There's something about the first day after turning the clocks back that's a bit depressing.
After all, not that long ago it was light out past 7. Now? Sunset at 4:55 yesterday. Pitch black by 5:15 or so.
It's a real punch in the face that winter is on the way, even if the extended forecast for Princeton for the next 10 days is actually pretty good and that this week should see four days in the 70s.
The end of Daylight Savings Time also coincides with the sprint that goes from Halloween to Thanksgiving to Christmas. In fact Thanksgiving is just three weeks from Thursday, and TigerBlog saw his first Christmas commercial earlier this week.
And then? Cold. Snow. Bleh.
So yeah, that's what turning the clocks back means. The depressing news that winter is knocking.
Ah, but TigerBlog can't be too depressed after this weekend. Not when Princeton won three Ivy League championships in a little over 24 hours.
TigerBlog was at the Ivy League Heptagonal championships Friday when they made their return to Van Cortlandt Park in New York City.
If you've never been to Heps, it's just a big cross country party. There are tents for each team that are loaded with food, and nobody really seems to care who eats what. TigerBlog, dressed head-to-toe in Princeton stuff, tested that theory at the Penn tent, where he snagged a bagel.
As for the races, there are two ways to watch them. The first is to see the start and then cut across the big field to see where the runners go into the woods. The other way is to do what TigerBlog did: stay by the tents and take a Quaker bagel when everyone else is in the woods.
The men ran first Friday, and the young Princeton team finished in the middle of the pack, as predicted. The winning team was Columbia.
Then it was time for the women's race.
Princeton and Columbia, as TB understood it, were the favorites. As TB stood near the finish line, he didn't need a calculator to figure out that Princeton had won, and relatively easily at that.
The Tigers had five runners in the top 30, including three of the top six. At the top of the list as the individual winner, Lizzie Bird, who won by nearly eight seconds.
Usually at a Heps meet, there's a long wait while the officials total the scores and make it official. This time, it was obvious Princeton had won, and the team began to celebrate almost immediately.
TigerBlog did a short video interview with Bird, whom he'd never before, and his first thought was "she's not from around here, is she?" In fact, she's from St. Albans Herts. That's in England.
Before the race, TigerBlog saw Princeton coach Peter Farrell and asked him if he was nervous. Farrell's response was "you don't have to tell me it's race day." He was quoting someone. TigerBlog isn't sure if it was a real person or a fictional character. Either way, TB is also not sure if Farrell was nervous.
If he was, he had no reason to be. The win was his 27th Heps title as Princeton coach, with nine each in cross country, indoor track and field and outdoor track and field.
So that was one title.
The field hockey team entered the weekend unbeaten in the league, and Cornell and Penn had one loss each. Princeton also had games at home against Cornell and at Penn remaining, so the league was pretty wide open.
It got less wide open after the Tigers topped Cornell 4-0. The best goal was the last one, when Maddie Copeland took a long pass and was one-on-one with the Big Red goalie. Instead of shooting immediately, she gathered herself, spun around once - and then knocked it in. TigerBlog describes the goal as "graceful."
The win eliminated Cornell and left Princeton and Penn, who defeated Brown 2-1, in a big one Saturday at Penn as the winner gets the automatic bid to the NCAA tournament. Princeton, though, is assured of at least a share of the Ivy League title, which is a stunning 21st Ivy League title in 22 years in field hockey.
It's so stunning that TigerBlog wonders how many other teams on any level anywhere have won 21 titles in 22 years. He'll look that up later, if he can figure out how.
When the field hockey game ended, there wasn't much of a celebration by Princeton. Perhaps that's what happens when you get so used to winning. Or maybe it was an acknowledgement that there's more work to do.
About 100 yards away from the field hockey field, the women's soccer team was playing Cornell for its shot at the NCAA tournament. In fact, unlike field hockey, the women's soccer team had all kinds of margin of error, but the Tigers chose not to test any it.
Instead, Tyler Lussi did what she's done 40 other times in her career, which is to score a goal. This one came 15 minutes into the game and was a nice little chip over the goalkeeper, who had come off her line as a long ball was played down the field. Then, in the second half, Jesse McDonough headed in a cross from Lussi, and that was that for the game.
Princeton's 2-0 win meant that Princeton had clinched the league's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament. It also meant at least a share of the Ivy title. All that was left was to get an outright championship, and that came when Dartmouth and Harvard tied 1-1, making Princeton's game at Penn next week meaningless in the league race.
The surging Tigers, who have won 11 straight and now will head to the NCAA tournament for the 11th time. This time Princeton will have a different leader, as Sean Driscoll has his team headed to the postseason in his first year as head coach.
And that was the weekend.
Two days. Three championships.
And that ominous first day of darkness at 5:00.
Monday, November 2, 2015
Friday, October 30, 2015
Ivy Title Time
The Office of Athletic Communications will be relocating from its current perch on the Jadwin Gym balcony to E level, downstairs, next to the wrestling room.
TigerBlog has a great view out of his window of Weaver Track and Princeton Stadium. He's thinking of taking a nice panoramic picture of it and then hanging it on the wall of his new office, from which the outside will no longer be readily available.
Besides daylight, TigerBlog will also miss his neighbors in what used to be the mailroom. Chessie Jackson, the volunteer assistant women's basketball coach, shares that office with Mike Henderson, the director of track and field operations.
The two were sort of thrown together, and it seemed like it took them awhile until either one spoke to the other. At some point, it became apparent to TigerBlog - and he assumes the two of them - that they had something in common: a dry sense of humor. With some healthy sarcasm mixed in.
So now, the room next door is usually good for a laugh or two, if only for another two weeks or so, before TB moves downstairs.
Henderson will duck his head into TB's office a few times a day with something clever and understated. You can't really ask for more out of a neighbor.
It was actually two days ago that Henderson came in with a picture and a text message. The message said: "Think there's a place for it on TigerBlog or anything like that?"
Now this would get TB's attention regardless of who sent it. The fact that it came from none other than Donn Cabral was ever better.
TigerBlog has only talked to Cabral twice, but he is a huge fan. How could he not be?
Cabral is a former NCAA champion and Olympic finalist in the steeplechase. He hopes to repeat the second of those next year in Rio, where he will be looking to improve on his eighth-place finish in the London Olympics of 2012.
TigerBlog could see Cabral's workouts on the track in the spring when he was here, and they were nearly as impressive as watching him run. TB's favorite moment of seeing Cabral compete in person was at the 2010 Heps cross country championships, where Cabral destroyed the field and seemed completely unfazed by having run the treacherous Van Cortlandt Park course as he soared to the finish.
So if Donn Cabral wants a picture on TigerBlog, he has a good chance of getting it. And here it is:
The picture is of four Princetonians at the World Championships in Beijing last summer. Along with Cabral, there is Craig Masback ’77, Amadeus Mason ’89 and Carrie Dimoff ’05.
There will be at least two Ivy League championships awarded this weekend, and as many as four. And two others could go a long way towards being decided, though cannot mathematically be clinched. Those two would be football and men's soccer, where Harvard and Dartmouth are tied for first and meet in both in Cambridge.
The two Ivy titles that will definitely be decided are the men's and women's cross country championships, which will be returning to Van Cortlandt Park for the first time since Cabral won there in 2010. TigerBlog will be there too, as Heps cross country could be his favorite annual Ivy League event that doesn't have the word "lacrosse" in it.
