from those students?
Certainly the woods are full of high profile, highly paid coaches who didn't win.
And what exactly is Michigan buying with such a highly paid coach? Any guarantees? Is there another coach out there who doesn't the Harbaugh name, would work cheaply - say, $1 million a year? - and still be able to win at Michigan?
TigerBlog is always fascinated by this. There is a perception that school or pro teams have to throw truckloads of money at big-name coaches because they have some proven formula that guarantees wins. TB laughs at that. There are high school coaches out there who are better actual coaches than NFL coaches. Jim Harbaugh knows this.
The reality is that there are very few "super-coaches," ones who could go anywhere and win. Nick Saban wins big at Alabama? Gee, stunning. How about coaching the bottom team in the SEC and then winning there? That would impress TigerBlog.
What if Michigan could play in alternate universes, with Harbaugh as coach in one and Bob Surace as coach in the other. Suppose this could go on for five years. Would anyone bet that Harbaugh would automatically be more successful?
So what are you paying for? And what are you getting back?
One thing you get back is scorn from those at your university who aren't on board with the idea that the football coach makes 50-100 times what a good teacher makes. On the pro level, at least, TB does admit that the modern player probably wouldn't respect a coach who makes a fraction of what the players make.
TigerBlog has said this a billion times, but one of his favorite things about Princeton is that that dynamic does not exist here. The football coach, the basketball coach, no coach is bigger than the University itself.
The result is that you don't have a football coach or basketball coach who is so empowered as to feel above everything else that happens in the athletic department. Fortunately, Princeton has been blessed with coaches in those positions through the years who have understood just that.
The current group - Surace, Mitch Henderson, Courtney Banghart - certainly get it. More than that, they embrace it.
TigerBlog still wouldn't pay them $8 million a year though - or any coach, for that matter.
Especially in college.
Tuesday, December 9, 2014
Zeuli And Shon
Today TigerBlog will be talking about Mike Zeuli and Kelly Shon.
Zeuli first.
TigerBlog figured that Harvard's Zach Hodges would win the Bushnell Cup as the Ivy League Defensive Player of the Year yesterday at the Waldorf-Astoria. He thought that the offensive award was a toss-up between Yale's Tyler Varga and Dartmouth's Dalyn Williams, with an edge to Williams.
He was wrong there.
Still, was it so far-fetched to think that a quarterback who completed 65% of his passes and had 21 touchdown passes and only three interceptions while running for another 444 yards and six touchdowns couldn't win over a running back who ran for 1,423 yards and 22 touchdowns? Especially when 1) the running back was helped by a quarterback who threw for more yards than any other QB in the league and 2) the quarterback's team finished second and the running back's team finished third?
Hey, it's not a knock on Varga at all. He's a great player. It's just that TigerBlog is really impressed with Williams and would probably have voted for him.
Maybe that's influenced by the fact that Williams has played some of his best games against Princeton.
As for the defensive side of the ball, Hodges won the Bushnell Cup last year, led the league in sacks this year, is Harvard's all-time leader in sacks and plays for a team that went 10-0. TB figured all that would put Hodges over the top.
Instead, Hodges and Zeuli split the votes and shared the award.
That's great for Zeuli, and it's a sign of just how great a season he had. Zeuli led the league in tackles for loss and was second in overall tackles, as well as fifth in sacks.
More than that, he was a force on every play. What he did was play really, really hard on every single snap.
His intensity was obvious at all time. He flew from sideline to sideline and attacked endlessly. He was often unblockable.
His Princeton football resume will include an Ivy title, two bonfires and now the Bushnell Cup. There aren't many holes there, and TB was happy to see him get the acknowledgement from the league coaches - or half of them at least.
Kelly Shon graduated a year ago. This past weekend, she earned her LPGA tour card, which is a huge deal in the world of golf.
Shon becomes the first Princeton golfer and third Ivy League golfer ever to get an LPGA card. Doing so allows her to play in basically any LPGA event in 2015.
To earn her card, she had to go through three stages of qualifying. The top 100 from Stage 1 advanced, and she tied for 98th. She then had to finish in the top 80 in Stage 2 and easily did so, finishing 56th. This past weekend she had to be in the top 20, and she finished ninth after playing five rounds.
Shon was a two-time Ivy League Player of the Year while at Princeton. She also qualified for the NCAA championships her junior year, making her one of two Princeton golfers ever to do so.
TigerBlog has always been a huge fan of the athletic diversity that makes up Princeton's varsity program.
There are 38 teams that compete in wildly different sports, requiring vastly different physical and mental abilities. Zeuli plays football. Shon plays golf. Does it get much different than that?
TB has no idea if Zeuli and Shon have ever met each other or talked to each other.
There's something fascinating, though, about being part of a department with 1,000 athletes who come from such different backgrounds and perspectives and then compete under the singular name "Princeton."
It was a big few days for two of those athletes, one who graduated last year, one who will graduate this year.
TB congratulates both of them.
Zeuli first.
TigerBlog figured that Harvard's Zach Hodges would win the Bushnell Cup as the Ivy League Defensive Player of the Year yesterday at the Waldorf-Astoria. He thought that the offensive award was a toss-up between Yale's Tyler Varga and Dartmouth's Dalyn Williams, with an edge to Williams.
He was wrong there.
Still, was it so far-fetched to think that a quarterback who completed 65% of his passes and had 21 touchdown passes and only three interceptions while running for another 444 yards and six touchdowns couldn't win over a running back who ran for 1,423 yards and 22 touchdowns? Especially when 1) the running back was helped by a quarterback who threw for more yards than any other QB in the league and 2) the quarterback's team finished second and the running back's team finished third?
Hey, it's not a knock on Varga at all. He's a great player. It's just that TigerBlog is really impressed with Williams and would probably have voted for him.
Maybe that's influenced by the fact that Williams has played some of his best games against Princeton.
As for the defensive side of the ball, Hodges won the Bushnell Cup last year, led the league in sacks this year, is Harvard's all-time leader in sacks and plays for a team that went 10-0. TB figured all that would put Hodges over the top.
Instead, Hodges and Zeuli split the votes and shared the award.
That's great for Zeuli, and it's a sign of just how great a season he had. Zeuli led the league in tackles for loss and was second in overall tackles, as well as fifth in sacks.
More than that, he was a force on every play. What he did was play really, really hard on every single snap.
His intensity was obvious at all time. He flew from sideline to sideline and attacked endlessly. He was often unblockable.
His Princeton football resume will include an Ivy title, two bonfires and now the Bushnell Cup. There aren't many holes there, and TB was happy to see him get the acknowledgement from the league coaches - or half of them at least.
Kelly Shon graduated a year ago. This past weekend, she earned her LPGA tour card, which is a huge deal in the world of golf.
Shon becomes the first Princeton golfer and third Ivy League golfer ever to get an LPGA card. Doing so allows her to play in basically any LPGA event in 2015.
To earn her card, she had to go through three stages of qualifying. The top 100 from Stage 1 advanced, and she tied for 98th. She then had to finish in the top 80 in Stage 2 and easily did so, finishing 56th. This past weekend she had to be in the top 20, and she finished ninth after playing five rounds.
Shon was a two-time Ivy League Player of the Year while at Princeton. She also qualified for the NCAA championships her junior year, making her one of two Princeton golfers ever to do so.
TigerBlog has always been a huge fan of the athletic diversity that makes up Princeton's varsity program.
There are 38 teams that compete in wildly different sports, requiring vastly different physical and mental abilities. Zeuli plays football. Shon plays golf. Does it get much different than that?
TB has no idea if Zeuli and Shon have ever met each other or talked to each other.
There's something fascinating, though, about being part of a department with 1,000 athletes who come from such different backgrounds and perspectives and then compete under the singular name "Princeton."
It was a big few days for two of those athletes, one who graduated last year, one who will graduate this year.
TB congratulates both of them.
Friday, November 21, 2014
Closing Kickoff
The blur that is the Ivy League football season will have come and gone by nightfall tomorrow.
It's really hard to imagine another season has come and gone.
TigerBlog remembers watching the first game of each basketball season or each lacrosse season and thinking to himself that he couldn't believe a whole year had come and gone, and that was nearly 30 years ago now. Hey, this basketball season has already started, and lacrosse season is less than three months away, even if it seems like yesterday that TigerBlog was driving back from Long Island after Princeton's season-finale against Cornell last spring.
There was a time when TigerBlog was sure that sportswriting was just a passing phase, and he used to tell himself that this year would be the last one. Whatever year that was. Football would start, and he promised himself that when the spring ended, he would move on. Find a different career.
And he never really has. While he's gone from sportswriting to here, he'd hardly call this a completely different career.
Time in this business is always measured by the passing of the seasons. Not the fall, winter, etc. The sports seasons.
And no season flies by like Ivy League football. It seems like five minutes ago that Princeton was on its way to San Diego to start the 2014 season. Now it has but one game left.
Princeton hosts Dartmouth tomorrow at 1. Your ticket to the football game gets you into the basketball game at 11 against Incarnate Word. If you have a basketball ticket, you'll be given one for football when you get to the game tomorrow morning.
If you're wondering about the 11 a.m. start, it was agreed to so that Incarnate Word can get back to San Antonio tomorrow evening.
If you're wondering who Incarnate Word is, this team is no joke. The Cardinals are in their second year of Division I, and they went 9-5 in the Southland Conference last year. The overall record was 21-6.
This year, the team is 2-0 with two big blowouts, though Princeton is its first Division I opponent. The Cardinals seem to be able to score points, with 89 and 94 in the first two games this year and an average of 82.1 a year ago.
So that's the basketball game.
The football game is the last of the year. Princeton, the preseason league favorite, will not be winning a second-straight championship.
One thing to root for if you're Princeton is for Yale not to score 50 points against Harvard. The 2013 Tigers scored an Ivy-record 437 points; Yale has 387 heading into its game tomorrow against the Crimson.
Speaking of the Crimson, they are 9-0, 6-0 in the league, and have already clinched at least a share of the Ivy title. Yale comes in 8-1, 5-1, with only a loss to Dartmouth, who is 7-2 but 5-1 in the league, having only lost to Harvard.
So, if Harvard wins, it wins the outright title. If Yale wins, it ties Harvard. If Yale and Dartmouth win, then there is the first three-way Ivy championship since 1982.
Princeton, currently 5-4 overall and 4-2 in the league, would finish tied for second with a win and a Harvard win.
The game tomorrow is the last chance to see Princeton's Class of 2015, a class that started out 1-9 and won an Ivy League championship as juniors. This class had two bonfires for sweeping Harvard and Yale.
It played a leading role in the scoring record. It had some epic games, including the two wins over Harvard. Hey, if you're adding it all up, Harvard is on a run where it is 29-1 against everyone else and 1-2 against Princeton. That's not too bad.
It's a pretty strong resume for the Class of 2015.
Now they have one last game to play.
TigerBlog has always thought that it was toughest to walk away from football than any other sport, to know you've played for the last time. It's not like there are too many pickup tackle football games out there. Basically every other sport here can be played to some extent post-graduation, in some league or club, but not football.
Plus, football is so physically and mentally taxing and is such a sport of week to week to week routine. Letting go of all that has to be tough.
Princeton's seniors play for the final time tomorrow. One hole in the resume is that this class has never beaten Dartmouth, so there's a chance to turn that around.
No matter what, though, this has been a really special class for Princeton football.
One game to go. TigerBlog is shaking his head.
Where did those 10 weeks go?
It's really hard to imagine another season has come and gone.
TigerBlog remembers watching the first game of each basketball season or each lacrosse season and thinking to himself that he couldn't believe a whole year had come and gone, and that was nearly 30 years ago now. Hey, this basketball season has already started, and lacrosse season is less than three months away, even if it seems like yesterday that TigerBlog was driving back from Long Island after Princeton's season-finale against Cornell last spring.
There was a time when TigerBlog was sure that sportswriting was just a passing phase, and he used to tell himself that this year would be the last one. Whatever year that was. Football would start, and he promised himself that when the spring ended, he would move on. Find a different career.
And he never really has. While he's gone from sportswriting to here, he'd hardly call this a completely different career.
Time in this business is always measured by the passing of the seasons. Not the fall, winter, etc. The sports seasons.
And no season flies by like Ivy League football. It seems like five minutes ago that Princeton was on its way to San Diego to start the 2014 season. Now it has but one game left.
Princeton hosts Dartmouth tomorrow at 1. Your ticket to the football game gets you into the basketball game at 11 against Incarnate Word. If you have a basketball ticket, you'll be given one for football when you get to the game tomorrow morning.
If you're wondering about the 11 a.m. start, it was agreed to so that Incarnate Word can get back to San Antonio tomorrow evening.
If you're wondering who Incarnate Word is, this team is no joke. The Cardinals are in their second year of Division I, and they went 9-5 in the Southland Conference last year. The overall record was 21-6.
This year, the team is 2-0 with two big blowouts, though Princeton is its first Division I opponent. The Cardinals seem to be able to score points, with 89 and 94 in the first two games this year and an average of 82.1 a year ago.
So that's the basketball game.
The football game is the last of the year. Princeton, the preseason league favorite, will not be winning a second-straight championship.
One thing to root for if you're Princeton is for Yale not to score 50 points against Harvard. The 2013 Tigers scored an Ivy-record 437 points; Yale has 387 heading into its game tomorrow against the Crimson.
Speaking of the Crimson, they are 9-0, 6-0 in the league, and have already clinched at least a share of the Ivy title. Yale comes in 8-1, 5-1, with only a loss to Dartmouth, who is 7-2 but 5-1 in the league, having only lost to Harvard.
So, if Harvard wins, it wins the outright title. If Yale wins, it ties Harvard. If Yale and Dartmouth win, then there is the first three-way Ivy championship since 1982.
Princeton, currently 5-4 overall and 4-2 in the league, would finish tied for second with a win and a Harvard win.
The game tomorrow is the last chance to see Princeton's Class of 2015, a class that started out 1-9 and won an Ivy League championship as juniors. This class had two bonfires for sweeping Harvard and Yale.
It played a leading role in the scoring record. It had some epic games, including the two wins over Harvard. Hey, if you're adding it all up, Harvard is on a run where it is 29-1 against everyone else and 1-2 against Princeton. That's not too bad.
It's a pretty strong resume for the Class of 2015.
Now they have one last game to play.
TigerBlog has always thought that it was toughest to walk away from football than any other sport, to know you've played for the last time. It's not like there are too many pickup tackle football games out there. Basically every other sport here can be played to some extent post-graduation, in some league or club, but not football.
Plus, football is so physically and mentally taxing and is such a sport of week to week to week routine. Letting go of all that has to be tough.
Princeton's seniors play for the final time tomorrow. One hole in the resume is that this class has never beaten Dartmouth, so there's a chance to turn that around.
No matter what, though, this has been a really special class for Princeton football.
One game to go. TigerBlog is shaking his head.
Where did those 10 weeks go?
Monday, November 17, 2014
Another Weekend, Another Title
TigerBlog is jealous.
He found out that ESPN was going to be doing its awesome pregame show - College Game Day - from Harvard Saturday before the Harvard-Yale game and was jealous.
Yes, it's great exposure for the league. No, it doesn't involve Princeton - and therefore TB is jealous.
He goes through this all the time. Princeton competes against seven other schools in all these sports all the time, and of course a huge part of being in college athletics is to win.
And these schools are Princeton's rivals. So when something good outside of the league - like in NCAA competition - or something like the College Game Day event comes to one of the other campuses, what is the natural reaction?
To be happy for a league partner? To be annoyed that it's not Princeton?
In this case, it's definitely jealousy. How cool would it be to have College Game Day at Princeton?
Oh well. Another time.
TB also hopes that the College Game Day people don't fall back into the stereotyping of Ivy League that so often happens. People like you know what Ivy League sports are all about, how serious they are, how well the teams do outside the league.
When outsiders, as it were, come along, they know very little about just how strong Ivy League teams are. They tend to fall back to the stereotypes - nerdy kids, sports that aren't that serious, all that stuff, everybody's smart, that kind of stuff.
The ESPN presence will come before the kickoff between Harvard and Yale. Had Princeton been able to beat Yale Saturday, then it's unlikely the show would be in Cambridge.
Now, heading into the final weekend of Ivy football - boy, does that season fly by - Harvard is unbeaten, while Yale and Dartmouth have one loss each. Princeton has two.