The men's race is at 11, and the women's race is at noon. In the reconfigured world of Van Cortlandt, the men will race eight kilometers instead of five miles and the women will go 6K instead of 5K.
Princeton is the highest ranked among the women's teams in the league. Both races figure to be competitive.
Is that not enough insight for you? Click HERE for the men's preview and HERE for the women's preview.
The other two Ivy titles that could be decided this weekend are in field hockey and women's soccer, and in both, Princeton is the team that could be doing the deciding.
Princeton hosts Cornell at noon in field hockey and women's soccer at 1 (and football at 3:30 and men's soccer at 4). Admission to the two soccer games and field hockey game is free.
The field hockey field and soccer field are right next to each other, so you can see both title chases within an easy walk.
It's simple for both, but even simpler for women's soccer.
Princeton, after its 2-1 win over Harvard last weekend, is 5-0-0 in the league in women's soccer, with games against Cornell and Penn remaining. Other than Harvard, who is now 4-1-0, every other team in the league has been mathematically eliminated.
Should Princeton beat either Cornell or Penn, it would be headed to the NCAA tournament with the Ivy League's automatic bid, and it would be assured of no worse than a tie for the league championship. The same would apply if Harvard were to lose either of its final two games, to Dartmouth or Yale.
Of course, there are ties in soccer, and they all factor in to different possible outcomes. For instance, two Princeton ties and two Harvard wins, and Harvard would win the championship and automatic bid.
But Princeton won't have to worry about any of that with a win. Or a Harvard loss.
As in women's soccer,Princeton is also 5-0, also with games left against Cornell and Penn, in field hockey. The big difference is that both Cornell and Penn are 4-1, and so Princeton would clinch at least a share of the league title with a win in one game but not necessarily the NCAA tournament bid. Wins in both games, or a Princeton win in one game and a loss by the team that beats Princeton in the other game, would also send the Tigers to the tournament.
Again, win and don't worry about any of that.
The Heps meet will crown the first of 33 Ivy League championships for the 2015-16 academic year. In case you lost track, Princeton has won 438 Ivy League titles all-time, by far the most of any Ivy school and nearly one-quarter of all those that have been won through the years.
Just saying.
TigerBlog has a great view out of his window of Weaver Track and Princeton Stadium. He's thinking of taking a nice panoramic picture of it and then hanging it on the wall of his new office, from which the outside will no longer be readily available.
Besides daylight, TigerBlog will also miss his neighbors in what used to be the mailroom. Chessie Jackson, the volunteer assistant women's basketball coach, shares that office with Mike Henderson, the director of track and field operations.
The two were sort of thrown together, and it seemed like it took them awhile until either one spoke to the other. At some point, it became apparent to TigerBlog - and he assumes the two of them - that they had something in common: a dry sense of humor. With some healthy sarcasm mixed in.
So now, the room next door is usually good for a laugh or two, if only for another two weeks or so, before TB moves downstairs.
Henderson will duck his head into TB's office a few times a day with something clever and understated. You can't really ask for more out of a neighbor.
It was actually two days ago that Henderson came in with a picture and a text message. The message said: "Think there's a place for it on TigerBlog or anything like that?"
Now this would get TB's attention regardless of who sent it. The fact that it came from none other than Donn Cabral was ever better.
TigerBlog has only talked to Cabral twice, but he is a huge fan. How could he not be?
Cabral is a former NCAA champion and Olympic finalist in the steeplechase. He hopes to repeat the second of those next year in Rio, where he will be looking to improve on his eighth-place finish in the London Olympics of 2012.
TigerBlog could see Cabral's workouts on the track in the spring when he was here, and they were nearly as impressive as watching him run. TB's favorite moment of seeing Cabral compete in person was at the 2010 Heps cross country championships, where Cabral destroyed the field and seemed completely unfazed by having run the treacherous Van Cortlandt Park course as he soared to the finish.
So if Donn Cabral wants a picture on TigerBlog, he has a good chance of getting it. And here it is:
The picture is of four Princetonians at the World Championships in Beijing last summer. Along with Cabral, there is Craig Masback ’77, Amadeus Mason ’89 and Carrie Dimoff ’05.
There will be at least two Ivy League championships awarded this weekend, and as many as four. And two others could go a long way towards being decided, though cannot mathematically be clinched. Those two would be football and men's soccer, where Harvard and Dartmouth are tied for first and meet in both in Cambridge.
The two Ivy titles that will definitely be decided are the men's and women's cross country championships, which will be returning to Van Cortlandt Park for the first time since Cabral won there in 2010. TigerBlog will be there too, as Heps cross country could be his favorite annual Ivy League event that doesn't have the word "lacrosse" in it.
The men's race is at 11, and the women's race is at noon. In the reconfigured world of Van Cortlandt, the men will race eight kilometers instead of five miles and the women will go 6K instead of 5K.
Princeton is the highest ranked among the women's teams in the league. Both races figure to be competitive.
Is that not enough insight for you? Click HERE for the men's preview and HERE for the women's preview.
The other two Ivy titles that could be decided this weekend are in field hockey and women's soccer, and in both, Princeton is the team that could be doing the deciding.
Princeton hosts Cornell at noon in field hockey and women's soccer at 1 (and football at 3:30 and men's soccer at 4). Admission to the two soccer games and field hockey game is free.
The field hockey field and soccer field are right next to each other, so you can see both title chases within an easy walk.
It's simple for both, but even simpler for women's soccer.
Princeton, after its 2-1 win over Harvard last weekend, is 5-0-0 in the league in women's soccer, with games against Cornell and Penn remaining. Other than Harvard, who is now 4-1-0, every other team in the league has been mathematically eliminated.
Should Princeton beat either Cornell or Penn, it would be headed to the NCAA tournament with the Ivy League's automatic bid, and it would be assured of no worse than a tie for the league championship. The same would apply if Harvard were to lose either of its final two games, to Dartmouth or Yale.
Of course, there are ties in soccer, and they all factor in to different possible outcomes. For instance, two Princeton ties and two Harvard wins, and Harvard would win the championship and automatic bid.
But Princeton won't have to worry about any of that with a win. Or a Harvard loss.
As in women's soccer,Princeton is also 5-0, also with games left against Cornell and Penn, in field hockey. The big difference is that both Cornell and Penn are 4-1, and so Princeton would clinch at least a share of the league title with a win in one game but not necessarily the NCAA tournament bid. Wins in both games, or a Princeton win in one game and a loss by the team that beats Princeton in the other game, would also send the Tigers to the tournament.
Again, win and don't worry about any of that.
The Heps meet will crown the first of 33 Ivy League championships for the 2015-16 academic year. In case you lost track, Princeton has won 438 Ivy League titles all-time, by far the most of any Ivy school and nearly one-quarter of all those that have been won through the years.
Just saying.
Thursday, October 29, 2015
The Leftover Blog
TigerBlog was at the newspaper late one night in a summer long ago when somebody threw a no-hitter.
He can't remember the year or the pitcher or anything like. He just remembers the no-hitter, which came after the paper had been laid out but before the second edition had been finalized.