As a result, Princeton cannot win a share of the championship, but Yale and Dartmouth can. Yale needs to beat Harvard, and that would be a co-championship. Dartmouth would get in on it by having Yale win and by having Dartmouth win in its final game, which just happens to be here Saturday.
Should Harvard win, it'll all be over anyway.
TigerBlog's focus this weekend was on Princeton's game at Yale, but not as much the football one as the men's soccer game.
Princeton went into the final weekend of Ivy men's soccer tied with Dartmouth for first place and needing only a win over Yale, who was 0-5-1 in the league and 1-12-3 overall to get at least a share of the league crown. Of course, as TB said last week, Yale had played 13 one-goal or tied games.
And now that number is 14. Princeton, using yet another Cameron Porter goal, escaped New Haven with a 1-0 win. As a result, Princeton earned at least a share of the Ivy League title.
If you're keeping track, that's three straight weekends with one Ivy championship, after men's cross country two weeks ago and field hockey last week. That's not too bad.
It was an emotional game for Yale, whose coach, Brian Tompkins, was in his final game with the program after 19 years. Yale desperately wanted to win, and it was not an easy one for the Tigers.
When it was over, there was hope that Brown could beat or tie Dartmouth and give Princeton the outright championship. TigerBlog wrote that in his story and then had to go back and update it one way or another.
At the World Cup (TigerBlog's two main focuses in soccer are the World Cup and the Ivy League), the last group matches all start at the same time, so nobody can do any scoreboard watching. In the Ivy League, Princeton's game ended just as Dartmouth's was starting.
Unfortunately, it was not to be. Dartmouth scored in the 11th minute (TB probably could have updated his story right there) and then added two more in the second half for a 3-0 win.
As a result, Dartmouth ties Princeton for the championship and gets the automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.
Princeton now waits for the NCAA selection show this afternoon at 1 on ncaasports.com. Princeton is right on the bubble, one way or another, but TigerBlog is optimistic that the Tigers will be rewarded for their 11-3-3 season, challenging schedule and 8-0-1 record in its last nine.
He and they will find out at 1.
Elsewhere this weekend, the women's hockey team won two overtime games against teams who are last place in the ECAC. Another way to say that is that Princeton swept its league weekend, and style points don't matter.
The cross country teams did well at the NCAA regionals, but only Megan Curham qualified for the national championships. The women's basketball team swept two games in Pittsburgh; the men split, winning at home against Rider and losing at George Mason.
Women's volleyball finished third in the Ivy League (Harvard and Yale tied for the title). The men's hockey team was swept on the road. The field hockey team was eliminated in the NCAA tournament.
Was it a good weekend?
Any weekend with an Ivy title is a good one, TB supposes.
He's really happy for Jim Barlow and his team. A great deal was made about how the football team went from 1-9 and 1-9 to an Ivy title.
The seniors on the men's soccer team were 1-5-1 in the league as freshmen. Now? Ivy champs.
Is the season over?
TigerBlog hopes not.
He found out that ESPN was going to be doing its awesome pregame show - College Game Day - from Harvard Saturday before the Harvard-Yale game and was jealous.
Yes, it's great exposure for the league. No, it doesn't involve Princeton - and therefore TB is jealous.
He goes through this all the time. Princeton competes against seven other schools in all these sports all the time, and of course a huge part of being in college athletics is to win.
And these schools are Princeton's rivals. So when something good outside of the league - like in NCAA competition - or something like the College Game Day event comes to one of the other campuses, what is the natural reaction?
To be happy for a league partner? To be annoyed that it's not Princeton?
In this case, it's definitely jealousy. How cool would it be to have College Game Day at Princeton?
Oh well. Another time.
TB also hopes that the College Game Day people don't fall back into the stereotyping of Ivy League that so often happens. People like you know what Ivy League sports are all about, how serious they are, how well the teams do outside the league.
When outsiders, as it were, come along, they know very little about just how strong Ivy League teams are. They tend to fall back to the stereotypes - nerdy kids, sports that aren't that serious, all that stuff, everybody's smart, that kind of stuff.
The ESPN presence will come before the kickoff between Harvard and Yale. Had Princeton been able to beat Yale Saturday, then it's unlikely the show would be in Cambridge.
Now, heading into the final weekend of Ivy football - boy, does that season fly by - Harvard is unbeaten, while Yale and Dartmouth have one loss each. Princeton has two.
As a result, Princeton cannot win a share of the championship, but Yale and Dartmouth can. Yale needs to beat Harvard, and that would be a co-championship. Dartmouth would get in on it by having Yale win and by having Dartmouth win in its final game, which just happens to be here Saturday.
Should Harvard win, it'll all be over anyway.
TigerBlog's focus this weekend was on Princeton's game at Yale, but not as much the football one as the men's soccer game.
Princeton went into the final weekend of Ivy men's soccer tied with Dartmouth for first place and needing only a win over Yale, who was 0-5-1 in the league and 1-12-3 overall to get at least a share of the league crown. Of course, as TB said last week, Yale had played 13 one-goal or tied games.
And now that number is 14. Princeton, using yet another Cameron Porter goal, escaped New Haven with a 1-0 win. As a result, Princeton earned at least a share of the Ivy League title.
If you're keeping track, that's three straight weekends with one Ivy championship, after men's cross country two weeks ago and field hockey last week. That's not too bad.
It was an emotional game for Yale, whose coach, Brian Tompkins, was in his final game with the program after 19 years. Yale desperately wanted to win, and it was not an easy one for the Tigers.
When it was over, there was hope that Brown could beat or tie Dartmouth and give Princeton the outright championship. TigerBlog wrote that in his story and then had to go back and update it one way or another.
At the World Cup (TigerBlog's two main focuses in soccer are the World Cup and the Ivy League), the last group matches all start at the same time, so nobody can do any scoreboard watching. In the Ivy League, Princeton's game ended just as Dartmouth's was starting.
Unfortunately, it was not to be. Dartmouth scored in the 11th minute (TB probably could have updated his story right there) and then added two more in the second half for a 3-0 win.
As a result, Dartmouth ties Princeton for the championship and gets the automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.
Princeton now waits for the NCAA selection show this afternoon at 1 on ncaasports.com. Princeton is right on the bubble, one way or another, but TigerBlog is optimistic that the Tigers will be rewarded for their 11-3-3 season, challenging schedule and 8-0-1 record in its last nine.
He and they will find out at 1.
Elsewhere this weekend, the women's hockey team won two overtime games against teams who are last place in the ECAC. Another way to say that is that Princeton swept its league weekend, and style points don't matter.
The cross country teams did well at the NCAA regionals, but only Megan Curham qualified for the national championships. The women's basketball team swept two games in Pittsburgh; the men split, winning at home against Rider and losing at George Mason.
Women's volleyball finished third in the Ivy League (Harvard and Yale tied for the title). The men's hockey team was swept on the road. The field hockey team was eliminated in the NCAA tournament.
Was it a good weekend?
Any weekend with an Ivy title is a good one, TB supposes.
He's really happy for Jim Barlow and his team. A great deal was made about how the football team went from 1-9 and 1-9 to an Ivy title.
The seniors on the men's soccer team were 1-5-1 in the league as freshmen. Now? Ivy champs.
Is the season over?
TigerBlog hopes not.
Monday, November 10, 2014
A Fairly Full Weekend
Let's see.
TigerBlog went to four Princeton athletic events over the weekend. He watched others on the videostream. He followed Twitter to get updates.
He announced. He wrote. He did stats.
It was a fairly full weekend. Of course it was. How could it not be, what with nine different teams who played on campus.
TigerBlog saw four of them live - men's water polo, women's hockey, men's hockey and football. He watched the women's soccer and men's soccer games on videostream. He kept track of Twitter updates for field hockey, sprint football and women's volleyball.
He actually saw a little of the women's hockey game Friday against RIT live. It was 3-0 Tigers - the RIT Tigers - when TB got there and when he left. Then he went to the pool for a little bit of men's water polo. He got back to his office to see the end of the women's hockey comebck on the videostream, including Morgan Sly's pretty overtime goal to win it.
He then had to help out doing stats at men's hockey against Cornell. This is something that TigerBlog has a demonstrated record of doing poorly.
Lacrosse? He can do that all by himself. He doesn't even need a spotter. Hockey is another story.
TB had what would appear to be the easiest job, doing the shot chart. All he had to do was write down the number of the player on each team who took a shot and where on the ice they were. If the shot was a save, he had to underline it twice. A blocked shot was underlined once. A shot that went wide was left alone. A goal was circled.
TigerBlog failed this miserably. First, because he was sitting in the press box at Baker Rink, he was at above and behind one goal. The paper with the chart, of course, had the goals to his left and right, as if he was sitting at center ice.
As a result, he couldn't figure out his left from his right on the chart without turning the paper 90 degrees. And then he couldn't keep straight which side was Cornell and which side was Princeton.
If he kept the paper turned to replicate the ice, then the numbers he wrote down would also be off by 90 degrees.
It was very stressful.
On the other hand, Colton Phinney had a great 40-save performance, with a few "wow" saves, as Princeton won the game 2-1. The Tigers were up 1-0 early, as in 3:14 in, on a goal by Aaron Ave. TigerBlog's shot chart had him shooting it in the other goal, by the way.
The next time either team scored was 56:01 later, when Garrett Skrbich scored into an empty net. Game over, right? Not exactly. Cornell scored with 16 seconds left to keep it interesting, but that would be it.
As for Saturday, he kept checking Twitter for the field hockey score, and Princeton won that one 4-3. By then, Columbia had lost 4-1 to Harvard.
It was the one scenario that would bring Princeton an outright Ivy title and the league's bid to the NCAA tournament. And it worked out perfectly.
Princeton, the Ivy field hockey champ for the 20th time in 21 years, is going to be a tough out come NCAA tournament time.
Then it was time to do PA at football.
The game dragged for nearly 3.5 hours, with 16 TV timeouts and 98 passes. And it wasn't exactly the most artistic game for much of it.
Still, it was exactly what Princeton needed. A win. And so here is where the Tigers are: tied with Yale and Dartmouth - its last two opponents - for second, one game back of Harvard, who play Penn and Yale.
The Tigers need two wins and at least one Harvard loss, but at least they still have a chance. A loss to Penn would have basically ended that hope.
After that, TB watched the second half of men's soccer on the videostream. Princeton was up 3-2 at the half, and that's how it ended.
Dartmouth defeated Columbia, meaning that Princeton and Dartmouth are still tied for first at 4-1-1, with 13 points. Princeton is at Yale (0-5-1); Dartmouth hosts Brown (2-2-2).
Princeton would lose the tiebreaker for the NCAA bid to Dartmouth because of the OT loss on Myslik Field at Roberts Stadium earlier this season. But Princeton also is right in the mix for an at-large NCAA bid either way, and a win over Yale means no worse than a share of the Ivy title.
And with that, TB was able to exhale.
These are the kinds of weekends that TB loves. Lots of teams. Lots of games. Lots to do.
This one was a pretty good one.
TigerBlog went to four Princeton athletic events over the weekend. He watched others on the videostream. He followed Twitter to get updates.
He announced. He wrote. He did stats.
It was a fairly full weekend. Of course it was. How could it not be, what with nine different teams who played on campus.
TigerBlog saw four of them live - men's water polo, women's hockey, men's hockey and football. He watched the women's soccer and men's soccer games on videostream. He kept track of Twitter updates for field hockey, sprint football and women's volleyball.
He actually saw a little of the women's hockey game Friday against RIT live. It was 3-0 Tigers - the RIT Tigers - when TB got there and when he left. Then he went to the pool for a little bit of men's water polo. He got back to his office to see the end of the women's hockey comebck on the videostream, including Morgan Sly's pretty overtime goal to win it.
He then had to help out doing stats at men's hockey against Cornell. This is something that TigerBlog has a demonstrated record of doing poorly.
Lacrosse? He can do that all by himself. He doesn't even need a spotter. Hockey is another story.
TB had what would appear to be the easiest job, doing the shot chart. All he had to do was write down the number of the player on each team who took a shot and where on the ice they were. If the shot was a save, he had to underline it twice. A blocked shot was underlined once. A shot that went wide was left alone. A goal was circled.
TigerBlog failed this miserably. First, because he was sitting in the press box at Baker Rink, he was at above and behind one goal. The paper with the chart, of course, had the goals to his left and right, as if he was sitting at center ice.
As a result, he couldn't figure out his left from his right on the chart without turning the paper 90 degrees. And then he couldn't keep straight which side was Cornell and which side was Princeton.
If he kept the paper turned to replicate the ice, then the numbers he wrote down would also be off by 90 degrees.
It was very stressful.
On the other hand, Colton Phinney had a great 40-save performance, with a few "wow" saves, as Princeton won the game 2-1. The Tigers were up 1-0 early, as in 3:14 in, on a goal by Aaron Ave. TigerBlog's shot chart had him shooting it in the other goal, by the way.
The next time either team scored was 56:01 later, when Garrett Skrbich scored into an empty net. Game over, right? Not exactly. Cornell scored with 16 seconds left to keep it interesting, but that would be it.
As for Saturday, he kept checking Twitter for the field hockey score, and Princeton won that one 4-3. By then, Columbia had lost 4-1 to Harvard.
It was the one scenario that would bring Princeton an outright Ivy title and the league's bid to the NCAA tournament. And it worked out perfectly.
Princeton, the Ivy field hockey champ for the 20th time in 21 years, is going to be a tough out come NCAA tournament time.
Then it was time to do PA at football.
The game dragged for nearly 3.5 hours, with 16 TV timeouts and 98 passes. And it wasn't exactly the most artistic game for much of it.
Still, it was exactly what Princeton needed. A win. And so here is where the Tigers are: tied with Yale and Dartmouth - its last two opponents - for second, one game back of Harvard, who play Penn and Yale.
The Tigers need two wins and at least one Harvard loss, but at least they still have a chance. A loss to Penn would have basically ended that hope.
After that, TB watched the second half of men's soccer on the videostream. Princeton was up 3-2 at the half, and that's how it ended.
Dartmouth defeated Columbia, meaning that Princeton and Dartmouth are still tied for first at 4-1-1, with 13 points. Princeton is at Yale (0-5-1); Dartmouth hosts Brown (2-2-2).
Princeton would lose the tiebreaker for the NCAA bid to Dartmouth because of the OT loss on Myslik Field at Roberts Stadium earlier this season. But Princeton also is right in the mix for an at-large NCAA bid either way, and a win over Yale means no worse than a share of the Ivy title.
And with that, TB was able to exhale.
These are the kinds of weekends that TB loves. Lots of teams. Lots of games. Lots to do.
This one was a pretty good one.
Thursday, November 6, 2014
Guest TIgerBlog: In Search Of Football
He loves to go to Ivy League football games, with their charm, their history, their competitiveness, their true student-athlete ideal. It's just that there would be something really special about going to a game at, say, Ole Miss or Louisville or someplace like that.
TB watched most of the second half of last Saturday's epic - and ultimately semi-tragic - game between Auburn and Ole Miss. Ryan Yurko and Brendan Van Ackeren, TigerBlog's colleagues from the business office, saw it in the stadium.
Yurko and Van Ackeren took advantage of Princeton's light home schedule last weekend to head on the road to experience college football. Van Ackeren played football at Lehigh; if TigerBlog had to choose a position Yurko might have excelled at in football, it would probably be holder.
The two - plus Yurko's brother - set their itinerary several weeks ago, before they realized how big Auburn-Mississippi would be. They also stumbled onto another great game and had a an experience that they won't soon forget.
Van Ackeren, whose wife Lisa is Princeton's softball coach, did the chronicling:
Everyone has a bucket list.
Such lists take various forms, and cover a myriad of interests, hobbies, geographies, etc. As employees in the collegiate athletics space, and fans of the spectacle that has become college football, colleague Ryan Yurko and myself (Brendan Van Ackeren) used the relatively quiet weekend on campus, coupled with the anticipated late-October chill, to embark on a southern college football swing that included five Division I campuses and three nationally-televised games across four days.
The road-trip commenced at Vanderbilt and included stops at Western Kentucky, Louisville and Memphis, before culminating on the storied “Grove” of Ole Miss. Many miles and BBQ dinners later, we find ourselves back in the friendly confines of Jadwin Gym, happy to share the experience with Tiger Blog.
WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 29th (VANDERBILT)
In advance of our three-games-in-three-days College Football gauntlet, we used our scheduled “off-day” to tour the beautiful city of Nashville, expand our appreciation for country music and pay a visit to the Vanderbilt Commodores.
The scenic campus and overt emphasis of the Student-Athlete certainly drew parallels to life at Princeton. It was refreshing to see the Academic All-America accolades displayed just as front-and-center as the All-SEC Honors. With that being said, there was no mistaking Vanderbilt’s efforts to build, bolster and brand in an effort to keep up in the arms race that has become SEC football.
We had the pleasure of catching up with defensive coordinator Dave “Koto” Kotulski (who served in the same capacity at Lehigh during my collegiate playing career there) and head coach Derek Mason, who both arrived from Stanford this past offseason and are truly two of the good guys in the business.
The Vandy coaching staff was gracious enough to extend us the invite to that afternoon’s practice, where we watched the Commodores game-plan for their eventual 42-28 victory over Old Dominion.
Upon leaving the facility that evening, we could not help but sense that it is only a matter of time before Mason-led Vanderbilt is able to “Anchor Down” and become a major force in the formidable SEC.
THURSDAY OCTOBER 30th (WESTERN KENTUCKY/LOUISVILLE)
Thursday was headlined by a visit to Papa Johns’ Cardinal Stadium to watch No. 25 Louisville try to play spoiler to No. 2 Florida State and reigning Heisman Trophy winner Jameis Winston in their quest for a second consecutive national championship. Despite Princeton Softball Assistant Coach Jen Lapicki’s allegiance to her alma mater and beloved Seminoles, Ryan and I were fully entrenched in the Louisville corner and pulling hard for the primetime upset.
The drive to Cardinal Stadium included stops on the campus of Western Kentucky, who we quickly learned are nicknamed the Hilltoppers for a reason, as well as the Louisville University KFC Yum Center, quite possibly the finest modern arena in college athletics. The hospitality of the Louisville tailgate crowd far exceeded any expectations and made for a delicious dinner consisting of chili, sausage and chicken wings, not to mention a cold beverage or two. The highlight of the tailgate was undoubtedly our encounter with a NJ-bred Louisville fan singing the praises of Shawnee, N.J., superstar and Princeton basketball assistant Brian Earl.
The game featured everything an impartial fan could ask for – high scoring, including 10 touchdown drives of seven plays or less; huge swings in momentum; David jumping on Goliath early to the tune of 21-0 before trying fearlessly to hang on; the home team possessing the ball at midfield down less than a touchdown in the closing minutes.
In the end, Florida State showed the moxie of a team that has not lost since 2012 and defeated the upset-minded Cardinals 42-31. There would be no storming of the field, but nevertheless, what a game/stadium environment it was.
FRIDAY OCTOBER 31st (MEMPHIS)
Friday entailed the longest leg of our journey. We drove the 390 miles from Louisville to Memphis, scooping up younger brother Matt Yurko on the way, to attend the American Athletic Conference tilt between Memphis and Tulsa. No fan should arrive at the Memphis Liberty Bowl without first paying a visit to Central BBQ and consuming as much slow smoked Memphis style BBQ as humanly possible (FIVE STARS!).
We arrived at Memphis not expecting to see a sold-out 60,000+ seat stadium with college football playoff implications like our other stops. What we got was an aspiring mid-major program that made every effort to market its product and provide a memorable Homecoming evening. Pre-game festivities included the traditional Tiger Walk, in-stadium treat-or-treating and a costume contest, topped off with a 60-minute Bret Michaels concert, the last of a four-game Tailgate Concert Series.
One obvious difference between Princeton and Memphis was the presence of a live Tiger, Tom III, gracing the tailgate lots and stadium sideline in his cage on wheels. Outside of that, there are many similarities to be drawn between the game day challenges, and ensuing efforts and successes we face here at Princeton to that of the non-Power 5 institutions. Following a 40-20 Memphis victory and quick trip through Beale Street, it was on to the Magnolia State.
SATURDAY NOVEMBER 1st (OLE MISS)
Our final stop marked the true epitome of the road-trip, and included an experience that should top any college football fan’s bucket list: Saturday afternoon in “The Grove.” On these seven fall weekends, the Ole Miss quad just outside Vaught Hemingway Stadium is transformed into a sea of red and blue tents, southern cooking and Ole Miss Rebel love.
We stepped foot in The Grove nearly eight hours prior to kickoff, and there were already tents and accompanying tailgates covering every patch of grass in all directions, many set up during the midnight hour. Rather than fully depicting The Grove experience in this blog, we will leave it up to each of you to visit Oxford firsthand.
If the Ole Miss tailgate scene and competing “Hotty Toddy” and “War Eagle” chants were not enough, the Football Gods were gracious enough to bless us with a match-up between the No. 3 and No. 4 ranked teams in the nation, two pillars of SEC and College Football tradition. Auburn and Ole Miss were ranked sixth and 18th at the time we booked the trip, but stellar performances to date yielded a virtuoso championship elimination game.
The game was electric. Ole Miss and Auburn traded touchdowns much of the evening, leaving one with the feeling that the last team with the ball would leave that night record intact. For all who witnessed the finish to the game on television, you cannot even imagine the raw emotion in the stands surrounding our goal line seats (yes that goal line). You hate to see any student-athlete lose his season, let alone after an amazing catch-and-run that virtually flipped the script on the National Championship outlook. After 60 minutes of championship-level football, Auburn prevailed 35-31.
BACK-TO-WORK
That wrapped our college football excursion through the SEC, ACC and AAC landscapes. Each campus and each match-up provided a different lens to the current state of college athletics, and notably college football.
During every conversation I have had with coach Dave Kotulski during his Pac 12 and SEC tenures, he is quick to point out that while the stadium size and TV ratings change, the schemes, execution and commitment of the student-athletes remain constant. That serves as a healthy reminder that our Princeton coaches and student-athletes are every bit as invested and committed as those we root on in sold-out stadiums and arenas.
With that, Ryan and I are excited for the next college football game on our agenda – Princeton vs. Penn this Saturday at Princeton Stadium.
Wednesday, November 5, 2014
1,021,292
If TigerBlog's colleague Andrew Borders is to be believed, then there have been 85 football games played on Powers Field at Princeton Stadium.
Andrew, the women's soccer, men's basketball, softball, golf and tennis contact here in the Office of Athletic Communications, also likes to research some information across all sports. And so it was that he emailed to TigerBlog a list of every Princeton football game played at Princeton Stadium since it opened in 1998 and the attendance figure for each.
It's the kind of thing Andrew would do. Organizations need people like Andrew, who do their own jobs without having to be watched over at every moment, go above and beyond when necessary and do all this while being completely low maintenance. It's a very, very good combination.
So now that TB was armed with Andrew's research, he tried to figure out what it all meant.
It's an old story. TigerBlog has long wondered how in the world Princeton is supposed to know if it drawing well in football.
The stadium seats 27,800. It's been full exactly once, back for the first game ever played in the stadium, between the Tigers and Cornell.
TigerBlog will be in his 130s when Princeton plays Cornell in football in 2098. He's not high on his chances of attending, and that's a shame, since he wants to see if Princeton will beat Cornell 6-0 again.
Why 6-0? Well, Princeton did so in 1898 and then again in 1998, in that first game. Wouldn't it be cool if the same thing happened again.
TigerBlog still remembers what he wrote about that game - the 1998 one, not the 1898 one. TB wrote: "Fans who came to see the new stadium and a Princeton win went home happy. Those who wanted to see a touchdown will have to wait for the next game."
In fact, the first touchdown would come in the second game, against Brown, on a touchdown pass from James Perry (now Princeton's offensive coordinator) to Sean Morey (now Princeton's sprint football coach).
Actually, TigerBlog has a book called "Athletics at Princeton," which is basically a history of Princeton sports in the 1800s. It said this about the 1898 game: "Princeton defeated Cornell 6-0 in a clean exhibition of football."
Anyway, the attendance for Game 1 was 27,800. Of the 85 games played in the stadium, there have been eight that have drawn at least 20,000.
Of those eight, three were in 1998, two were in 1999, two were in 2000 and one was in 2001. That suggests that there was interest in seeing the new stadium, no?
The numbers are fairly fascinating. As with everything else, though, they raise more questions than they answer.
For instance, there have been 49 crowds of at least 10,000. Of those, only five have come in the last four years. Of course, two of those five have been this year.
Is winning a big factor?
Princeton has won the Ivy League title twice since the stadium opened, in 2006 and 2013. The 2006 team averaged 12,220 fans for five home games. The 2004 Tigers averaged 12,950 fans - and went 5-5 while losing four of its last five.
The 2013 team was as exciting as any Princeton team has ever been. The Tigers went 8-2, 6-1 in the league, and set Ivy records for points and yards in a season. They ran a fast-paced, creative offense with trick plays, big plays, odd plays, every kind of play that would generate fan interest.
A year ago, Princeton averaged 8,508 - nearly four thousand fewer than the 2006 team averaged. The 2008 team, which went 4-6, averaged 9,384.
So what does all this mean? What conclusions can you draw? And what decisions would you make off of this?
Clearly, attendance has dipped through the years. Why is that?
It can't be cost. Princeton football tickets are cheaper than movie tickets.
Is it television? Too many games on? Too easy to watch Princeton on TV or online?
Then there is this question: Is an average of 8,508 fans for five football games good or bad?
Compared to Rutgers, who draws more than 50,000 fans per game 20 minutes from here? Doesn't seem that good.
On the other hand, what else regular draws that many people to this campus? Reunions. Anything else?
There is one line of thinking that says that stadiums should be full, that attendance numbers in the Ivy League are bad. One poster on the Ivy message board used one word to describe Princeton's attendance at its most recent home game, a game against Harvard that drew 12,164: pathetic.
But is it? Or is this the audience?
TigerBlog does know that the subject of attendance has always brought with it the idea that Princeton is unsuccessful in that area. TB isn't so sure about this. Maybe the factors that have led attendance to fall are beyond the control of the best intentions of Princeton athletics.
Anyway, here is something that TB completely missed.
The total attendance for the 85 games is 1,021,292 which means two things: 1) the average for every game in the stadium has been 12,015 and 2) the stadium drew its one millionth fan during the Davidson game.
The next home game is Saturday against Penn. The weather looks good. It's two old rivals. Yes, Penn is having a down year, but the Quakers always turn out here.
Say 10,000 are here.
Is that a good crowd?
All this time, a million people, 85 games - and TigerBlog still has no idea.
Andrew, the women's soccer, men's basketball, softball, golf and tennis contact here in the Office of Athletic Communications, also likes to research some information across all sports. And so it was that he emailed to TigerBlog a list of every Princeton football game played at Princeton Stadium since it opened in 1998 and the attendance figure for each.
It's the kind of thing Andrew would do. Organizations need people like Andrew, who do their own jobs without having to be watched over at every moment, go above and beyond when necessary and do all this while being completely low maintenance. It's a very, very good combination.
So now that TB was armed with Andrew's research, he tried to figure out what it all meant.
It's an old story. TigerBlog has long wondered how in the world Princeton is supposed to know if it drawing well in football.
The stadium seats 27,800. It's been full exactly once, back for the first game ever played in the stadium, between the Tigers and Cornell.
TigerBlog will be in his 130s when Princeton plays Cornell in football in 2098. He's not high on his chances of attending, and that's a shame, since he wants to see if Princeton will beat Cornell 6-0 again.
Why 6-0? Well, Princeton did so in 1898 and then again in 1998, in that first game. Wouldn't it be cool if the same thing happened again.
TigerBlog still remembers what he wrote about that game - the 1998 one, not the 1898 one. TB wrote: "Fans who came to see the new stadium and a Princeton win went home happy. Those who wanted to see a touchdown will have to wait for the next game."
In fact, the first touchdown would come in the second game, against Brown, on a touchdown pass from James Perry (now Princeton's offensive coordinator) to Sean Morey (now Princeton's sprint football coach).
Actually, TigerBlog has a book called "Athletics at Princeton," which is basically a history of Princeton sports in the 1800s. It said this about the 1898 game: "Princeton defeated Cornell 6-0 in a clean exhibition of football."
Anyway, the attendance for Game 1 was 27,800. Of the 85 games played in the stadium, there have been eight that have drawn at least 20,000.
Of those eight, three were in 1998, two were in 1999, two were in 2000 and one was in 2001. That suggests that there was interest in seeing the new stadium, no?
The numbers are fairly fascinating. As with everything else, though, they raise more questions than they answer.
For instance, there have been 49 crowds of at least 10,000. Of those, only five have come in the last four years. Of course, two of those five have been this year.
Is winning a big factor?
Princeton has won the Ivy League title twice since the stadium opened, in 2006 and 2013. The 2006 team averaged 12,220 fans for five home games. The 2004 Tigers averaged 12,950 fans - and went 5-5 while losing four of its last five.
The 2013 team was as exciting as any Princeton team has ever been. The Tigers went 8-2, 6-1 in the league, and set Ivy records for points and yards in a season. They ran a fast-paced, creative offense with trick plays, big plays, odd plays, every kind of play that would generate fan interest.
A year ago, Princeton averaged 8,508 - nearly four thousand fewer than the 2006 team averaged. The 2008 team, which went 4-6, averaged 9,384.
So what does all this mean? What conclusions can you draw? And what decisions would you make off of this?
Clearly, attendance has dipped through the years. Why is that?
It can't be cost. Princeton football tickets are cheaper than movie tickets.
Is it television? Too many games on? Too easy to watch Princeton on TV or online?
Then there is this question: Is an average of 8,508 fans for five football games good or bad?
Compared to Rutgers, who draws more than 50,000 fans per game 20 minutes from here? Doesn't seem that good.
On the other hand, what else regular draws that many people to this campus? Reunions. Anything else?
There is one line of thinking that says that stadiums should be full, that attendance numbers in the Ivy League are bad. One poster on the Ivy message board used one word to describe Princeton's attendance at its most recent home game, a game against Harvard that drew 12,164: pathetic.
But is it? Or is this the audience?
TigerBlog does know that the subject of attendance has always brought with it the idea that Princeton is unsuccessful in that area. TB isn't so sure about this. Maybe the factors that have led attendance to fall are beyond the control of the best intentions of Princeton athletics.
Anyway, here is something that TB completely missed.
The total attendance for the 85 games is 1,021,292 which means two things: 1) the average for every game in the stadium has been 12,015 and 2) the stadium drew its one millionth fan during the Davidson game.
The next home game is Saturday against Penn. The weather looks good. It's two old rivals. Yes, Penn is having a down year, but the Quakers always turn out here.
Say 10,000 are here.
Is that a good crowd?
All this time, a million people, 85 games - and TigerBlog still has no idea.
Monday, November 3, 2014
At Home In Ithaca
When summer lacrosse tournaments or camp games end in ties, a standard tiebreaking procedure is the dreaded "Braveheart."
What's a Braveheart? It's one-on-one, full-field lacrosse, along with goalies. Each team sends out one player to face-off and then play one-on-one until somebody scores. It usually doesn't last too long, since it's a bit difficult to chase someone the length of a lacrosse field once you've given up a step.
TigerBlog thought this would have been a much cooler way to decide who advanced at the Liberty Hockey Invitational first round games Friday at the Prudential Center in Newark, rather than having a conventional three-round shootout.
UConn and Merrimack opened the tournament with a 2-2 tie, and Princeton and Yale concluded the day with their own 2-2 tie. Because of the tournament format, though, someone had to advance to the final, so there was a shootout.
How about a Braveheart instead? Each team sends out the goalie and one skater. They face off and play until someone scores. How much more fun would that be?
Hey, the NHL should adopt this too.
TigerBlog doesn't know much about hockey. He does know that Princeton has scored three goals this year, and they're all by freshmen. That's a good sign.
The Princeton-Yale game was a good one, the first for head coach Ron Fogarty with the Tigers, against the team that won the NCAA championship two years ago. The incredible thing about the game is that the teams meet again twice more in the regular season, and the next meeting was to be one day short of exactly three months later.
What will happen between then and now? A lot. But still, it was an entertaining day of hockey in Newark, and TB got a chance to see the arena, which he had not before.
At the same time, the Princeton women's hockey team was knocking off Cornell, who has dominated Ivy League women's hockey for the last few years. That game was played in Ithaca.
And this weekend, if it was Princeton-Cornell in Ithaca, Princeton won.