Whoever was laying out the paper that night - in the slot, it was called - didn't put the no-hitter out front, instead banishing it to the lead of the baseball wrap. This incensed TigerBlog's former colleague Harvey Yavener, who questioned whether or not the slot person knew what the "news" part of the newspaper meant.
It was a classic Yav moment.
TigerBlog thought of it as the 12th, 13th and 14th innings of Game 1 of the World Series were playing out. At what point did TigerBlog need to scrap what he'd already written and replace it with what Chris Young was doing for the Royals?
What if Young got a no-decision? Or a loss? Did that merit a new blog?
Either way, TB knew he had no choice once Young did what he did, which was throw three hitless innings and get the win. And so it was back to the newspaper days, which meant a little late night - actually early morning - rewriting.
It was actually sort of fun. TB rewrote while watching Young on the postgame set of the MLB Network, where he was what he is - humble and calm.
So yeah, TB didn't get much sleep after Game 1. That's okay. Besides, he had this blog left over that he was going to have run yesterday, but he'll just go with it today instead:
TigerBlog was all in on watching Rutgers-Ohio State last Saturday night.
He thought the Scarlet Knights would play the No. 1 ranked Buckeyes somewhat closer than they did. He figured it wouldn't be a nailbiter, but thought Rutgers could hang in.
The game started at 8 and was the feature game on ABC. Or ESPN on ABC, as it's officially known.
By 8:40 or so, he was over on PBS. Why? Two reasons.
First, because it was apparent that Rutgers wasn't going to hang with Ohio State. And second?
Because "On The Waterfront" was on. Does he need a better reason?
TigerBlog isn't sure how many times he's seen "On The Waterfront," but it's enough to know that the most famous scene is seared into his brain as much as any other he's even seen.
You know the scene, right? Marlon Brando, a former boxer, and his brother, played by Rod Steiger, are in the back of a car, being driven to where Brando is going to be knocked off unless Steiger can convince him not to testify against Lee J. Cobb, who had Eva Marie Saint's brother thrown off a roof. Brando and Saint have since fallen in love, as a side plot.
Steiger fails to convince Brando to keep his mouth shut, largely because Karl Malden, the local priest, has gotten inside his head. Realizing that he's going to have to take the hit, literally, for his brother, Steiger changes the subject and tries to get nostalgic about his brother's boxing career.
This really pisses Brando off. Instead of reminiscing, he reminds Steiger that he was on his way to a "title shot outdoors in a ballpark" but instead, because Steiger and Cobb made him throw a fight, he ended up with "a one-way ticket to Palookaville." And then he goes for the jugular, putting it all on Steiger.
And when his brother, in a way of justifying it all, reminds Brando that he had put some bets down for him and that "he saw some money," Brando utters as famous a line as has ever been uttered in the history of American movies:
"You don't understand. I coulda had class. I coulda been a contenduh. I coulda been somebody. Instead of a bum. Which is what I am. Let's face Charlie. It was you."
Chills. Total awe that something can be done so perfectly. Ah, that's when movies were movies.
TigerBlog remembers an episode of "Happy Days" where Richie, Potsie and Ralph got into a fight, and Fonzie explains that the girls will love that they looked all beaten up, like Brando did at the end of "On The Waterfront." He's pretty sure that was before he had seen the movie, but yeah, Brando gets a little beaten up at the end.
Other than the iconic scene, TB's favorites are when Malden goes into the bar and talks Brando out of shooting Cobb and when Brando finally confronts Steiger at the end, calling him "nothing."
"On The Waterfront" is one of the greatest movies ever. It won eight Academy Awards in 1954, including Best Picture, Best Actor for Brando and Best Supporting Actress for the then-17-year-old Saint.
TigerBlog stayed with the movie until the end. Then he went back to the Rutgers game, which was long decided by then.
Princeton and Rutgers played in the first football game ever, back on Nov. 6, 1869. For much of the next 100-plus years, Princeton football was far superior to its neighbor 20 miles to the north.
Even now, Princeton has won 803 games all-time, while Rutgers has won 644.
Rutgers, though, made a decision to go in a vastly different direction than Princeton when it came to football, pursuing the highest level while Princeton has stayed true to the Ivy League. Now Rutgers finds itself in the Big Ten, and you can't get much more big-time than that.
The Rutgers-Ohio State game drew 53,111 fans to High Point Solutions Stadium. The Scarlet Knights average 48,722 through five games at home, which is nothing compared to the road, where they average 71,945 after trips to Indiana and Penn State.
And hey, Temple and Notre Dame have sold out Lincoln Financial Field, home of the Philadelphia Eagles, for Saturday night.
Princeton and Rutgers are two of the nine pre-colonial colleges in the U.S. The others are six of the other seven Ivy schools and William & Mary.
The Ivy school not on the list is Cornell, which is at Princeton in football, both soccers and field hockey Saturday.
Remember that 71,945 average for Rutgers away games? The eight Ivy League teams combined average 67,918. That's the average attendance of the eight schools added together. Divide that by eight, and it comes to 8,490.
To which TigerBlog says: So what.
There's a reason Ivy League football and Big Ten football are different animals. Actually, there are a lot of reasons.
They don't need to be rehashed here.
The point is that Ivy League football isn't trying to be what Big Ten football is. Ivy League football is highly competitive. It's devoid of a lot of the ills that plague the Power Five conferences.
It provides a great game-day atmosphere. And it features players who are fully integrated into the academic missions of the schools they represent.
As TigerBlog has said on many occasions, other than Reunions, he can't think of anything that brings more people to Princeton's campus than football.
Princeton is 4-2. Cornell is 0-6. Princeton is looking to snap a two-game losing streak, and a win means a non-losing season is assured with three weeks to play.
Will the stadium be sold out? No. But that's okay.
It'll still be a great atmosphere for a game.
He can't remember the year or the pitcher or anything like. He just remembers the no-hitter, which came after the paper had been laid out but before the second edition had been finalized.
Whoever was laying out the paper that night - in the slot, it was called - didn't put the no-hitter out front, instead banishing it to the lead of the baseball wrap. This incensed TigerBlog's former colleague Harvey Yavener, who questioned whether or not the slot person knew what the "news" part of the newspaper meant.
It was a classic Yav moment.
TigerBlog thought of it as the 12th, 13th and 14th innings of Game 1 of the World Series were playing out. At what point did TigerBlog need to scrap what he'd already written and replace it with what Chris Young was doing for the Royals?
What if Young got a no-decision? Or a loss? Did that merit a new blog?
Either way, TB knew he had no choice once Young did what he did, which was throw three hitless innings and get the win. And so it was back to the newspaper days, which meant a little late night - actually early morning - rewriting.
It was actually sort of fun. TB rewrote while watching Young on the postgame set of the MLB Network, where he was what he is - humble and calm.
So yeah, TB didn't get much sleep after Game 1. That's okay. Besides, he had this blog left over that he was going to have run yesterday, but he'll just go with it today instead:
TigerBlog was all in on watching Rutgers-Ohio State last Saturday night.
He thought the Scarlet Knights would play the No. 1 ranked Buckeyes somewhat closer than they did. He figured it wouldn't be a nailbiter, but thought Rutgers could hang in.
The game started at 8 and was the feature game on ABC. Or ESPN on ABC, as it's officially known.
By 8:40 or so, he was over on PBS. Why? Two reasons.
First, because it was apparent that Rutgers wasn't going to hang with Ohio State. And second?
Because "On The Waterfront" was on. Does he need a better reason?
TigerBlog isn't sure how many times he's seen "On The Waterfront," but it's enough to know that the most famous scene is seared into his brain as much as any other he's even seen.
You know the scene, right? Marlon Brando, a former boxer, and his brother, played by Rod Steiger, are in the back of a car, being driven to where Brando is going to be knocked off unless Steiger can convince him not to testify against Lee J. Cobb, who had Eva Marie Saint's brother thrown off a roof. Brando and Saint have since fallen in love, as a side plot.
Steiger fails to convince Brando to keep his mouth shut, largely because Karl Malden, the local priest, has gotten inside his head. Realizing that he's going to have to take the hit, literally, for his brother, Steiger changes the subject and tries to get nostalgic about his brother's boxing career.
This really pisses Brando off. Instead of reminiscing, he reminds Steiger that he was on his way to a "title shot outdoors in a ballpark" but instead, because Steiger and Cobb made him throw a fight, he ended up with "a one-way ticket to Palookaville." And then he goes for the jugular, putting it all on Steiger.
And when his brother, in a way of justifying it all, reminds Brando that he had put some bets down for him and that "he saw some money," Brando utters as famous a line as has ever been uttered in the history of American movies:
"You don't understand. I coulda had class. I coulda been a contenduh. I coulda been somebody. Instead of a bum. Which is what I am. Let's face Charlie. It was you."
Chills. Total awe that something can be done so perfectly. Ah, that's when movies were movies.
TigerBlog remembers an episode of "Happy Days" where Richie, Potsie and Ralph got into a fight, and Fonzie explains that the girls will love that they looked all beaten up, like Brando did at the end of "On The Waterfront." He's pretty sure that was before he had seen the movie, but yeah, Brando gets a little beaten up at the end.
Other than the iconic scene, TB's favorites are when Malden goes into the bar and talks Brando out of shooting Cobb and when Brando finally confronts Steiger at the end, calling him "nothing."
"On The Waterfront" is one of the greatest movies ever. It won eight Academy Awards in 1954, including Best Picture, Best Actor for Brando and Best Supporting Actress for the then-17-year-old Saint.
TigerBlog stayed with the movie until the end. Then he went back to the Rutgers game, which was long decided by then.
Princeton and Rutgers played in the first football game ever, back on Nov. 6, 1869. For much of the next 100-plus years, Princeton football was far superior to its neighbor 20 miles to the north.
Even now, Princeton has won 803 games all-time, while Rutgers has won 644.
Rutgers, though, made a decision to go in a vastly different direction than Princeton when it came to football, pursuing the highest level while Princeton has stayed true to the Ivy League. Now Rutgers finds itself in the Big Ten, and you can't get much more big-time than that.
The Rutgers-Ohio State game drew 53,111 fans to High Point Solutions Stadium. The Scarlet Knights average 48,722 through five games at home, which is nothing compared to the road, where they average 71,945 after trips to Indiana and Penn State.
And hey, Temple and Notre Dame have sold out Lincoln Financial Field, home of the Philadelphia Eagles, for Saturday night.
Princeton and Rutgers are two of the nine pre-colonial colleges in the U.S. The others are six of the other seven Ivy schools and William & Mary.
The Ivy school not on the list is Cornell, which is at Princeton in football, both soccers and field hockey Saturday.
Remember that 71,945 average for Rutgers away games? The eight Ivy League teams combined average 67,918. That's the average attendance of the eight schools added together. Divide that by eight, and it comes to 8,490.
To which TigerBlog says: So what.
There's a reason Ivy League football and Big Ten football are different animals. Actually, there are a lot of reasons.
They don't need to be rehashed here.
The point is that Ivy League football isn't trying to be what Big Ten football is. Ivy League football is highly competitive. It's devoid of a lot of the ills that plague the Power Five conferences.
It provides a great game-day atmosphere. And it features players who are fully integrated into the academic missions of the schools they represent.
As TigerBlog has said on many occasions, other than Reunions, he can't think of anything that brings more people to Princeton's campus than football.
Princeton is 4-2. Cornell is 0-6. Princeton is looking to snap a two-game losing streak, and a win means a non-losing season is assured with three weeks to play.
Will the stadium be sold out? No. But that's okay.
It'll still be a great atmosphere for a game.
Wednesday, October 28, 2015
Winning Pitcher Chris Young
Scott Bradley was on the treadmill in the Princeton Varsity Club weightroom, which is where he usually is these days. TigerBlog was on the exercise bike a few feet away.
This was last Friday, to be exact. The Kansas City Royals hadn't yet clinched the American League pennant, but Bradley, Princeton's baseball coach, was making plans to go to the first two games of the World Series.
Why go to the Midwest when the New York Mets were the National League champ? It would be easier, Bradley said, to get to the stadium in KC than to Citi Field.
Then there was Monday. As Bradley prepared to leave, TigerBlog had a brief conversation with him on the Jadwin Gym balcony.
Young, who had pitched for Bradley at Princeton, is Kansas City's fourth starter. Royals manager Ned Yost had just announced that Young would pitch Game 4, but Bradley thought there might be a chance that he might get into Game 1 in relief, depending on the situation.
Bradley probably thought the situation was something like 4-4 in the fifth inning. You know, if the starter couldn't get to the bullpen and the Royals needed a bridge.
Or maybe 4-4 in the 12th. That was the other possibility, and that's exactly how it played out.
There was Young, brought out of the bullpen in the top of the 12th, with the score tied 4-4 after Alex Gordon's home run had tied it in the bottom of the ninth.
And now it was all on Young. Forget Game 4. This was his moment.
TigerBlog slept through innings six to nine, woke up to hear Gordon's home run, and then fell asleep again until the 11th. Then it was time for Young, and TB was wide awake.
This wasn't going to be an easy 12th for the big righthander. He would have to face the scorchingly hot Daniel Murphy, followed by Yoenis Cespedes and Lucas Duda, all in the World Series, by the way.
So what did he do? Struck out Murphy. Struck out Cespedes. Struck out Duda.
KC loaded the bases in the bottom of the 12th but couldn't score, so back came Young. At this point, it was Young for Kansas City and Bartolo Colon for the Mets, and the two veterans were probably going to be out there until one of them won and the other lost, since both bullpens were pretty much spent.
Young got another K in the 13th, though he did walk a batter. After Colon had an easy 13th, Young went 1-2-3 in the 14th, getting Curtis Granderson, David Wright and then Murphy again.
Finally, Kansas City got a run off Colon in the 14th. Game over. Winning pitcher, Chris Young.
Along the way, there was some interesting stuff on the Fox broadcast. And on Twitter. Lots of good Twitter stuff, including someone who mentioned that the World Series was now a battle between two guys who were a combined 78 years old and 600 pounds.
For starters, Alex Rodriguez, whom TigerBlog can't stand a little bit, had some great insight into why Young - who at 6-10 doesn't throw relatively hard - is so difficult for hitters. It was good stuff.
Then there was Tom Verducci as he showed up Joe Buck, who mentioned that the Mets might go to their Game 4 starter, Steven Matz. Verducci immediately shot that down, saying Matz had thrown a simulated game the day before and that New York manager Terry Collins had said he wouldn't pitch Matz in relief. How did Buck not know that?