The Tigers and Big Red played in Ithaca in six different sports in a 28-hour stretch beginning with that women's hockey game, and Princeton went 6-0 in those six events. Maybe it's because Ithaca is Mollie Marcoux's hometown?
Anyway, if you're keeping track, Princeton defeated Cornell in women's hockey, field hockey, football, women's volleyball, women's soccer and men's soccer between last Friday and Saturday. It's left some of those teams right in the thick of the Ivy championship hunt.
* Field hockey
Princeton is tied with Columbia at 5-1 in the Ivy League. The Tigers host Penn Saturday, while Columbia is at Harvard.
Should only one win, then it would be outright Ivy League champion and the league's NCAA tournament representative. If they both win, then they share the title, but Columbia would be the league's automatic bid by virtue of its win over Princeton. In other words, Princeton needs to beat Penn and have Harvard beat Columbia to get to the NCAA tournament.
Penn and Harvard are both 3-3 in the league.
Things can get a bit murkier if Princeton and Columbia both lose and Cornell defeats Dartmouth, which would mean a three-way tie for the title. In that case, TigerBlog is pretty sure that there would be a random draw for the Ivy automatic bid, since all three would be 1-1 against each other and have a loss to either Penn or Harvard, who would be tied in the standings. TB has been wrong about these things before.
* Men's soccer
Don't look now - or actually look now - but Princeton is tied for first in the Ivy League men's soccer race. Princeton and Dartmouth are both 3-1-1, for 10 points. Harvard and Penn are both next with eight points.
There are two weeks left in the Ivy season, and Princeton hosts Penn and is at Yale. There is also a game Wednesday at American, a team earning votes in the national poll.
Should Princeton win its last two league games, it would be assured of at least a tie for the championship. Because Princeton's loss is to Dartmouth, Princeton would not get the league's automatic bid in a two-way tie, though TB figures the Tigers would be right in the mix for an at-large NCAA bid.
* Women's soccer
This is the final week of Julie Shackford's 20-year career as the women's soccer coach at Princeton. Her team can still get a share of the Ivy League title but cannot get the league's NCAA tournament bid.
Princeton has 10 points, trailing Harvard (13) and Dartmouth (12). A Tiger win over Penn Saturday, coupled with a Harvard loss to Columbia (eight points) and Dartmouth loss or tie in its game with Cornell (three points) gives Princeton a tie for the league championship. The Tigers cannot win a tiebreaker in either a two-way tie with Harvard or three-way tie with Harvard and Dartmouth, and Princeton cannot have a two-way tie with Dartmouth.
* Women's volleyball
There are two weekends and four matches left for each Ivy League women's volleyball team. Princeton is currently 7-3, trailing only Harvard and Yale, who are both 8-2.
The good news for Princeton is that they play both again, this Friday at home against Harvard and then the following Friday at Yale. Princeton is also home with Dartmouth Saturday.
The bad news? Princeton went 0-3 against those three the first time around. Still, the Tigers have a chance, and that's all they could really ask for at this point.
* Football
Princeton defeated Cornell 38-27 Saturday, going to 3-1 in the Ivy League with three games left, including one this Saturday at home at 3:30 against Penn.
Right now, Harvard is 4-0, followed by Princeton, Yale and Dartmouth all at 3-1. Princeton ends it season at Yale and home with Dartmouth.
Harvard knocked off Dartmouth Saturday in a match of the last two Ivy unbeatens. Harvard has also beaten Princeton.
Obviously, the Crimson finish the season against Yale, at home no less. Yale appears to have the best chance to knock off Harvard, who also has Columbia (0-4) and Penn (1-3) to go.
Princeton needs to win out and have someone beat Harvard. If that happens, then Princeton would be co-champion.
What's a Braveheart? It's one-on-one, full-field lacrosse, along with goalies. Each team sends out one player to face-off and then play one-on-one until somebody scores. It usually doesn't last too long, since it's a bit difficult to chase someone the length of a lacrosse field once you've given up a step.
TigerBlog thought this would have been a much cooler way to decide who advanced at the Liberty Hockey Invitational first round games Friday at the Prudential Center in Newark, rather than having a conventional three-round shootout.
UConn and Merrimack opened the tournament with a 2-2 tie, and Princeton and Yale concluded the day with their own 2-2 tie. Because of the tournament format, though, someone had to advance to the final, so there was a shootout.
How about a Braveheart instead? Each team sends out the goalie and one skater. They face off and play until someone scores. How much more fun would that be?
Hey, the NHL should adopt this too.
TigerBlog doesn't know much about hockey. He does know that Princeton has scored three goals this year, and they're all by freshmen. That's a good sign.
The Princeton-Yale game was a good one, the first for head coach Ron Fogarty with the Tigers, against the team that won the NCAA championship two years ago. The incredible thing about the game is that the teams meet again twice more in the regular season, and the next meeting was to be one day short of exactly three months later.
What will happen between then and now? A lot. But still, it was an entertaining day of hockey in Newark, and TB got a chance to see the arena, which he had not before.
At the same time, the Princeton women's hockey team was knocking off Cornell, who has dominated Ivy League women's hockey for the last few years. That game was played in Ithaca.
And this weekend, if it was Princeton-Cornell in Ithaca, Princeton won.
The Tigers and Big Red played in Ithaca in six different sports in a 28-hour stretch beginning with that women's hockey game, and Princeton went 6-0 in those six events. Maybe it's because Ithaca is Mollie Marcoux's hometown?
Anyway, if you're keeping track, Princeton defeated Cornell in women's hockey, field hockey, football, women's volleyball, women's soccer and men's soccer between last Friday and Saturday. It's left some of those teams right in the thick of the Ivy championship hunt.
* Field hockey
Princeton is tied with Columbia at 5-1 in the Ivy League. The Tigers host Penn Saturday, while Columbia is at Harvard.
Should only one win, then it would be outright Ivy League champion and the league's NCAA tournament representative. If they both win, then they share the title, but Columbia would be the league's automatic bid by virtue of its win over Princeton. In other words, Princeton needs to beat Penn and have Harvard beat Columbia to get to the NCAA tournament.
Penn and Harvard are both 3-3 in the league.
Things can get a bit murkier if Princeton and Columbia both lose and Cornell defeats Dartmouth, which would mean a three-way tie for the title. In that case, TigerBlog is pretty sure that there would be a random draw for the Ivy automatic bid, since all three would be 1-1 against each other and have a loss to either Penn or Harvard, who would be tied in the standings. TB has been wrong about these things before.
* Men's soccer
Don't look now - or actually look now - but Princeton is tied for first in the Ivy League men's soccer race. Princeton and Dartmouth are both 3-1-1, for 10 points. Harvard and Penn are both next with eight points.
There are two weeks left in the Ivy season, and Princeton hosts Penn and is at Yale. There is also a game Wednesday at American, a team earning votes in the national poll.
Should Princeton win its last two league games, it would be assured of at least a tie for the championship. Because Princeton's loss is to Dartmouth, Princeton would not get the league's automatic bid in a two-way tie, though TB figures the Tigers would be right in the mix for an at-large NCAA bid.
* Women's soccer
This is the final week of Julie Shackford's 20-year career as the women's soccer coach at Princeton. Her team can still get a share of the Ivy League title but cannot get the league's NCAA tournament bid.
Princeton has 10 points, trailing Harvard (13) and Dartmouth (12). A Tiger win over Penn Saturday, coupled with a Harvard loss to Columbia (eight points) and Dartmouth loss or tie in its game with Cornell (three points) gives Princeton a tie for the league championship. The Tigers cannot win a tiebreaker in either a two-way tie with Harvard or three-way tie with Harvard and Dartmouth, and Princeton cannot have a two-way tie with Dartmouth.
* Women's volleyball
There are two weekends and four matches left for each Ivy League women's volleyball team. Princeton is currently 7-3, trailing only Harvard and Yale, who are both 8-2.
The good news for Princeton is that they play both again, this Friday at home against Harvard and then the following Friday at Yale. Princeton is also home with Dartmouth Saturday.
The bad news? Princeton went 0-3 against those three the first time around. Still, the Tigers have a chance, and that's all they could really ask for at this point.
* Football
Princeton defeated Cornell 38-27 Saturday, going to 3-1 in the Ivy League with three games left, including one this Saturday at home at 3:30 against Penn.
Right now, Harvard is 4-0, followed by Princeton, Yale and Dartmouth all at 3-1. Princeton ends it season at Yale and home with Dartmouth.
Harvard knocked off Dartmouth Saturday in a match of the last two Ivy unbeatens. Harvard has also beaten Princeton.
Obviously, the Crimson finish the season against Yale, at home no less. Yale appears to have the best chance to knock off Harvard, who also has Columbia (0-4) and Penn (1-3) to go.
Princeton needs to win out and have someone beat Harvard. If that happens, then Princeton would be co-champion.
Monday, October 27, 2014
It Doesn't Always Go Your Way
Even before TigerBlog got out of his car Saturday, he knew that something was up.
There was more traffic, more tailgating, more people everywhere he looked. The energy was obvious as soon as he parked and walked towards Princeton Stadium.
It was Princeton-Harvard, 2-0 against 2-0, and it reaffirmed a great truth of contemporary American higher education - and the history of American higher education, for that matter.
Nothing - nothing - can unify a college campus like a big football game, even colleges that are ranked 1 and 2 every year in the U.S. News and World Report rankings.
Here's another truth - not every big game goes your way.
Let's get back to the big game part.
Everywhere TigerBlog looked, he saw people brought back to this campus - or visiting this campus - for the footbal game, in numbers that nothing else short of Reunions can do. There were people of all age ranges, from little kids with their parents all the way through the old guard.
It's what football can do. No other sport can. Only football.
It's woven that deeply into the American consciousness, and has been that way for nearly 150 years, ever since Princeton and Rutgers played the first game ever.
What is it about football that trumps every other sport?
TigerBlog isn't sure per se. Maybe it's just the head start it's had. Who knows. Maybe it's the size of the stadium or the fact that there are fewer football games than any other sport, so they're more significant.
No matter. There is nothing to bring out the school spirit like football.
TigerBlog has never been to a really, really big-time college football game, unless you count Rutgers back when he covered some Scarlet Knights football when the Big East first started or even before that.
TB is talking about the SEC. Or the Big Ten. Games like that.
He wouldn't have wanted to spend his career at schools like that. He wouldn't mind going once, though.
This brings us to the game Saturday. After two heartstopping Princeton wins over Harvard, this one was, well, if you're a Princeton fan, you know what it was.
The final was Harvard 49, Princeton 7. It was a one-sided game to be sure, one that was 28-0 at halftime.
It was actually 21-0 Harvard late in the first half when the Crimson had to punt. It appeared to be clear that the Harvard player who touched the ball had his foot in the end zone, and TigerBlog assumed touchback.
Princeton ball, first and 10 at the 20. About two minutes left. And the Tigers were getting the ball to start the second half. Who knows? Score. Halftime. Score? It's a whole new ballgame.
Except the refs spotted the ball inside the one, and not at the 20. Princeton had to punt, Harvard got a short field and added a TD, and just like that, it was 28-0 at the break.
Just before the start of the second half, TigerBlog ran into defensive coordinator Jim Salgado in the press box. TB asked about the non-touchback, and he learned that the rule in college is different than the rule in the NFL. The rule in college says that the ball has to cross the plane of the goal line, and therefore it was correctly spotted inside the 1, even if the player had his foot on the goal line. In the NFL, that would have been a touchback.
So what does it all mean?
Well, for starters, it means that Harvard and Dartmouth are both 3-0 as they prepare to meet this Saturday in Hanover. If you're a Princeton fan, you're probably rooting for Dartmouth.
Why?
If you're an optimist, then you say that this past Saturday was one of those days and now Princeton moves forward with its final four games. Win out, and the Tigers are 6-1.
That would also mean Yale would have two losses and Dartmouth would have a loss. So that just leaves Harvard, who would need a loss to create a tie for the Ivy title.
Simple, right?
Good teams - and TigerBlog considers Princeton to be a good team - are never as bad as they look at their worst. Up next for Princeton is a game at Cornell and then a home game against Penn; the two are a combined 1-5 in the league.
Wins in both of those games are musts if the Tigers are going to have a meaningful last two weeks of the year, at Yale and then home against Dartmouth.
But if Princeton can go into Week 9 at 4-1 in the league, then that'll be a huge game - and Princeton will take its chances with that.
TigerBlog expected a close game on Saturday and didn't get it. He knows, though, that Princeton's season hardly ended with that loss.
Last year Princeton beat Harvard 51-48 in three OTs. The year before, Princeton scored a touchdown with 13 seconds left for the 39-34 win after trailing 34-10 with 12 minutes left.
Saturday? Princeton scored with 28 seconds to go. It was hardly as dramatic as the late touchdowns in the preceding two years. Those wins were in all-time epic classic games.
Saturday? It meant Princeton avoided a shutout.
Hey, it doesn't always go your way.
There was more traffic, more tailgating, more people everywhere he looked. The energy was obvious as soon as he parked and walked towards Princeton Stadium.
It was Princeton-Harvard, 2-0 against 2-0, and it reaffirmed a great truth of contemporary American higher education - and the history of American higher education, for that matter.
Nothing - nothing - can unify a college campus like a big football game, even colleges that are ranked 1 and 2 every year in the U.S. News and World Report rankings.
Here's another truth - not every big game goes your way.
Let's get back to the big game part.
Everywhere TigerBlog looked, he saw people brought back to this campus - or visiting this campus - for the footbal game, in numbers that nothing else short of Reunions can do. There were people of all age ranges, from little kids with their parents all the way through the old guard.
It's what football can do. No other sport can. Only football.
It's woven that deeply into the American consciousness, and has been that way for nearly 150 years, ever since Princeton and Rutgers played the first game ever.
What is it about football that trumps every other sport?
TigerBlog isn't sure per se. Maybe it's just the head start it's had. Who knows. Maybe it's the size of the stadium or the fact that there are fewer football games than any other sport, so they're more significant.
No matter. There is nothing to bring out the school spirit like football.
TigerBlog has never been to a really, really big-time college football game, unless you count Rutgers back when he covered some Scarlet Knights football when the Big East first started or even before that.
TB is talking about the SEC. Or the Big Ten. Games like that.
He wouldn't have wanted to spend his career at schools like that. He wouldn't mind going once, though.
This brings us to the game Saturday. After two heartstopping Princeton wins over Harvard, this one was, well, if you're a Princeton fan, you know what it was.
The final was Harvard 49, Princeton 7. It was a one-sided game to be sure, one that was 28-0 at halftime.
It was actually 21-0 Harvard late in the first half when the Crimson had to punt. It appeared to be clear that the Harvard player who touched the ball had his foot in the end zone, and TigerBlog assumed touchback.
Princeton ball, first and 10 at the 20. About two minutes left. And the Tigers were getting the ball to start the second half. Who knows? Score. Halftime. Score? It's a whole new ballgame.
Except the refs spotted the ball inside the one, and not at the 20. Princeton had to punt, Harvard got a short field and added a TD, and just like that, it was 28-0 at the break.
Just before the start of the second half, TigerBlog ran into defensive coordinator Jim Salgado in the press box. TB asked about the non-touchback, and he learned that the rule in college is different than the rule in the NFL. The rule in college says that the ball has to cross the plane of the goal line, and therefore it was correctly spotted inside the 1, even if the player had his foot on the goal line. In the NFL, that would have been a touchback.
So what does it all mean?
Well, for starters, it means that Harvard and Dartmouth are both 3-0 as they prepare to meet this Saturday in Hanover. If you're a Princeton fan, you're probably rooting for Dartmouth.
Why?
If you're an optimist, then you say that this past Saturday was one of those days and now Princeton moves forward with its final four games. Win out, and the Tigers are 6-1.
That would also mean Yale would have two losses and Dartmouth would have a loss. So that just leaves Harvard, who would need a loss to create a tie for the Ivy title.
Simple, right?
Good teams - and TigerBlog considers Princeton to be a good team - are never as bad as they look at their worst. Up next for Princeton is a game at Cornell and then a home game against Penn; the two are a combined 1-5 in the league.
Wins in both of those games are musts if the Tigers are going to have a meaningful last two weeks of the year, at Yale and then home against Dartmouth.
But if Princeton can go into Week 9 at 4-1 in the league, then that'll be a huge game - and Princeton will take its chances with that.
TigerBlog expected a close game on Saturday and didn't get it. He knows, though, that Princeton's season hardly ended with that loss.
Last year Princeton beat Harvard 51-48 in three OTs. The year before, Princeton scored a touchdown with 13 seconds left for the 39-34 win after trailing 34-10 with 12 minutes left.
Saturday? Princeton scored with 28 seconds to go. It was hardly as dramatic as the late touchdowns in the preceding two years. Those wins were in all-time epic classic games.
Saturday? It meant Princeton avoided a shutout.
Hey, it doesn't always go your way.
Friday, October 24, 2014
Tigers, From Then And Now
TigerBlog has spent some time of late putting together some highlights of the 1964 Princeton football team, to be played on the videoboard at Princeton Stadium tomorrow at halftime of the Harvard game.
The occasion is a celebration of the 50th anniversary of the 1964 team's perfect season. The Tigers were pretty good that year, outscoring its opponents 216-53 overall and 197-46 in league games and posting four consecutive shutouts in midseason. Princeton finished 13th in the final UPI national poll and second in the Lambert Poll for the best team in the East, behind only Penn State.
Cosmo Iacavazzi, the captain of that team and a member of the College Football Hall of Fame, gave TigerBlog a DVD with three year's worth of highlights on it, covering 1963-65.
Princeton went 24-3 in those three years, winning the Ivy title outright in ’64 and tying in ’63. The Tigers won 17 straight at one point, from opening day 1964 through the final day of the 1965 season. Princeton lost to Dartmouth to end 1963 and 1965; the only other loss was to Harvard in ’63.
TigerBlog didn't see much of those teams play live, as he was busy with more pressing tasks at the time, such as being potty trained and the like. The DVD, though, put him right into Palmer Stadium and the other Ivy venues that he would come to know so well.
The highlights show Princeton in the single wing that it played under head coach Dick Colman. It was a powerful offense, led by the bruising Iacavazzi and with a strong supporting cast.
One thing that really struck TB from these highlights was the extent to which players then would celebrate in the end zone after touchdowns. They wouldn't dance and thump their own chests, but they would spike the ball, toss it up in the air or in the case of Iacavazzi not once but twice against Yale, fire it into the stands.
They'd also jump up and down wildly in celebration, seemingly spontaneously, to the point where TB thought a few of them might have blown out an ankle or knee or something.
There was another pretty cool thing about the highlights. The narrators.
The first two years were narrated by Marty Glickman, who is as good as an announcer as who has ever lived. The last was narrated by Chris Schenkel, another Hall of Fame broadcaster.
TigerBlog can't believe the number of people he works with who have never heard of either.
Anyway, if you played football during that era, then you're probably in the range of 70 years old right now.
And so it will be a group of 70-ish men who will be on the field at halftime tomorrow, while their highlights play on the videoboard.
Here is a sample, if you have 17 seconds to invest.
The halftime show will be part of what figures to be 1) a close game and 2) not as high scoring as last year, or even the year before.
It'll be hard to match the dramatics of the last two years as well, though TB would have thought it impossible for last year to match the year before, and in some ways it exceeded it.
Two years ago, Princeton defeated Harvard 39-34 after trailing 34-10 with 12 minutes left. Last year it was 51-48 Tigers in three overtimes behind six Quinn Epperly touchdown passes.
If you're a Harvard fan, you know your team is 26-1 against all other teams and 0-2 against Princeton its last 29 games. Harvard has been waiting 52 weeks for this chance.
And the team that comes here is a good one, 5-0, 2-0 in the league, 21st in the rankings.
Princeton is 2-0 as well in the league, though 3-2 overall. Not that any of that makes a difference.
If Princeton is going to win a second straight league title, it's going to have to earn it, just as whoever wins will have to do so. By tomorrow night, there will be four teams in the race - Princeton, Harvard and Dartmouth who are all 2-0 and whoever wins the Yale-Penn game tomorrow, who will then be 2-1.
Princeton still has to play all four of those teams, as does Harvard.
As for the game tomorrow, here are some important numbers to keep in mind.
First, there is Harvard's 191.4 rushing yards per game against Princeton's best-in-the-FCS 61.0 rushing yards per game allowed.
Then there's Princeton's 36.0 points per game on offense against Harvard's 11.2 points per game allowed on defense, which is best in the Ivy League and third nationally.
Harvard has the top overall defense in the Ivy League. Princeton has the second-best offense in the league.
What will come of all this?
Well, it can't possibly be the game it was the last two years, right? Every year can't be a classic, right?
And it won't be as high scoring, right?
Who knows.
TigerBlog does know the weather will be perfect, and the matchup is two old rivals who have taken their rivalry to a pretty high level in recent years.
He's looking forward to it.
The occasion is a celebration of the 50th anniversary of the 1964 team's perfect season. The Tigers were pretty good that year, outscoring its opponents 216-53 overall and 197-46 in league games and posting four consecutive shutouts in midseason. Princeton finished 13th in the final UPI national poll and second in the Lambert Poll for the best team in the East, behind only Penn State.
Cosmo Iacavazzi, the captain of that team and a member of the College Football Hall of Fame, gave TigerBlog a DVD with three year's worth of highlights on it, covering 1963-65.
Princeton went 24-3 in those three years, winning the Ivy title outright in ’64 and tying in ’63. The Tigers won 17 straight at one point, from opening day 1964 through the final day of the 1965 season. Princeton lost to Dartmouth to end 1963 and 1965; the only other loss was to Harvard in ’63.
TigerBlog didn't see much of those teams play live, as he was busy with more pressing tasks at the time, such as being potty trained and the like. The DVD, though, put him right into Palmer Stadium and the other Ivy venues that he would come to know so well.
The highlights show Princeton in the single wing that it played under head coach Dick Colman. It was a powerful offense, led by the bruising Iacavazzi and with a strong supporting cast.
One thing that really struck TB from these highlights was the extent to which players then would celebrate in the end zone after touchdowns. They wouldn't dance and thump their own chests, but they would spike the ball, toss it up in the air or in the case of Iacavazzi not once but twice against Yale, fire it into the stands.
They'd also jump up and down wildly in celebration, seemingly spontaneously, to the point where TB thought a few of them might have blown out an ankle or knee or something.
There was another pretty cool thing about the highlights. The narrators.
The first two years were narrated by Marty Glickman, who is as good as an announcer as who has ever lived. The last was narrated by Chris Schenkel, another Hall of Fame broadcaster.
TigerBlog can't believe the number of people he works with who have never heard of either.
Anyway, if you played football during that era, then you're probably in the range of 70 years old right now.
And so it will be a group of 70-ish men who will be on the field at halftime tomorrow, while their highlights play on the videoboard.
Here is a sample, if you have 17 seconds to invest.
It'll be hard to match the dramatics of the last two years as well, though TB would have thought it impossible for last year to match the year before, and in some ways it exceeded it.
Two years ago, Princeton defeated Harvard 39-34 after trailing 34-10 with 12 minutes left. Last year it was 51-48 Tigers in three overtimes behind six Quinn Epperly touchdown passes.
If you're a Harvard fan, you know your team is 26-1 against all other teams and 0-2 against Princeton its last 29 games. Harvard has been waiting 52 weeks for this chance.
And the team that comes here is a good one, 5-0, 2-0 in the league, 21st in the rankings.
Princeton is 2-0 as well in the league, though 3-2 overall. Not that any of that makes a difference.
If Princeton is going to win a second straight league title, it's going to have to earn it, just as whoever wins will have to do so. By tomorrow night, there will be four teams in the race - Princeton, Harvard and Dartmouth who are all 2-0 and whoever wins the Yale-Penn game tomorrow, who will then be 2-1.
Princeton still has to play all four of those teams, as does Harvard.
As for the game tomorrow, here are some important numbers to keep in mind.
First, there is Harvard's 191.4 rushing yards per game against Princeton's best-in-the-FCS 61.0 rushing yards per game allowed.
Then there's Princeton's 36.0 points per game on offense against Harvard's 11.2 points per game allowed on defense, which is best in the Ivy League and third nationally.
Harvard has the top overall defense in the Ivy League. Princeton has the second-best offense in the league.
What will come of all this?
Well, it can't possibly be the game it was the last two years, right? Every year can't be a classic, right?
And it won't be as high scoring, right?
Who knows.
TigerBlog does know the weather will be perfect, and the matchup is two old rivals who have taken their rivalry to a pretty high level in recent years.
He's looking forward to it.
Thursday, October 23, 2014
Princeton Hosts Harvard - Times Four
TigerBlog has written about Oscar Pistorius before.
If you don't want to click on the link, TB will give you the gist in one paragraph:
TB couldn't believe it when he saw the news. And he was mad at himself, mad for once again believing in an athlete, holding that athlete up to be more than he was, to be a great international citizen, when all he really is is a murderer who can run fast on fake legs.
That was from Feb. 15, 2013, right after it came out that Pistorius - the South African double-amputee turned Olympic runner - had killed his girlfriend, the beautiful model Reeva Steenkamp.
Now Pistorius sits in the medical wing of a South African prison. His sentence is five years, but it appears that he'll be out in 10 months. And he'll serve his time in the medical wing, with other disabled prisoners.
Less than a year. For murder.
What strikes TB about it most now is that Pistorius is in the medical wing, and not the most worse main area of the prison, because of his disability, the very thing he fought against being labeled with when he wanted to run in the Olympics, or, in other words, he's disabled when it suits him.
And yes, TigerBlog read how Pistorius suffers from depression. Unfortunately, that's not as serious as Steenkamp, who suffers from being dead.
This entire story from the beginning has really affected TigerBlog, probably because of how much he allowed himself to admire Pistorius during the last Olympics. Never again. TigerBlog will never again look at a professional athlete with that kind of admiration.
TigerBlog has not yet watched a pitch of the World Series. He has watched very little NFL football this year. He watched almost none of the NBA and NHL regular seasons or playoffs last year.
He did watch a lot of the World Cup, and clearly those guys aren't saints either. So why that event? Maybe it's the fact that the players aren't being paid additionally for competing, that they're doing it for love of the game and because of the great respect the event has earned?
It wasn't until today that TigerBlog wondered if part of the reason he watches so little of the major sports leagues now is because of Pistorius? Maybe TB just reached his breaking point?
Anyway, no segue today. Let's just get to the four Princeton-Harvard matchups Saturday, going in chronological order:
* Field Hockey at noon
Unlike most years, this current Ivy League field hockey race is actually just that, a race. Princeton, winner of 19 of the last 20 Ivy titles in the sport, is in a dogfight with five teams.
The Tigers, who lost earlier this year to Columbia, are one of four teams at 3-1, along with the Lions, Cornell (whom Princeton plays next week) and Dartmouth (whom Princeton has already beaten). Harvard is 2-2 and still hoping to get back into the hunt, though a loss to Princeton would pretty much end that hope. Harvard did deal Cornell its first league loss of the year a week ago.
Princeton, after playing Harvard Saturday, will host Connecticut Sunday at 1 in a matchup of the last two NCAA champions.
* Football at 1
There are three 2-0 teams in the Ivy League, and two of them play here Saturday at 1. The last two times these teams played, the results were wild - a 29-point fourth-quarter rally for a 39-34 Princeton win two years ago and a 51-48 three OT win for Princeton last year. The winning points in both came from Quinn Epperly to Roman Wilson.
Couple all that with the nearly perfect weather forecast, and TigerBlog is hoping to see a huge crowd in the stands Saturday.
Princeton, Harvard and Dartmouth are all 2-0. Yale is 1-1, with a loss to Dartmouth. Penn is also 1-1, and the Quakers play the Bulldogs Saturday in what amounts to an elimination game. If one assumes that Princeton, Harvard, Dartmouth and Yale are the main contenders, then the schedule is a great one, since only one head-to-head game among that group has been played to date.
As a little added bonus, Harvard is 26-1 against all other opponents and 0-2 against Princeton in its last 29 games.
* Women's soccer at 4
The Ivy League women's soccer picture will be much clearer come Saturday night.
Harvard is currently 3-0-1 in the league for 10 points. Princeton and Columbia are 2-1-1, with seven points. Dartmouth is hanging around at 1-0-3, which adds up to six points. In addition to Princeton-Harvard, Columbia hosts Dartmouth Saturday.
There could be a three-way tie for first with wins by Princeton and Columbia should both win. On the other hand, a Harvard win and Dartmouth-Columbia tie would mean that the Crimson would be five points ahead of the Lions and six points ahead of the Tigers and Big Green. Dartmouth is rooting for a Princeton win to go along with its own win, which would mean Harvard and Princeton with 10 points and Dartmouth with nine.
Dartmouth takes on Harvard next weekend.
* Men's soccer at 7
As is the case on the women's side, Harvard is the lone Ivy unbeaten on the women's side, at 2-0-1. Also like the women, the Princeton men would tie Harvard with a win, though unlike the women, that wouldn't guarantee first place.
Dartmouth and Penn are both 2-1. Columbia and Brown join Princeton at 1-1-1. In other words, one week behind the women's race, the men's side is a bit more crowded.
The bottom line for Princeton is that a win would be huge, not that anyone needs TigerBlog to tell them that.
Harvard opened the year at 0-3 and then won eight straight before tying Brown last week.
And there you have it. Princeton vs. Harvard, four times, on Princeton's campus, on a perfect fall Saturday.
Of course, just how perfect remains to be seen, depending on the results.
If you don't want to click on the link, TB will give you the gist in one paragraph:
TB couldn't believe it when he saw the news. And he was mad at himself, mad for once again believing in an athlete, holding that athlete up to be more than he was, to be a great international citizen, when all he really is is a murderer who can run fast on fake legs.
That was from Feb. 15, 2013, right after it came out that Pistorius - the South African double-amputee turned Olympic runner - had killed his girlfriend, the beautiful model Reeva Steenkamp.
Now Pistorius sits in the medical wing of a South African prison. His sentence is five years, but it appears that he'll be out in 10 months. And he'll serve his time in the medical wing, with other disabled prisoners.
Less than a year. For murder.
What strikes TB about it most now is that Pistorius is in the medical wing, and not the most worse main area of the prison, because of his disability, the very thing he fought against being labeled with when he wanted to run in the Olympics, or, in other words, he's disabled when it suits him.
And yes, TigerBlog read how Pistorius suffers from depression. Unfortunately, that's not as serious as Steenkamp, who suffers from being dead.
This entire story from the beginning has really affected TigerBlog, probably because of how much he allowed himself to admire Pistorius during the last Olympics. Never again. TigerBlog will never again look at a professional athlete with that kind of admiration.
TigerBlog has not yet watched a pitch of the World Series. He has watched very little NFL football this year. He watched almost none of the NBA and NHL regular seasons or playoffs last year.
He did watch a lot of the World Cup, and clearly those guys aren't saints either. So why that event? Maybe it's the fact that the players aren't being paid additionally for competing, that they're doing it for love of the game and because of the great respect the event has earned?
It wasn't until today that TigerBlog wondered if part of the reason he watches so little of the major sports leagues now is because of Pistorius? Maybe TB just reached his breaking point?
Anyway, no segue today. Let's just get to the four Princeton-Harvard matchups Saturday, going in chronological order:
* Field Hockey at noon
Unlike most years, this current Ivy League field hockey race is actually just that, a race. Princeton, winner of 19 of the last 20 Ivy titles in the sport, is in a dogfight with five teams.
The Tigers, who lost earlier this year to Columbia, are one of four teams at 3-1, along with the Lions, Cornell (whom Princeton plays next week) and Dartmouth (whom Princeton has already beaten). Harvard is 2-2 and still hoping to get back into the hunt, though a loss to Princeton would pretty much end that hope. Harvard did deal Cornell its first league loss of the year a week ago.
Princeton, after playing Harvard Saturday, will host Connecticut Sunday at 1 in a matchup of the last two NCAA champions.
* Football at 1
There are three 2-0 teams in the Ivy League, and two of them play here Saturday at 1. The last two times these teams played, the results were wild - a 29-point fourth-quarter rally for a 39-34 Princeton win two years ago and a 51-48 three OT win for Princeton last year. The winning points in both came from Quinn Epperly to Roman Wilson.
Couple all that with the nearly perfect weather forecast, and TigerBlog is hoping to see a huge crowd in the stands Saturday.