And Harold Reynolds mentioned that he had seen Bradley before Game 1, with Young, who figured he wouldn't be the pitcher. Reynolds had been a teammate of Bradley's in Seattle. Again, really good stuff.
There was also a great graphic, mentioning this game and the 1916 World Series game that also had gone 14 innings. This game took more than five hours and used 13 total pitchers. The 1916 game? Two pitchers, 2:30.
The only pitcher TigerBlog really cared all that much about was Young, on the very short list of TB's all-time favorite Princeton athletes.
As TB watched, he couldn't help but chuckle about how he will always think of Young as a basketball player first, how great a basketball player he was at Princeton. Had he not lost his last two years of basketball after signing his first pro baseball contract, Young would probably be known now as the second-best player in program history, behind only Bill Bradley. He certainly would have vaulted past 2,000 points had he stayed healthy for those two years, and he would have obliterated the blocked shots record while also finishing in the top three or so in rebounds and assists.
From Day 1 that TigerBlog met him, he's been impressed by his demeanor, his poise, his maturity, his warmth, his genuine warmth at that.
TigerBlog once drove to Lakewood to see him pitch in A ball for the Hickory Crawdads, on whose buses Young had finished writing his senior thesis, something that was also brought up on the Fox broadcast.
And now here he was in the World Series. TB wonders what kind of NBA player he might have been, but none of that matters anymore. He chose the baseball route, and he chose wisely.
Yes, it was late, but TB was going to stay with this one til the end. And he really, really, didn't want to see Young lose it.
As it turned out, there was nothing to worry about. Young went three hitless, not just scoreless innings.
After it was over, Young was interviewed on the Fox broadcast. He was calm and cool, just like he had been on the mound.
How long could he have gone, he was asked? As long as he had to, he replied.
After all, he said, he had waited his whole life for this chance.
And he made the most of it.
It was a great moment for him. Actually, it's one of the great moments ever for a Princeton athlete.
Chris Young, the winning pitcher in an incredible World Series game. Sounds pretty good, right?
Tuesday, October 27, 2015
Let's Go Royals
When TigerBlog was a Penn freshman, he lived in a series of dorms called "The Quad."
It stretches from maybe 34th Street up to about 38th on Spruce Street, and is really a long series of interconnected dorms with different names. There are a few courtyards in the middle, including one that has stairs going up to connect the lower quad with the upper quad.
When TB was a freshman, he lived in Class of 1928 Hall. He didn't yet appreciate the importance of class years at that point.
Anyway, underneath the stairs that go up to the upper quad was a gathering area that had washing machines, study rooms and a small rec center. Included in the rec center was a ping-pong table.
One evening, TigerBlog and his friend Larry Harding went to play ping-pong. Larry's biggest claim to fame at that time was that he was from Natick, Mass., and had played high school football with Doug Flutie.
Anyway, TB and Harding played ping-pong for awhile and then went outside to find the whole place closed up and, more importantly, locked up. For some reason, it was bolted from the inside, so the two couldn't get out.
TigerBlog's memory of what happened next is a bit fuzzy, though he does remember having to call public safety from one of the emergency phones - the cell phone didn't exist yet - and then having to explain that they hadn't broken in, they were simply stuck there.
He also thinks he won the ping-pong match.
There was another time, back in 1990, when TB covered Trenton State (now the College of New Jersey) at Ithaca in the NCAA Division III football playoffs. As TB and another reporter wrote their stories (by the way, it was Dana O'Neil, who now writes for ESPN.com and whom TB fixed up with her husband, Princeton athletic trainer George O'Neil) everyone left - and when TB and Dana went to leave, the entire complex had been chained shut. With them on the inside.
TB remembered those two stories yesterday, when his colleague Ben Badua explained that while at Harvard for field hockey Saturday, he found himself also locked inside a chained up facility.
How did he get out? He climbed over a 10-foot high chain link fence, with his computer bag draped over his back.
That's impressive, at least to TB.
Ben said that the members of the field hockey team had gone to watch the women's soccer team, who was also at Harvard Saturday. Both teams won 2-1, and both wins were huge for them.
Princeton field hockey and women's soccer both find themselves 5-0 in the Ivy League and alone in first place with two weeks to play. They are both in position to clinch at least a share of the Ivy title with a win at home Saturday against Cornell or the following week against Penn.
There are all kinds of other permutations and such about outright championships and NCAA tournament bids, and they're not the same for both teams. Suffice it to say that both are in a good position, though neither has clinched a thing yet.
Those two teams are closing in on league titles. The cross country teams compete Friday in New York City at the Ivy League Heptagonal championships, looking for their own championships.
The fall is reaching the top of the stretch. The winter seasons are starting up.
But the big, big story today in Princeton athletics is a spring sport, baseball.
Chris Young, as popular a Princeton Tiger as there has been since the day TigerBlog first started here, has reached the World Series. He is scheduled to pitch Saturday in Game 4, as his Kansas City Royals take on the New York Mets.
Before then, he could be used in relief in tonight's Game 1.
TigerBlog heard KC manager Ned Yost on the radio yesterday as he talked about his rotation. When he got to Young, he said that nothing is going to bother him, that he's had a great year and that he and his team have full confidence in him.
It's a great story, how Young has battled back from major arm, shoulder and back injuries to have back-to-back very good seasons, a year ago with Seattle and this year with Kansas City. And now here he is, in the World Series, pitching less than two months after the death of his father.
As TigerBlog has often said, Young would be the person he would choose as the most popular Princeton athlete he's seen. There is nobody who dislikes Young, and those who know him like him even more.
He is an extraordinarily nice person and has been from Day 1 that TB met him. TB can still see a very young TigerBlog Jr., up on Young's shoulders, as Young held him up to the basket on the Jadwin side court so TBJ could dunk. That's how Young is.
He's certainly enough to get TB to root for the Royals over the Mets, even if he grew up a Mets fan.
Now? He's a Chris Young fan. A big one.
It stretches from maybe 34th Street up to about 38th on Spruce Street, and is really a long series of interconnected dorms with different names. There are a few courtyards in the middle, including one that has stairs going up to connect the lower quad with the upper quad.
When TB was a freshman, he lived in Class of 1928 Hall. He didn't yet appreciate the importance of class years at that point.
Anyway, underneath the stairs that go up to the upper quad was a gathering area that had washing machines, study rooms and a small rec center. Included in the rec center was a ping-pong table.
One evening, TigerBlog and his friend Larry Harding went to play ping-pong. Larry's biggest claim to fame at that time was that he was from Natick, Mass., and had played high school football with Doug Flutie.
Anyway, TB and Harding played ping-pong for awhile and then went outside to find the whole place closed up and, more importantly, locked up. For some reason, it was bolted from the inside, so the two couldn't get out.
TigerBlog's memory of what happened next is a bit fuzzy, though he does remember having to call public safety from one of the emergency phones - the cell phone didn't exist yet - and then having to explain that they hadn't broken in, they were simply stuck there.
He also thinks he won the ping-pong match.
There was another time, back in 1990, when TB covered Trenton State (now the College of New Jersey) at Ithaca in the NCAA Division III football playoffs. As TB and another reporter wrote their stories (by the way, it was Dana O'Neil, who now writes for ESPN.com and whom TB fixed up with her husband, Princeton athletic trainer George O'Neil) everyone left - and when TB and Dana went to leave, the entire complex had been chained shut. With them on the inside.