Princeton, Harvard and Dartmouth are all 2-0. Yale is 1-1, with a loss to Dartmouth. Penn is also 1-1, and the Quakers play the Bulldogs Saturday in what amounts to an elimination game. If one assumes that Princeton, Harvard, Dartmouth and Yale are the main contenders, then the schedule is a great one, since only one head-to-head game among that group has been played to date.
As a little added bonus, Harvard is 26-1 against all other opponents and 0-2 against Princeton in its last 29 games.
* Women's soccer at 4
The Ivy League women's soccer picture will be much clearer come Saturday night.
Harvard is currently 3-0-1 in the league for 10 points. Princeton and Columbia are 2-1-1, with seven points. Dartmouth is hanging around at 1-0-3, which adds up to six points. In addition to Princeton-Harvard, Columbia hosts Dartmouth Saturday.
There could be a three-way tie for first with wins by Princeton and Columbia should both win. On the other hand, a Harvard win and Dartmouth-Columbia tie would mean that the Crimson would be five points ahead of the Lions and six points ahead of the Tigers and Big Green. Dartmouth is rooting for a Princeton win to go along with its own win, which would mean Harvard and Princeton with 10 points and Dartmouth with nine.
Dartmouth takes on Harvard next weekend.
* Men's soccer at 7
As is the case on the women's side, Harvard is the lone Ivy unbeaten on the women's side, at 2-0-1. Also like the women, the Princeton men would tie Harvard with a win, though unlike the women, that wouldn't guarantee first place.
Dartmouth and Penn are both 2-1. Columbia and Brown join Princeton at 1-1-1. In other words, one week behind the women's race, the men's side is a bit more crowded.
The bottom line for Princeton is that a win would be huge, not that anyone needs TigerBlog to tell them that.
Harvard opened the year at 0-3 and then won eight straight before tying Brown last week.
And there you have it. Princeton vs. Harvard, four times, on Princeton's campus, on a perfect fall Saturday.
Of course, just how perfect remains to be seen, depending on the results.
Wednesday, October 22, 2014
Better Today Than Saturday
The outside temperature gauge on TigerBlog's dashboard as he pulled into Lot 21 read 53 degrees. As he got out of his car, the first thing he had to get was his umbrella.
That's the kind of morning it is around here.
As he started the short walk into the building, TigerBlog had one thought: Better today than Saturday.
When his colleague Craig Sachson walked in, the first thing he said was this: Better today than Saturday.
In between, TigerBlog talked to one person, Ryan Yurko, whose exact title is either "Assistant Director of Athletics For Finance and Administration" or "guy who has something to do with money." And what did Yurko say?
Right. Better today than Saturday.
The unanimous thinking in Jadwin this morning seems to be that it's worth it to have a rainy Wednesday in exchange for Saturday's forecast, which is this: Sunny, high 67, zero percent chance of rain.
And that makes today not that big a deal.
What's going on Saturday? A lot.
Princeton is home against Harvard in four different events, beginning at noon in field hockey and continuing with football at 1, women's soccer at 4 and men's soccer at 7. Admission to three of those four is free.
All four are huge games in their Ivy League races. Each one will have a direct impact on who wins the championship in each sport, even with several weeks to go for each.
But hey, that's not for right now.
For now, TigerBlog wants to talk about Yurko.
One of TB's favorite words to describe people is "amiable," as in "having or displaying a friendly and pleasant manner." If anyone fits that description, it's Yurko.
He's a Midwesterner, transplanted here to the East, and he's pretty much what you'd expect from someone from Indiana, which is interesting, because as TigerBlog writes these words, his iTunes is playing the music from "Hoosiers."
That's actually true.
Yurko came up with an idea that TigerBlog thought wasn't too bad. Play the last two Harvard football games on the website in advance of Saturday's game, sort of like ESPN does before a big game. Of course if they were Ivy League Digital Network games (as opposed to ESPN3; TB can't remember), they'd already be archived.
But it wasn't a bad idea.
From there, Yurko went down the path of suggesting a regular feature of old games, and the first one he mentioned was the 1989 NCAA men's basketball game against Georgetown, which he had never seen. TigerBlog suggested that if Yurko did watch the game, he'd come away shocked by how in control of the game the Tigers were and how much it got away at the end.
After that, TigerBlog took Yurko through Ivy League men's basketball of the 1990s, which was a glorious time for the Princeton-Penn rivalry.
Princeton won in 1989 and played Georgetown, losing 50-49 in the classic 16 vs. 1 game. Princeton also won the next three years, making the class of 1992 the only one in Ivy men's basketball history (since freshmen became eligible in the 1970s) to win four league titles in four years.
Princeton also lost in the first round of the NCAA tournament all four of those years, by a total of 15 points. The losses were by one to Georgetown, four to Arkansas, two to Villanova and eight to Syracuse.
TigerBlog is still bothered by the Villanova loss in the Carrier Dome. It's one of his five worst losses for Princeton Athletics that he has experienced, maybe even second, behind the loss to Michigan State in 1998 in the second round.
Penn then went 42-0 between 1993 and 1995, with an NCAA win over Nebraska in 1994 at the Nassau Coliseum. Then Penn beat Princeton in the first game of the 1996 Ivy season before the Tigers won 12 straight and the Quakers stumbled against Yale and Dartmouth. Penn beat Princeton on the final day of the regular season to force a playoff, and Princeton then won that historic game, the one at Lehigh on the night Pete Carril quite casually mentioned that he was retiring.
Then it was the win over UCLA. And then two more Ivy titles, as well as a 27-2 record and Top 10 ranking in 1998.
What's fascinating about it to TigerBlog is that there are fewer and fewer people who work here who were here for those days.
There's a real value to what Gary Walters always called "institutional memory," and it's one of TigerBlog's best things. Writing here every day helps to maintain that.
TB was a history major at Penn, and he's always loved the historical side of Princeton Athletics. It's how he came across the fact that Princeton Athletics turns 150 next month - spoiler alert - there will be a lot more on this subject in the next few weeks.
In the meantime, TB also tried to get across to Yurko how much he would have loved to have seen what Jadwin Gym was like for some of those games, back before the Princeton Offense was copied and dispersed throughout the entire basketball world and before every game was on TV someplace.
It's sort of like Palmer Stadium in the older days. TB has seen pictures of it. He wonders what it would have been like.
And TigerBlog could probably have talked for 10 hours about those 10 years of Ivy basketball, from 1989-1998. They were really special times in Princeton history, and TB had a front row seat for all of it.
Yurko probably would have listened. That's what amiable people from Indiana do.
That's the kind of morning it is around here.
As he started the short walk into the building, TigerBlog had one thought: Better today than Saturday.
When his colleague Craig Sachson walked in, the first thing he said was this: Better today than Saturday.
In between, TigerBlog talked to one person, Ryan Yurko, whose exact title is either "Assistant Director of Athletics For Finance and Administration" or "guy who has something to do with money." And what did Yurko say?
Right. Better today than Saturday.
The unanimous thinking in Jadwin this morning seems to be that it's worth it to have a rainy Wednesday in exchange for Saturday's forecast, which is this: Sunny, high 67, zero percent chance of rain.
And that makes today not that big a deal.
What's going on Saturday? A lot.
Princeton is home against Harvard in four different events, beginning at noon in field hockey and continuing with football at 1, women's soccer at 4 and men's soccer at 7. Admission to three of those four is free.
All four are huge games in their Ivy League races. Each one will have a direct impact on who wins the championship in each sport, even with several weeks to go for each.
But hey, that's not for right now.
For now, TigerBlog wants to talk about Yurko.
One of TB's favorite words to describe people is "amiable," as in "having or displaying a friendly and pleasant manner." If anyone fits that description, it's Yurko.
He's a Midwesterner, transplanted here to the East, and he's pretty much what you'd expect from someone from Indiana, which is interesting, because as TigerBlog writes these words, his iTunes is playing the music from "Hoosiers."
That's actually true.
Yurko came up with an idea that TigerBlog thought wasn't too bad. Play the last two Harvard football games on the website in advance of Saturday's game, sort of like ESPN does before a big game. Of course if they were Ivy League Digital Network games (as opposed to ESPN3; TB can't remember), they'd already be archived.
But it wasn't a bad idea.
From there, Yurko went down the path of suggesting a regular feature of old games, and the first one he mentioned was the 1989 NCAA men's basketball game against Georgetown, which he had never seen. TigerBlog suggested that if Yurko did watch the game, he'd come away shocked by how in control of the game the Tigers were and how much it got away at the end.
After that, TigerBlog took Yurko through Ivy League men's basketball of the 1990s, which was a glorious time for the Princeton-Penn rivalry.
Princeton won in 1989 and played Georgetown, losing 50-49 in the classic 16 vs. 1 game. Princeton also won the next three years, making the class of 1992 the only one in Ivy men's basketball history (since freshmen became eligible in the 1970s) to win four league titles in four years.
Princeton also lost in the first round of the NCAA tournament all four of those years, by a total of 15 points. The losses were by one to Georgetown, four to Arkansas, two to Villanova and eight to Syracuse.
TigerBlog is still bothered by the Villanova loss in the Carrier Dome. It's one of his five worst losses for Princeton Athletics that he has experienced, maybe even second, behind the loss to Michigan State in 1998 in the second round.
Penn then went 42-0 between 1993 and 1995, with an NCAA win over Nebraska in 1994 at the Nassau Coliseum. Then Penn beat Princeton in the first game of the 1996 Ivy season before the Tigers won 12 straight and the Quakers stumbled against Yale and Dartmouth. Penn beat Princeton on the final day of the regular season to force a playoff, and Princeton then won that historic game, the one at Lehigh on the night Pete Carril quite casually mentioned that he was retiring.
Then it was the win over UCLA. And then two more Ivy titles, as well as a 27-2 record and Top 10 ranking in 1998.
What's fascinating about it to TigerBlog is that there are fewer and fewer people who work here who were here for those days.
There's a real value to what Gary Walters always called "institutional memory," and it's one of TigerBlog's best things. Writing here every day helps to maintain that.
TB was a history major at Penn, and he's always loved the historical side of Princeton Athletics. It's how he came across the fact that Princeton Athletics turns 150 next month - spoiler alert - there will be a lot more on this subject in the next few weeks.
In the meantime, TB also tried to get across to Yurko how much he would have loved to have seen what Jadwin Gym was like for some of those games, back before the Princeton Offense was copied and dispersed throughout the entire basketball world and before every game was on TV someplace.
It's sort of like Palmer Stadium in the older days. TB has seen pictures of it. He wonders what it would have been like.
And TigerBlog could probably have talked for 10 hours about those 10 years of Ivy basketball, from 1989-1998. They were really special times in Princeton history, and TB had a front row seat for all of it.
Yurko probably would have listened. That's what amiable people from Indiana do.
Monday, October 20, 2014
Passing Lane
With apologies to Peter Farrell, a Notre Dame grad and the only women's track and field coach Princeton has ever had, TigerBlog struggles to root for the Fighting Irish in football.
It's because of the current head coach, Brian Kelly, who is impossible to root for, or at least that's how he comes across. Actually, TB has rooted against Notre Dame way more than he has for Notre Dame through the years. He was never a Lou Holtz guy, for instance.
Still, there TB was Saturday night, rooting for Notre Dame against Florida State in what was probably the best college football game of the year to date. Either that or Ole Miss-Alabama.
In the end, Notre Dame lost 31-27 despite having the lead five different times during the game and almost a sixth with 13 seconds left, before an offensive pass interference call wiped out what would have been Everett Golson's fourth touchdown pass.
Was it a good call? It was close. What TigerBlog wants to know is if the same call would have been made in South Bend.
Here's something else TB wants to know: What does Jameis Winston have to do before Florida State wouldn't let its Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback play?
Seriously, has there ever been a player who seemingly had done more than Winston and kept playing? TigerBlog won't go into all the details, because 1) there are too many of them and 2) they're everywhere on the internet.
Yes, Notre Dame's quarterback was suspended last year. He was suspended for an academic violation at Notre Dame, not even for something that was against NCAA rules. He was perfectly eligible to keep playing, and do you think he wouldn't have under the same circumstances at Florida State?
And speaking of Florida State, what was up with its coach, Jimbo Fisher, after the game, whispering in Winston's ear like, well, TB has no idea like what? It was weird. As was his ESPN postgame interview. Who was the guy interviewing him, his brother?
Anyway, Notre Dame lost, but TB came away with a new-found respect for the program there. At least it has some academic integrity.
And Winston, Fisher and FSU? TigerBlog would root for an all-star team of the Yankees and Duke before he'd root for them.
Earlier that day, TigerBlog saw Princeton's record-setting 27-16 win over Brown. Well, sort of record-setting.
Brown quarterback Marcus Fuller set the Ivy League record for pass attempts in a game with 71. As records go, it's not quite one you start out dreaming of setting, but it's a record nonetheless.
Fuller's line for the day was quite interesting: 29 for 71 for 454 yards, one touchdown and two interceptions. The 71 passes contrast with eight called running plays.
In other words, Fuller threw the ball nearly nine times more than he handed it off. And while he threw 42 incomplete passes, he also averaged nearly 16 yards per completion, which is outstanding.
Perhaps it shows that completion percentage is overrated? He could have completed a lot more passes if he threw short dump-offs but for far fewer yards.
Princeton's Connor Michelsen had a big day, going 33 for 45 for 367 yards, two touchdowns and one interception. In all, four receivers in the game had at least 100 yards, which has to be a rarity.
Added up, and there were 116 passes in the game, which made it go a tad long. TigerBlog couldn't find an Ivy League or NCAA record for most passes by two teams in one game, but that's a lot of passes.
Anyway, stats weren't ultimately what this game was about.
But talking stats, Brown outscored Princeton 32-3 in the beginning and end of the last two games between the teams but lost both, largely because of that little 63-0 run Princeton went on in the middle of the two, including getting out to at 24-0 lead Saturday.
No, what this game was about was getting the win and looking ahead.
The Ivy League football season is now halfway over, which means two things: 1) only Ivy vs. Ivy games remain and 2) if it was up to TigerBlog, then there would be a league-wide week off right now before play resumed.
Each Ivy team has played two league games, and three teams are currently 2-0: Dartmouth, Harvard and Princeton.
That alone makes Saturday's game on Powers Field at Princeton Stadium between the Tigers and Crimson the second huge game of the year in terms of the eventual league champ, after Dartmouth's win over Yale.
Then there's what happened the last two years between Princeton and Harvard.
The 2012 game saw the Tigers win 39-34 after trailing 34-10 with 12 minutes left. That was a wild one.
Last year might have been wilder, as Princeton beat Harvard 51-48 in three OTs.
Both of those games were won on a Quinn Epperly-to-Roman Wilson touchdown pass. Wilson, of course, has graduated, so this game cannot end the same way.
Princeton's win over Brown was fun statistically, and in the end, it was the win that Princeton needed.
This coming week?
It's much different. Princeton-Harvard. It can't possibly live up to the last two years, can it?
Or maybe it can. Regardless, it's still going to go a long way to shape the Ivy race.
It's because of the current head coach, Brian Kelly, who is impossible to root for, or at least that's how he comes across. Actually, TB has rooted against Notre Dame way more than he has for Notre Dame through the years. He was never a Lou Holtz guy, for instance.
Still, there TB was Saturday night, rooting for Notre Dame against Florida State in what was probably the best college football game of the year to date. Either that or Ole Miss-Alabama.
In the end, Notre Dame lost 31-27 despite having the lead five different times during the game and almost a sixth with 13 seconds left, before an offensive pass interference call wiped out what would have been Everett Golson's fourth touchdown pass.
Was it a good call? It was close. What TigerBlog wants to know is if the same call would have been made in South Bend.
Here's something else TB wants to know: What does Jameis Winston have to do before Florida State wouldn't let its Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback play?
Seriously, has there ever been a player who seemingly had done more than Winston and kept playing? TigerBlog won't go into all the details, because 1) there are too many of them and 2) they're everywhere on the internet.
Yes, Notre Dame's quarterback was suspended last year. He was suspended for an academic violation at Notre Dame, not even for something that was against NCAA rules. He was perfectly eligible to keep playing, and do you think he wouldn't have under the same circumstances at Florida State?
And speaking of Florida State, what was up with its coach, Jimbo Fisher, after the game, whispering in Winston's ear like, well, TB has no idea like what? It was weird. As was his ESPN postgame interview. Who was the guy interviewing him, his brother?
Anyway, Notre Dame lost, but TB came away with a new-found respect for the program there. At least it has some academic integrity.
And Winston, Fisher and FSU? TigerBlog would root for an all-star team of the Yankees and Duke before he'd root for them.
Earlier that day, TigerBlog saw Princeton's record-setting 27-16 win over Brown. Well, sort of record-setting.
Brown quarterback Marcus Fuller set the Ivy League record for pass attempts in a game with 71. As records go, it's not quite one you start out dreaming of setting, but it's a record nonetheless.
Fuller's line for the day was quite interesting: 29 for 71 for 454 yards, one touchdown and two interceptions. The 71 passes contrast with eight called running plays.
In other words, Fuller threw the ball nearly nine times more than he handed it off. And while he threw 42 incomplete passes, he also averaged nearly 16 yards per completion, which is outstanding.
Perhaps it shows that completion percentage is overrated? He could have completed a lot more passes if he threw short dump-offs but for far fewer yards.
Princeton's Connor Michelsen had a big day, going 33 for 45 for 367 yards, two touchdowns and one interception. In all, four receivers in the game had at least 100 yards, which has to be a rarity.
Added up, and there were 116 passes in the game, which made it go a tad long. TigerBlog couldn't find an Ivy League or NCAA record for most passes by two teams in one game, but that's a lot of passes.
Anyway, stats weren't ultimately what this game was about.
But talking stats, Brown outscored Princeton 32-3 in the beginning and end of the last two games between the teams but lost both, largely because of that little 63-0 run Princeton went on in the middle of the two, including getting out to at 24-0 lead Saturday.
No, what this game was about was getting the win and looking ahead.
The Ivy League football season is now halfway over, which means two things: 1) only Ivy vs. Ivy games remain and 2) if it was up to TigerBlog, then there would be a league-wide week off right now before play resumed.
Each Ivy team has played two league games, and three teams are currently 2-0: Dartmouth, Harvard and Princeton.
That alone makes Saturday's game on Powers Field at Princeton Stadium between the Tigers and Crimson the second huge game of the year in terms of the eventual league champ, after Dartmouth's win over Yale.
Then there's what happened the last two years between Princeton and Harvard.
The 2012 game saw the Tigers win 39-34 after trailing 34-10 with 12 minutes left. That was a wild one.
Last year might have been wilder, as Princeton beat Harvard 51-48 in three OTs.
Both of those games were won on a Quinn Epperly-to-Roman Wilson touchdown pass. Wilson, of course, has graduated, so this game cannot end the same way.
Princeton's win over Brown was fun statistically, and in the end, it was the win that Princeton needed.
This coming week?
It's much different. Princeton-Harvard. It can't possibly live up to the last two years, can it?
Or maybe it can. Regardless, it's still going to go a long way to shape the Ivy race.
Friday, October 17, 2014
Finally, A Kickoff
TigerBlog isn't sure when he's going to completely give up on "Modern Family." It'll be soon, though.
How can a show go from being as good as it was in Seasons 1-4 and then become what it has become now, which is a show that just isn't funny.
It reminds TigerBlog of another show that was great from Seasons 1-4 and then completely fell apart. That show was the most overrated show in television history - "Seinfeld."
Actually, the issue with "Modern Family" is not that much different than what happened with "Seinfeld." The characters went from being sharp, well-defined and - here's the key word - believable to being vague caricatures of what they once were. What made them funny originally was how they reflected the absurdity of every day life; what they became was merely absurd.
TB isn't sure if it's coincidence that this happened after four seasons of both shows, but the drop-off is precipitous between Season 4 and Season 5.
"The Big Bang Theory" is another show that used to be really funny and isn't what it once was, but this is for a different reason. TB's theory on "Big Bang" is that it's simply out of ideas.
Then there's "Two And A Half Men." As TB said last year, the only one still laughing at this show is Charlie Sheen, for how bad it got when he left. And yet it's still on for one more season?
One show that TigerBlog hasn't seen is "Blackish," but he can't imagine how this show's title ever got approved. Maybe it wasn't meant to be, but couldn't they have come up with something that comes across a tad less offensively?
Most of TB's television watching these days has been focused on "Breaking Bad," which he's seeing on Netflix.
At first, TigerBlog didn't want to start down the path of the show, since it was 62 episodes over five seasons. It seemed like more than he wanted to invest.
Now? He has 48 down, 14 to go. It's a pretty good show, and TB can see why it got all the acclaim it did. It has great characters, and the story is one that makes you think at all times.
Maybe that's the secret. Fewer episodes per season. Fewer seasons per show. Stay true to what made the show great in the first place.
One thing about watching "Breaking Bad" on Netflix is that there are no commercials, so each episode is only 45 minutes, as opposed to an hour. Of course, that means that TB has spent 36 hours watching "Breaking Bad" in the last month or so.
You know what he hasn't watched yet this year? A live Princeton football play.
He's watched pieces of the three away games online. He was at a wedding for the home game.
TigerBlog would have to go back to the 1988 season to have not seen at least one of Princeton's first four football games That's a long time ago.
He will be there tomorrow for Princeton's home game against Brown.
It's the start of a six-week stretch drive for the Tigers that will see the team play its final six league games. It's also the first of back-to-back home games for Princeton, who will host Harvard next Saturday.
Under the current Ivy League schedule, Brown has the least fortunate annual opener, as the Bears always play Harvard in their first league game. Brown has played Harvard to start its league schedule every year since 2000 (either in Week 1 or Week 2) and is 2-13 in those games - including 0-4 in the last four years.
In other words, Brown almost always starts off in an 0-1 league hole. This year is no different, as Harvard beat Brown 22-14 three weeks ago.
Princeton, on the other hand, opens with Columbia and has every year since 2000. Since that time, Princeton is 12-3 in its league opener, including 1-0 this year after its 38-6 win two weeks ago in New York City.
Brown is used to playing Princeton with its back to the wall, and tomorrow will be no different. The Bears lost to Georgetown and Harvard to start the year but have beaten Rhode Island and Holy Cross since.
And they're playing for their season.
As for Princeton, it's playing to find out what kind of season it'll be. And to get the taste of last week's 31-30 loss to Colgate out of its collective mouths.
Princeton vs. Brown. Kickoff is at 3:30.
TigerBlog will be there. Finally.
How can a show go from being as good as it was in Seasons 1-4 and then become what it has become now, which is a show that just isn't funny.
It reminds TigerBlog of another show that was great from Seasons 1-4 and then completely fell apart. That show was the most overrated show in television history - "Seinfeld."
Actually, the issue with "Modern Family" is not that much different than what happened with "Seinfeld." The characters went from being sharp, well-defined and - here's the key word - believable to being vague caricatures of what they once were. What made them funny originally was how they reflected the absurdity of every day life; what they became was merely absurd.
TB isn't sure if it's coincidence that this happened after four seasons of both shows, but the drop-off is precipitous between Season 4 and Season 5.
"The Big Bang Theory" is another show that used to be really funny and isn't what it once was, but this is for a different reason. TB's theory on "Big Bang" is that it's simply out of ideas.
Then there's "Two And A Half Men." As TB said last year, the only one still laughing at this show is Charlie Sheen, for how bad it got when he left. And yet it's still on for one more season?
One show that TigerBlog hasn't seen is "Blackish," but he can't imagine how this show's title ever got approved. Maybe it wasn't meant to be, but couldn't they have come up with something that comes across a tad less offensively?
Most of TB's television watching these days has been focused on "Breaking Bad," which he's seeing on Netflix.
At first, TigerBlog didn't want to start down the path of the show, since it was 62 episodes over five seasons. It seemed like more than he wanted to invest.
Now? He has 48 down, 14 to go. It's a pretty good show, and TB can see why it got all the acclaim it did. It has great characters, and the story is one that makes you think at all times.
Maybe that's the secret. Fewer episodes per season. Fewer seasons per show. Stay true to what made the show great in the first place.
One thing about watching "Breaking Bad" on Netflix is that there are no commercials, so each episode is only 45 minutes, as opposed to an hour. Of course, that means that TB has spent 36 hours watching "Breaking Bad" in the last month or so.
You know what he hasn't watched yet this year? A live Princeton football play.
He's watched pieces of the three away games online. He was at a wedding for the home game.
TigerBlog would have to go back to the 1988 season to have not seen at least one of Princeton's first four football games That's a long time ago.
He will be there tomorrow for Princeton's home game against Brown.
It's the start of a six-week stretch drive for the Tigers that will see the team play its final six league games. It's also the first of back-to-back home games for Princeton, who will host Harvard next Saturday.
Under the current Ivy League schedule, Brown has the least fortunate annual opener, as the Bears always play Harvard in their first league game. Brown has played Harvard to start its league schedule every year since 2000 (either in Week 1 or Week 2) and is 2-13 in those games - including 0-4 in the last four years.
In other words, Brown almost always starts off in an 0-1 league hole. This year is no different, as Harvard beat Brown 22-14 three weeks ago.
Princeton, on the other hand, opens with Columbia and has every year since 2000. Since that time, Princeton is 12-3 in its league opener, including 1-0 this year after its 38-6 win two weeks ago in New York City.
Brown is used to playing Princeton with its back to the wall, and tomorrow will be no different. The Bears lost to Georgetown and Harvard to start the year but have beaten Rhode Island and Holy Cross since.
And they're playing for their season.
As for Princeton, it's playing to find out what kind of season it'll be. And to get the taste of last week's 31-30 loss to Colgate out of its collective mouths.
Princeton vs. Brown. Kickoff is at 3:30.
TigerBlog will be there. Finally.
Thursday, October 16, 2014
One Time
It has to be so unfair to be a fan of the Baltimore Orioles.
Here your team emerges from nearly 20 years of chronically bad baseball. Finally, your team gets out of the shadows of the Yankees and Red Sox, who have won eight World Series between them in the last 18 years, and makes it to the American League Championship Series.
Surely this is an underdog team well worth rooting for, no? So what happens to your team? It finds waiting for it the Kansas City Royals, who are an even bigger underdog Cinderella type, and suddenly every neutral fan is against you.
It's hard to root against the Royals, who have an even bigger record of futility during the last 20, or even nearly 30, years than the Orioles.
Beginning in 1975, the Royals finished first or second 10 straight times and won the 1985 World Series, the only one in franchise history. Since then, though, the bottom basically fell out of a team that had little money and little fan interest.
By 1992, the Royals were in the their third straight year of finishing sixth in the AL West, and attendance dipped below 2,000,000. At no point since has it made it back, including this year.
Kansas City is playing in its first postseason since 1985 - and making the most of it. First there was a thrilling comeback win over Oakland in the wild card game, followed by sweeps over the Angels and Orioles that have put the Royals back in the World Series.
And they're 8-0 in the postseason. How nuts is that?
It's even nuttier when you consider that four of those eight wins are by one run and four of those wins were in extra innings. Of the other four games, two were decided by one run. The last two wins against the Orioles were 2-1 and 2-1.
By the way, here's a list of all Kansas City Royals players TigerBlog could have named before the playoffs began - .........
That's supposed to mean he couldn't have named any.
One thing these Royals have done is make it clear that these days, nothing is more overrated than starting pitching. Kansas City has won basically every game because of three bullpen guys whom TB had never heard of but who are completely lights out. Take yesterday. It was 2-1 in the sixth - and 2-1 when it ended.
The ability to win close games in the postseason is what defines greatness. Of Princeton's nine NCAA lacrosse championships between the men's and women's teams, five were won in overtime.
TigerBlog has been struck by the number of close games that Princeton teams have been playing this fall. Or at least he thought he was.
The numbers don't always back up what is originally suspected, so he figured he'd look.
He researched the football, two soccer and field hockey teams. He wasn't sure what to do with women's volleyball, since no game can be a one-point win but a match can be won 3-2.
Here's what he found:
* the men's soccer team has played 11 games, of which eight have been decided by either one goal or ended in a tie
* the women's soccer team has played 11 games, of which six have been decided by either one goal ended in a tie
* the football team has played four games, of which one has been decided by one point
* the field hockey team has played 12 games, of which six have been decided by one goal - and three have gone to overtime
* the women's volleyball team has played 15 matches, of which six ended 3-2, though it's not quite the same thing as one one-point game
Either way, add that up, and between the five sports, you have 53 games, of which 27 - or one more than half - have been either ties or one-point, one-goal or one-game margins.
If you factor out volleyball, then you have 38 games and 21 one-point margins. That's a lot, no?
TigerBlog didn't add this up, but the men's soccer team has probably played more than 80 percent of its season so far with the score either tied or one team up by one. That puts a ton of pressure on each possession, even in soccer, which has more possessions than any other sport, TB would guess.
Is this an anomaly? A year ago, Princeton played 17 men's soccer games, and 13 of them were one-goal or tie games. The women had eight in 17 games. The field hockey team had eight in 19 games. The football team had two in 10 games.
That's 31 of 63, or 49 percent, as opposed to 55 percent this year.
What does all this mean? Maybe it's just the nature of soccer and field hockey to play close games.
Maybe it's means nothing.
Or maybe it means that if you come watch a Princeton game, it's likely to go down to the wire. And other than football, it's free.
Yeah, let's go with that.
Here your team emerges from nearly 20 years of chronically bad baseball. Finally, your team gets out of the shadows of the Yankees and Red Sox, who have won eight World Series between them in the last 18 years, and makes it to the American League Championship Series.
Surely this is an underdog team well worth rooting for, no? So what happens to your team? It finds waiting for it the Kansas City Royals, who are an even bigger underdog Cinderella type, and suddenly every neutral fan is against you.
It's hard to root against the Royals, who have an even bigger record of futility during the last 20, or even nearly 30, years than the Orioles.
Beginning in 1975, the Royals finished first or second 10 straight times and won the 1985 World Series, the only one in franchise history. Since then, though, the bottom basically fell out of a team that had little money and little fan interest.
By 1992, the Royals were in the their third straight year of finishing sixth in the AL West, and attendance dipped below 2,000,000. At no point since has it made it back, including this year.
Kansas City is playing in its first postseason since 1985 - and making the most of it. First there was a thrilling comeback win over Oakland in the wild card game, followed by sweeps over the Angels and Orioles that have put the Royals back in the World Series.
And they're 8-0 in the postseason. How nuts is that?
It's even nuttier when you consider that four of those eight wins are by one run and four of those wins were in extra innings. Of the other four games, two were decided by one run. The last two wins against the Orioles were 2-1 and 2-1.
By the way, here's a list of all Kansas City Royals players TigerBlog could have named before the playoffs began - .........
That's supposed to mean he couldn't have named any.
One thing these Royals have done is make it clear that these days, nothing is more overrated than starting pitching. Kansas City has won basically every game because of three bullpen guys whom TB had never heard of but who are completely lights out. Take yesterday. It was 2-1 in the sixth - and 2-1 when it ended.
The ability to win close games in the postseason is what defines greatness. Of Princeton's nine NCAA lacrosse championships between the men's and women's teams, five were won in overtime.
TigerBlog has been struck by the number of close games that Princeton teams have been playing this fall. Or at least he thought he was.
The numbers don't always back up what is originally suspected, so he figured he'd look.
He researched the football, two soccer and field hockey teams. He wasn't sure what to do with women's volleyball, since no game can be a one-point win but a match can be won 3-2.
Here's what he found:
* the men's soccer team has played 11 games, of which eight have been decided by either one goal or ended in a tie
* the women's soccer team has played 11 games, of which six have been decided by either one goal ended in a tie
* the football team has played four games, of which one has been decided by one point
* the field hockey team has played 12 games, of which six have been decided by one goal - and three have gone to overtime
* the women's volleyball team has played 15 matches, of which six ended 3-2, though it's not quite the same thing as one one-point game
Either way, add that up, and between the five sports, you have 53 games, of which 27 - or one more than half - have been either ties or one-point, one-goal or one-game margins.
If you factor out volleyball, then you have 38 games and 21 one-point margins. That's a lot, no?
TigerBlog didn't add this up, but the men's soccer team has probably played more than 80 percent of its season so far with the score either tied or one team up by one. That puts a ton of pressure on each possession, even in soccer, which has more possessions than any other sport, TB would guess.
Is this an anomaly? A year ago, Princeton played 17 men's soccer games, and 13 of them were one-goal or tie games. The women had eight in 17 games. The field hockey team had eight in 19 games. The football team had two in 10 games.