TB remembered those two stories yesterday, when his colleague Ben Badua explained that while at Harvard for field hockey Saturday, he found himself also locked inside a chained up facility.
How did he get out? He climbed over a 10-foot high chain link fence, with his computer bag draped over his back.
That's impressive, at least to TB.
Ben said that the members of the field hockey team had gone to watch the women's soccer team, who was also at Harvard Saturday. Both teams won 2-1, and both wins were huge for them.
Princeton field hockey and women's soccer both find themselves 5-0 in the Ivy League and alone in first place with two weeks to play. They are both in position to clinch at least a share of the Ivy title with a win at home Saturday against Cornell or the following week against Penn.
There are all kinds of other permutations and such about outright championships and NCAA tournament bids, and they're not the same for both teams. Suffice it to say that both are in a good position, though neither has clinched a thing yet.
Those two teams are closing in on league titles. The cross country teams compete Friday in New York City at the Ivy League Heptagonal championships, looking for their own championships.
The fall is reaching the top of the stretch. The winter seasons are starting up.
But the big, big story today in Princeton athletics is a spring sport, baseball.
Chris Young, as popular a Princeton Tiger as there has been since the day TigerBlog first started here, has reached the World Series. He is scheduled to pitch Saturday in Game 4, as his Kansas City Royals take on the New York Mets.
Before then, he could be used in relief in tonight's Game 1.
TigerBlog heard KC manager Ned Yost on the radio yesterday as he talked about his rotation. When he got to Young, he said that nothing is going to bother him, that he's had a great year and that he and his team have full confidence in him.
It's a great story, how Young has battled back from major arm, shoulder and back injuries to have back-to-back very good seasons, a year ago with Seattle and this year with Kansas City. And now here he is, in the World Series, pitching less than two months after the death of his father.
As TigerBlog has often said, Young would be the person he would choose as the most popular Princeton athlete he's seen. There is nobody who dislikes Young, and those who know him like him even more.
He is an extraordinarily nice person and has been from Day 1 that TB met him. TB can still see a very young TigerBlog Jr., up on Young's shoulders, as Young held him up to the basket on the Jadwin side court so TBJ could dunk. That's how Young is.
He's certainly enough to get TB to root for the Royals over the Mets, even if he grew up a Mets fan.
Now? He's a Chris Young fan. A big one.
Monday, October 26, 2015
Three Out Of Four
Winning a little differently since 1864.
TigerBlog likes that little slogan. It's catchy. Creative. Says a lot in a few words. Whoever came up with it should get a big, big raise.
Okay, it was TigerBlog who came up with it.
So what does it mean?
The point is that Princeton Athletics started in 1864, so right away you know that there's a ton of history there. And you know there's a lot of winning there too.
The different part? Princeton has built one of the best programs in the history of American intercollegiate athletics, with a legacy of more than 200 national championships and nearly one-quarter of all Ivy League championships won. And it's done so while also staying loyal to the University's academic standards, with participants who are equal parts students, athletes and citizens.
Let's brag for a few seconds. There are very, very, very few schools who can make the same claim. And none who have done it without athletic scholarships.
So yeah, Princeton has been winning a little differently for the last 151 years.
Part of the difference is that the entire school does not revolve around football, as is the case in much of the college athletics world. If you don't believe that, then just look at the number of conference realignments in recent years that have destroyed decades old rivalries and left much of the country geographically displaced.
And for what? Football. And the money it generates.
At many schools, the football coach is the more powerful person on the campus. Princeton head coach Bob Surace is among the nicest and funniest on Princeton's campus, but he'll be the first to tell you that he's not the most powerful.
In fact, a football coach who didn't buy into the institutional philosophy wouldn't last here.
Now, that doesn't mean that football isn't important. And nothing other than Reunions can bring the number of people to campus that a big football game can.
All of this begs this question of Princeton fans: Were you happy with how Princeton did against Harvard in Cambridge Saturday?
Princeton got huge wins in women's soccer, field hockey and men's soccer. Princeton lost 42-7 in football.
At, say, Alabama, TigerBlog would suppose that 95% or more of the fans wouldn't be happy with a weekend like that. He wonders what the percentage at Princeton would be.
Anyway, the football game was 7-7 at one point and 14-7 at the half. In the second half, Harvard wore Princeton down and pulled away.
TigerBlog wonders if an offensive lineman can win the Bushnell Cup as the Ivy League's Offensive Player of the Year. Harvard has a lot of pieces, yes, but what really separates the Crimson is its offensive line.
The big game in the Ivy League will be Friday night, when Dartmouth is at Harvard in a matchup of teams who are 6-0 overall and 3-0 in the Ivy League. The league appears to be those two at the top, with Columbia and Cornell winless in the league and the other four sort of bunched in the middle.
Harvard and Dartmouth went into the weekend both unbeaten in the league in men's soccer. Only one of them - the Big Green - came out of it the same way.
Princeton handed Harvard its first league loss as Jeremy Colvin, Daniel Bowkett and Thomas Sanner had goals in a 3-2 win. Harvard is home with Dartmouth Saturday, and a win there will put the Crimson back in a tie for first with the tiebreaker for the automatic NCAA bid. On the other hand, a Dartmouth win and the Big Green will be nearly impossible to catch for the NCAA bid.
But hey, that's for Harvard and Dartmouth.
For Princeton, the biggest winners were field hockey and women's soccer.
The field hockey team trailed Harvard 1-0 with 13 minutes to go before Maddie Copeland scored twice in just about nine minutes to give the Tigers a 2-1 victory. Princeton lost 4-1 yesterday at No. 2 UConn in a matchup of teams who have combined for the last three NCAA tournaments.
The win over Harvard improved Princeton to 5-0 in the league. No other team is unbeaten, but Cornell and Penn are both 4-1. Those two just happen to be Princeton's two remaining opponents. A win in one of those games means no worse than a share of the 21st field hockey title in 22 years.
Wins in both mean an outright title and the automatic NCAA bid. Princeton can also get there by going 1-1 and having the team who beats the Tigers lose its other game.
And then there was women's soccer.
TigerBlog watched the last 20 minutes of Princeton-Harvard field hockey on the Ivy League Digital Network, where Princeton was wearing white and Harvard was wearing crimson. He then watched the women's soccer game, with no sound, and he thought for basically most of the game that Princeton was again in white, even though it was in orange. It was very confusing.
Once he finally figured it out, he realized that Mimi Asom and Tyler Lussi did it again, each with goals, in Princeton's 2-1 win. The Tigers and Harvard had come into the game with perfect league records.
Princeton, led by first-year head coach Sean Driscoll, has 15 points, followed by Harvard with 12. Every other team in the league has been mathematically eliminated.
The Tigers will get at least a share of the league title and the league's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament with a win in either of its last two games, this Saturday at home against Cornell or Nov. 7 at Penn. There are all kinds of scenarios where Harvard can catch Princeton, but none of them work unless Princeton doesn't win either of its last two.
It's a good spot to be in.
So that's your weekend in Cambridge.
Do you think it was a great one?
TigerBlog likes that little slogan. It's catchy. Creative. Says a lot in a few words. Whoever came up with it should get a big, big raise.
Okay, it was TigerBlog who came up with it.
So what does it mean?
The point is that Princeton Athletics started in 1864, so right away you know that there's a ton of history there. And you know there's a lot of winning there too.
The different part? Princeton has built one of the best programs in the history of American intercollegiate athletics, with a legacy of more than 200 national championships and nearly one-quarter of all Ivy League championships won. And it's done so while also staying loyal to the University's academic standards, with participants who are equal parts students, athletes and citizens.
Let's brag for a few seconds. There are very, very, very few schools who can make the same claim. And none who have done it without athletic scholarships.
So yeah, Princeton has been winning a little differently for the last 151 years.
Part of the difference is that the entire school does not revolve around football, as is the case in much of the college athletics world. If you don't believe that, then just look at the number of conference realignments in recent years that have destroyed decades old rivalries and left much of the country geographically displaced.
And for what? Football. And the money it generates.
At many schools, the football coach is the more powerful person on the campus. Princeton head coach Bob Surace is among the nicest and funniest on Princeton's campus, but he'll be the first to tell you that he's not the most powerful.
In fact, a football coach who didn't buy into the institutional philosophy wouldn't last here.
Now, that doesn't mean that football isn't important. And nothing other than Reunions can bring the number of people to campus that a big football game can.
All of this begs this question of Princeton fans: Were you happy with how Princeton did against Harvard in Cambridge Saturday?
Princeton got huge wins in women's soccer, field hockey and men's soccer. Princeton lost 42-7 in football.
At, say, Alabama, TigerBlog would suppose that 95% or more of the fans wouldn't be happy with a weekend like that. He wonders what the percentage at Princeton would be.
Anyway, the football game was 7-7 at one point and 14-7 at the half. In the second half, Harvard wore Princeton down and pulled away.
TigerBlog wonders if an offensive lineman can win the Bushnell Cup as the Ivy League's Offensive Player of the Year. Harvard has a lot of pieces, yes, but what really separates the Crimson is its offensive line.
The big game in the Ivy League will be Friday night, when Dartmouth is at Harvard in a matchup of teams who are 6-0 overall and 3-0 in the Ivy League. The league appears to be those two at the top, with Columbia and Cornell winless in the league and the other four sort of bunched in the middle.
Harvard and Dartmouth went into the weekend both unbeaten in the league in men's soccer. Only one of them - the Big Green - came out of it the same way.
Princeton handed Harvard its first league loss as Jeremy Colvin, Daniel Bowkett and Thomas Sanner had goals in a 3-2 win. Harvard is home with Dartmouth Saturday, and a win there will put the Crimson back in a tie for first with the tiebreaker for the automatic NCAA bid. On the other hand, a Dartmouth win and the Big Green will be nearly impossible to catch for the NCAA bid.
But hey, that's for Harvard and Dartmouth.
For Princeton, the biggest winners were field hockey and women's soccer.
The field hockey team trailed Harvard 1-0 with 13 minutes to go before Maddie Copeland scored twice in just about nine minutes to give the Tigers a 2-1 victory. Princeton lost 4-1 yesterday at No. 2 UConn in a matchup of teams who have combined for the last three NCAA tournaments.
The win over Harvard improved Princeton to 5-0 in the league. No other team is unbeaten, but Cornell and Penn are both 4-1. Those two just happen to be Princeton's two remaining opponents. A win in one of those games means no worse than a share of the 21st field hockey title in 22 years.
Wins in both mean an outright title and the automatic NCAA bid. Princeton can also get there by going 1-1 and having the team who beats the Tigers lose its other game.
And then there was women's soccer.
TigerBlog watched the last 20 minutes of Princeton-Harvard field hockey on the Ivy League Digital Network, where Princeton was wearing white and Harvard was wearing crimson. He then watched the women's soccer game, with no sound, and he thought for basically most of the game that Princeton was again in white, even though it was in orange. It was very confusing.
Once he finally figured it out, he realized that Mimi Asom and Tyler Lussi did it again, each with goals, in Princeton's 2-1 win. The Tigers and Harvard had come into the game with perfect league records.
Princeton, led by first-year head coach Sean Driscoll, has 15 points, followed by Harvard with 12. Every other team in the league has been mathematically eliminated.
The Tigers will get at least a share of the league title and the league's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament with a win in either of its last two games, this Saturday at home against Cornell or Nov. 7 at Penn. There are all kinds of scenarios where Harvard can catch Princeton, but none of them work unless Princeton doesn't win either of its last two.
It's a good spot to be in.
So that's your weekend in Cambridge.
Do you think it was a great one?
Friday, October 23, 2015
Princeton At Harvard Times Four
Peter Farrell is trying way too hard to convince TigerBlog that he's an actual New York Mets fan.
TB believes that Farrell, the women's track and field coach, was a Mets fan in the 1960s through the 1980s. It's just that it's interesting to TB that Farrell's love for the Mets ironically has resurfaced in 2015.
He was at it again yesterday, when he came in to TB's office with yet another piece of Mets apparel, which he no doubt had to dig out of a drawer somewhere.
Of course, if you're TigerBlog's age and older and grew up watching the Mets on Channel 9, then you remember who one of the main sponsors was. And it wasn't Dunkin' Donuts, which was on the back of Peter's shirt.
No. It was Rheingold beer. Peter sang the jingle yesterday in TB's office.
He also talked about how he taunted Senior Associate Director of Athletics, who is an Illinois native and a genuine Cubs fan. Her team got unceremoniously swept by the Mets in the National League Championship Series. TB read that the Cubs were the first team ever in a best-of-seven baseball playoff series to never have the lead at any point.
TigerBlog, being kind, told Allison that he would be the only person around here not to mention the Cubs to her.
Peter? He made a few Mets-centric comments to her. And he asked her about the absurdity of the rule that a ball that disappears in the Wrigley Field ivy is a ground-rule double.
And her response? It was perfect:
"Peter, you need to know the Ivy rules."
The Mets will play either the Royals or the Blue Jays in the World Series. Kansas City leads 3-2, with the last two games in KC. TigerBlog is rooting for the Royals, because of Chris Young.
TigerBlog read a great story on Chris in the Kansas City Star the other day, written by Andy McCollough, the beat writer for the paper. Andy used to work for the Star-Ledger and covered some Princeton stuff way back when.
You can read the story HERE.
Speaking of stories about Princeton teams, here's a really good one on the sprint football team from SB Nation. Well, HERE is where it actually is.
That's 10,000 words on Princeton sprint football. What is there to say about sprint football for that long? Read it for yourself.
That reminds TB of when he used to work at the newspaper with a guy named Ray Clark. One day TB heard Ray on the phone with someone who didn't like a story he'd written. He couldn't hear what the person on the other end was saying to Ray, but it was obvious Ray was getting annoyed. Finally, he let loose with the perfect comeback: Who read it to you?
The sprint football team has two games left, next week against Penn and the week after against Chestnut Hill. The Ivy League Heps cross country championships are also next week, as is the Capital City Classic for men's hockey at the Sun Bank Center.
That hardly means this isn't a huge weekend for Princeton, and most of it is in Cambridge.
The biggest game is the women's soccer showdown at Harvard. Princeton is 4-0-0, and Harvard is 4-0-0. Princeton probably has the tougher schedule the rest of the way after this one, but the winner of this one is in really good shape to snag the Ivy's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.