That's 31 of 63, or 49 percent, as opposed to 55 percent this year.
What does all this mean? Maybe it's just the nature of soccer and field hockey to play close games.
Maybe it's means nothing.
Or maybe it means that if you come watch a Princeton game, it's likely to go down to the wire. And other than football, it's free.
Yeah, let's go with that.
Tuesday, October 14, 2014
Meeting Ian
TigerBlog was driving on 95 and was almost to the exit for Route 31 when he saw the taillights.
Usually, there's almost no traffic on TigerBlog's ride to work. For fun, he listens to the traffic report and wonders how all those people can sit by the Lincoln Tunnel or on the Gowanus Expressway every morning.
The biggest traffic area he has is usually where 95 and 206 come together, if he gets off on 206. Then it backs up for about five minutes until he gets past the Lawrenceville School. Other than that, there's no much to slow him down on a normal morning.
This morning was different. If the traffic on 95 was backed up to 31, then it had to be an accident in a bad location. Hopefully nobody was hurt.
Fortunately for TB, he saw the traffic before the exit, so he got off, went up to Federal City Road and made his way to Carter Road and then 206. Crisis averted.
Others weren't so lucky with the traffic, including TB's colleague Craig Sachson, who sat through the whole wait.
TigerBlog got a text message from Craig at 9:15 saying that he was interviewing someone for his weekly podcast at 9:30 but that he obviously would be late and could TB ask if he could wait around. Sure, TB said.
If you don't listen to Craig's podcasts, you should.
TigerCast comes out every Thursday and is really, really well done. There is a little commentary at the beginning and then two or three interviews with Princeton athletes or coaches, with every sport represented, most multiple times, during the academic year.
At around 9:25, a rather large young man - turns out he's 6-2, 295 pounds - walked into the office looking for Craig. TB put two and two together and figured that this was the TigerCast subject.
TB explained the situation, and the young man said no problem, he could wait, his next class was at 11.
Then he did something most people his age don't do. He introduced himself and shook TB's hand. Most college kids will until they are approached, rather than doing the approaching.
His name is Ian McGeary, a junior defensive lineman for the football team from nearby North Brunswick. McGeary is in his first year as a starter, and he has 12 tackles and a sack through four games, including five tackles this past Saturday against Colgate.
His next game is Saturday at 3:30 against Brown. It's a pretty big game for Princeton, who is playing for a second straight Ivy League championship and is currently 1-0 in the league with six Ivy games with six weeks to go.
This was a Tuesday morning though. The last game was three days ago. The next one not for four days. This was a peaceful moment in between.
It's how football works. It's a very structured, regimented sport, with very little variance from week to week.
And the fury that gets unleashed, especially from a defensive lineman, on a gameday? Well, there was none of that in TB's office this morning.
Nope, there was just a polite young man from Middlesex County.
He talked about how his mother works near Quakerbridge Mall. About the fortunes of the North Brunswick High School football team, and a little about the situation at one of its rivals, Sayreville.
TigerBlog asked McGeary what he wanted to do post-Princeton, and he said he wanted to go to medical school, maybe after a little time off. His ultimate goal is to be in orthopedics.
Bob Surace, the head football coach, stopped in for a second, and coach and player had a nice greeting.
Craig showed up right when TB had to step out to go to the weekly event meeting. In all, TB and McGeary spent about 30 minutes together.
In those 30 minutes, TB got an up-close, 295-pound reminder of what Princeton Athletics is all about - the athletes themselves.
The goal is to provide the best possible experience for the athletes. TB says that all the time, hears that all the time in meetings. It's true.
But it's also easy to lose track of the fact that each of these athletes in an individual having his or her own individual experience. And it's easy to lose track of just how incredible some of these kids are.
TigerBlog told McGeary he was the PA announcer at football games. Hopefully, he'll get to say his name quite often this Saturday. Maybe he'll just give him tackles even if he doesn't make them. Nah.
Whether or not Princeton wins Saturday or wins another Ivy title during McGeary's last two years, the big kid who sat in TB's office this morning is having the kind of experience that should be the envy of every college that fields athletic teams.
He plays the sport he loves. He knows an NFL career is unlikely. He has a better career goal than that anyway.
It's not about whether or not Princeton can stay in a hotel the night before a home game or can give him limitless meals in a special athletes' dining room, like the Power Five conferences can't wait to do.
It's about being a real student and a real athlete - and having the right reasons for pursuing both.
TigerBlog didn't need to be reminded of that this morning. He knows it full well every morning, and it's one of the things that has kept him here all these years.
Still, it's always good to have that refresher. This morning, it came in the form of Ian McGeary.
Usually, there's almost no traffic on TigerBlog's ride to work. For fun, he listens to the traffic report and wonders how all those people can sit by the Lincoln Tunnel or on the Gowanus Expressway every morning.
The biggest traffic area he has is usually where 95 and 206 come together, if he gets off on 206. Then it backs up for about five minutes until he gets past the Lawrenceville School. Other than that, there's no much to slow him down on a normal morning.
This morning was different. If the traffic on 95 was backed up to 31, then it had to be an accident in a bad location. Hopefully nobody was hurt.
Fortunately for TB, he saw the traffic before the exit, so he got off, went up to Federal City Road and made his way to Carter Road and then 206. Crisis averted.
Others weren't so lucky with the traffic, including TB's colleague Craig Sachson, who sat through the whole wait.
TigerBlog got a text message from Craig at 9:15 saying that he was interviewing someone for his weekly podcast at 9:30 but that he obviously would be late and could TB ask if he could wait around. Sure, TB said.
If you don't listen to Craig's podcasts, you should.
TigerCast comes out every Thursday and is really, really well done. There is a little commentary at the beginning and then two or three interviews with Princeton athletes or coaches, with every sport represented, most multiple times, during the academic year.
At around 9:25, a rather large young man - turns out he's 6-2, 295 pounds - walked into the office looking for Craig. TB put two and two together and figured that this was the TigerCast subject.
TB explained the situation, and the young man said no problem, he could wait, his next class was at 11.
Then he did something most people his age don't do. He introduced himself and shook TB's hand. Most college kids will until they are approached, rather than doing the approaching.
His name is Ian McGeary, a junior defensive lineman for the football team from nearby North Brunswick. McGeary is in his first year as a starter, and he has 12 tackles and a sack through four games, including five tackles this past Saturday against Colgate.
His next game is Saturday at 3:30 against Brown. It's a pretty big game for Princeton, who is playing for a second straight Ivy League championship and is currently 1-0 in the league with six Ivy games with six weeks to go.
This was a Tuesday morning though. The last game was three days ago. The next one not for four days. This was a peaceful moment in between.
It's how football works. It's a very structured, regimented sport, with very little variance from week to week.
And the fury that gets unleashed, especially from a defensive lineman, on a gameday? Well, there was none of that in TB's office this morning.
Nope, there was just a polite young man from Middlesex County.
He talked about how his mother works near Quakerbridge Mall. About the fortunes of the North Brunswick High School football team, and a little about the situation at one of its rivals, Sayreville.
TigerBlog asked McGeary what he wanted to do post-Princeton, and he said he wanted to go to medical school, maybe after a little time off. His ultimate goal is to be in orthopedics.
Bob Surace, the head football coach, stopped in for a second, and coach and player had a nice greeting.
Craig showed up right when TB had to step out to go to the weekly event meeting. In all, TB and McGeary spent about 30 minutes together.
In those 30 minutes, TB got an up-close, 295-pound reminder of what Princeton Athletics is all about - the athletes themselves.
The goal is to provide the best possible experience for the athletes. TB says that all the time, hears that all the time in meetings. It's true.
But it's also easy to lose track of the fact that each of these athletes in an individual having his or her own individual experience. And it's easy to lose track of just how incredible some of these kids are.
TigerBlog told McGeary he was the PA announcer at football games. Hopefully, he'll get to say his name quite often this Saturday. Maybe he'll just give him tackles even if he doesn't make them. Nah.
Whether or not Princeton wins Saturday or wins another Ivy title during McGeary's last two years, the big kid who sat in TB's office this morning is having the kind of experience that should be the envy of every college that fields athletic teams.
He plays the sport he loves. He knows an NFL career is unlikely. He has a better career goal than that anyway.
It's not about whether or not Princeton can stay in a hotel the night before a home game or can give him limitless meals in a special athletes' dining room, like the Power Five conferences can't wait to do.
It's about being a real student and a real athlete - and having the right reasons for pursuing both.
TigerBlog didn't need to be reminded of that this morning. He knows it full well every morning, and it's one of the things that has kept him here all these years.
Still, it's always good to have that refresher. This morning, it came in the form of Ian McGeary.
Monday, October 13, 2014
Thoughts From Saturday
TigerBlog saw so many college football games Saturday he can't even keep track anymore.
That's part of the problem that a school like Princeton faces in getting people to its games, by the way. There is no shortage of games to watch on TV.
That's not today's point though.
At one point, TigerBlog had Princeton-Colgate and Yale-Dartmouth on videostream and about 10 games on his TV.
Later on, he watched the end of Baylor-TCU, which ended up 61-58 Baylor in regulation. The game turned on two plays, both of which were about as identical as plays can get, though with vastly different results.
The first was a fourth-down play for TCU just across the Baylor side of the 50. TCU threw for it, incomplete. There might have been a little contact on the play, but no flag.
It was the right call to go for it, by the way. With that way that game was going, whoever had the ball the last was going to win, and that meant keeping the ball away from Baylor.
When the Bears got the ball back, they were faced with a third-and-long. They threw for it, incomplete, with a little contact on that play as well.
This time, a flag was thrown. Pass interference. Then game-winning chip shot field goal.
Then there was Penn State-Michigan.
Michigan was up 16-13. Penn State ball, fourth and about 40 or so, near its goal line.
Penn State wisely took a safety, which meant a free kick, or in this case, an onsides kick. It was the Nittany Lions' only chance to get the ball back, other than hoping to convert on the fourth down.
And so that's what Penn State did. The center snapped the ball into the stands for the safety, 18-13 Wolverines.
Then onsides kick. Recovered by Penn State. Here comes the chance for the great finish.
But wait. No. Flag for offsides.
Doesn't matter that every replay showed there was no offsides.
TigerBlog doesn't understand why officials want to spend 59 quietly going about their jobs and then spend the last minute making awful calls that directly decide games. The two passes between Baylor and TCU were basically identical, and TB says no interference on either. So why one flag and not the other?
And the Penn State game? If you throw the flag for offsides, it better be really clear. So why throw that flag?
Could it be because the games were at Baylor and Michigan?
As for Princeton-Colgate, the Raiders came back from an early hole to defeat the Tigers 31-30. Up in Hamilton there would be no blaming this on the officials.
Nor, TigerBlog will say, could this be blamed on the decision to go two after the first touchdown, after Dre' Nelson ran the opening kickoff back for a touchdown for the second time in four games. The two-point try failed, making it 6-0 instead of 7-0 if the Tigers had kicked or 8-0 if it had been successful.
It's easy to say that Princeton lost by one, and that one point was the one from the failed conversion. That's a bit oversimplistic.
First of all, that assumes that every single thing that happened in the game from that point forward still would have happened in the exact same way had Princeton kicked. It wouldn't.
Even if it did for most of the game, the end game would have been different. In a tie game, Colgate wouldn't have played to run out the clock. It would have played to score. Maybe it would have. Maybe it wouldn't.
More importantly, it's a mentality thing.
Princeton's success last year was built on the idea of attacking. Fast and physical. Keep going at all times.
It's that kind of attitude that defines a team. If it backfires every now and then, so be it.
So where is Princeton now?
Unbeaten in the Ivy League, albeit at 1-0. There are six weeks left, with only Ivy games on the schedule. It begins Saturday when Brown comes to Powers Field at Princeton Stadium at 3:30.
After that? Harvard. At Cornell. Penn. At Yale. Dartmouth.
Right now, Dartmouth might be the best team of them all. The Big Green looked good against Yale in winning that one.
Dartmouth and Harvard are 2-0. Princeton is 1-0. Everyone else has a loss. Penn hosts Columbia this weekend, while the other four are outside the league.
Then it's all league games.
If TB had his way, there'd be a week off for the entire league after this weekend, Week 5. But no, they will keep playing straight through, a sprint to the finish line.
Maybe it hasn't been the dominant first four weeks Princeton might have hoped for in the preseason, when it was the league favorite. Whatever, that doesn't matter.
Now it's about the remaining six league games.
Is Princeton still the favorite? Maybe not.
Does Princeton have as good a chance as anyone?
Yes.
That's part of the problem that a school like Princeton faces in getting people to its games, by the way. There is no shortage of games to watch on TV.
That's not today's point though.
At one point, TigerBlog had Princeton-Colgate and Yale-Dartmouth on videostream and about 10 games on his TV.
Later on, he watched the end of Baylor-TCU, which ended up 61-58 Baylor in regulation. The game turned on two plays, both of which were about as identical as plays can get, though with vastly different results.
The first was a fourth-down play for TCU just across the Baylor side of the 50. TCU threw for it, incomplete. There might have been a little contact on the play, but no flag.
It was the right call to go for it, by the way. With that way that game was going, whoever had the ball the last was going to win, and that meant keeping the ball away from Baylor.
When the Bears got the ball back, they were faced with a third-and-long. They threw for it, incomplete, with a little contact on that play as well.
This time, a flag was thrown. Pass interference. Then game-winning chip shot field goal.
Then there was Penn State-Michigan.
Michigan was up 16-13. Penn State ball, fourth and about 40 or so, near its goal line.
Penn State wisely took a safety, which meant a free kick, or in this case, an onsides kick. It was the Nittany Lions' only chance to get the ball back, other than hoping to convert on the fourth down.
And so that's what Penn State did. The center snapped the ball into the stands for the safety, 18-13 Wolverines.
Then onsides kick. Recovered by Penn State. Here comes the chance for the great finish.
But wait. No. Flag for offsides.
Doesn't matter that every replay showed there was no offsides.
TigerBlog doesn't understand why officials want to spend 59 quietly going about their jobs and then spend the last minute making awful calls that directly decide games. The two passes between Baylor and TCU were basically identical, and TB says no interference on either. So why one flag and not the other?
And the Penn State game? If you throw the flag for offsides, it better be really clear. So why throw that flag?
Could it be because the games were at Baylor and Michigan?
As for Princeton-Colgate, the Raiders came back from an early hole to defeat the Tigers 31-30. Up in Hamilton there would be no blaming this on the officials.
Nor, TigerBlog will say, could this be blamed on the decision to go two after the first touchdown, after Dre' Nelson ran the opening kickoff back for a touchdown for the second time in four games. The two-point try failed, making it 6-0 instead of 7-0 if the Tigers had kicked or 8-0 if it had been successful.
It's easy to say that Princeton lost by one, and that one point was the one from the failed conversion. That's a bit oversimplistic.
First of all, that assumes that every single thing that happened in the game from that point forward still would have happened in the exact same way had Princeton kicked. It wouldn't.
Even if it did for most of the game, the end game would have been different. In a tie game, Colgate wouldn't have played to run out the clock. It would have played to score. Maybe it would have. Maybe it wouldn't.
More importantly, it's a mentality thing.
Princeton's success last year was built on the idea of attacking. Fast and physical. Keep going at all times.
It's that kind of attitude that defines a team. If it backfires every now and then, so be it.
So where is Princeton now?
Unbeaten in the Ivy League, albeit at 1-0. There are six weeks left, with only Ivy games on the schedule. It begins Saturday when Brown comes to Powers Field at Princeton Stadium at 3:30.
After that? Harvard. At Cornell. Penn. At Yale. Dartmouth.
Right now, Dartmouth might be the best team of them all. The Big Green looked good against Yale in winning that one.
Dartmouth and Harvard are 2-0. Princeton is 1-0. Everyone else has a loss. Penn hosts Columbia this weekend, while the other four are outside the league.
Then it's all league games.
If TB had his way, there'd be a week off for the entire league after this weekend, Week 5. But no, they will keep playing straight through, a sprint to the finish line.
Maybe it hasn't been the dominant first four weeks Princeton might have hoped for in the preseason, when it was the league favorite. Whatever, that doesn't matter.
Now it's about the remaining six league games.
Is Princeton still the favorite? Maybe not.
Does Princeton have as good a chance as anyone?
Yes.
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