The 2014 Princeton-Harvard women's soccer game was a wild one, which finally ended at 5-4 Crimson.
The field hockey team is also at Harvard.
Princeton is the lone unbeaten in the league at 4-0. Cornell and Penn are both 3-1. They also happen to be Princeton's last two league opponents.
Harvard is 2-2, as is Columbia.
There have been 16 Ivy League field hockey games to date this season. Of those 16, there have been 10 one-goal games, of which six have gone to overtime.
The men's soccer team is 0-2-1 in the league. A year ago, Princeton went 4-2-1 and got a share of the championship, so anything is still possible.
It's been a frustrating start to the Ivy season for the Tigers, who are 6-2-1 out of the league against a good schedule. Princeton can get rid of a bunch of that frustration Saturday, also at Harvard, who is 3-0-0 in the league, as is Dartmouth.
Lastly, the football team is at Harvard as well. As in men's soccer, the two unbeatens in Ivy football are Harvard and Dartmouth, who meet a week from today in Cambridge as well.
Princeton, Brown, Yale and Penn are all 1-1. The Tigers had been 4-0 before a 38-31 setback to Brown in Providence last weekend.
The math is obvious.
The weather in Cambridge tomorrow is supposed to be 55 and sunny, with zero chance of rain. That's a big-time forecast for what figures to be a big-time day.
TB believes that Farrell, the women's track and field coach, was a Mets fan in the 1960s through the 1980s. It's just that it's interesting to TB that Farrell's love for the Mets ironically has resurfaced in 2015.
He was at it again yesterday, when he came in to TB's office with yet another piece of Mets apparel, which he no doubt had to dig out of a drawer somewhere.
Of course, if you're TigerBlog's age and older and grew up watching the Mets on Channel 9, then you remember who one of the main sponsors was. And it wasn't Dunkin' Donuts, which was on the back of Peter's shirt.
No. It was Rheingold beer. Peter sang the jingle yesterday in TB's office.
He also talked about how he taunted Senior Associate Director of Athletics, who is an Illinois native and a genuine Cubs fan. Her team got unceremoniously swept by the Mets in the National League Championship Series. TB read that the Cubs were the first team ever in a best-of-seven baseball playoff series to never have the lead at any point.
TigerBlog, being kind, told Allison that he would be the only person around here not to mention the Cubs to her.
Peter? He made a few Mets-centric comments to her. And he asked her about the absurdity of the rule that a ball that disappears in the Wrigley Field ivy is a ground-rule double.
And her response? It was perfect:
"Peter, you need to know the Ivy rules."
The Mets will play either the Royals or the Blue Jays in the World Series. Kansas City leads 3-2, with the last two games in KC. TigerBlog is rooting for the Royals, because of Chris Young.
TigerBlog read a great story on Chris in the Kansas City Star the other day, written by Andy McCollough, the beat writer for the paper. Andy used to work for the Star-Ledger and covered some Princeton stuff way back when.
You can read the story HERE.
Speaking of stories about Princeton teams, here's a really good one on the sprint football team from SB Nation. Well, HERE is where it actually is.
That's 10,000 words on Princeton sprint football. What is there to say about sprint football for that long? Read it for yourself.
That reminds TB of when he used to work at the newspaper with a guy named Ray Clark. One day TB heard Ray on the phone with someone who didn't like a story he'd written. He couldn't hear what the person on the other end was saying to Ray, but it was obvious Ray was getting annoyed. Finally, he let loose with the perfect comeback: Who read it to you?
The sprint football team has two games left, next week against Penn and the week after against Chestnut Hill. The Ivy League Heps cross country championships are also next week, as is the Capital City Classic for men's hockey at the Sun Bank Center.
That hardly means this isn't a huge weekend for Princeton, and most of it is in Cambridge.
The biggest game is the women's soccer showdown at Harvard. Princeton is 4-0-0, and Harvard is 4-0-0. Princeton probably has the tougher schedule the rest of the way after this one, but the winner of this one is in really good shape to snag the Ivy's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.
The 2014 Princeton-Harvard women's soccer game was a wild one, which finally ended at 5-4 Crimson.
The field hockey team is also at Harvard.
Princeton is the lone unbeaten in the league at 4-0. Cornell and Penn are both 3-1. They also happen to be Princeton's last two league opponents.
Harvard is 2-2, as is Columbia.
There have been 16 Ivy League field hockey games to date this season. Of those 16, there have been 10 one-goal games, of which six have gone to overtime.
The men's soccer team is 0-2-1 in the league. A year ago, Princeton went 4-2-1 and got a share of the championship, so anything is still possible.
It's been a frustrating start to the Ivy season for the Tigers, who are 6-2-1 out of the league against a good schedule. Princeton can get rid of a bunch of that frustration Saturday, also at Harvard, who is 3-0-0 in the league, as is Dartmouth.
Lastly, the football team is at Harvard as well. As in men's soccer, the two unbeatens in Ivy football are Harvard and Dartmouth, who meet a week from today in Cambridge as well.
Princeton, Brown, Yale and Penn are all 1-1. The Tigers had been 4-0 before a 38-31 setback to Brown in Providence last weekend.
The math is obvious.
The weather in Cambridge tomorrow is supposed to be 55 and sunny, with zero chance of rain. That's a big-time forecast for what figures to be a big-time day.
Thursday, October 22, 2015
Back To the Future
TigerBlog saw "Back to the Future" in the movies, he's pretty sure.
He saw basically every movie that came out between 1979 and 1985. Why would he have missed that one?
He thought it was okay. Not great. It's not his kind of funny, not like "Caddyshack" or "Stripes" or "Animal House."
He never saw the sequel, so he missed the world that was created when Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd traveled 30 years into the future, arriving on Oct. 21, 2015.
That was yesterday. It seemed like it was a big deal to a lot of people, that it was Oct. 21, 2015, and that a movie 30 years ago predicted what the world would look like.
TB did see a youtube clip of "Back to the Future II" yesterday. In the futuristic world, there were cars that flew and all kinds of other science fiction-y type of things, and even Jaws 19 in the movie theater.
What was really interesting was that there was a United States Postal Service mailbox right there on the corner. TB takes that as an indication that the people who put the movie together assumed that people would still be using the U.S. Mail as the primary form of communication and therefore didn't see the internet coming.
Where was TB back then? He was in the newspaper business.
It's too bad he didn't give any thought to writing down what he thought the world would look like 30 years in the future back in 1985. On the other hand, what does he think the world will look like in 2045, 30 years from now?
TB's first thought is that he'll still be around to see it. He'll be in his 80s by then, but he likes his chances. And if he's wrong, well, then he won't realize it anyway.
What else will be going on in 2045? What will communication be like? Will the internet be obsolete, replaced by something that nobody today has even yet imagined?
This is all to metaphysical for TB right now. He has to give it more thought.
If he had to make one prediction for what life will be like in 2045, it'll be that American college sports will still exist and will be fairly similar to what it is today.
Professional sports figure to be more global, and sports in general figure to be more modern looking, in much the same way that pictures of games from 30 years ago seem dated and pictures from today seem new and fresh.
But the games? They'll still be similar. They won't be replaced by futuristic sports like Rollerball or Quiddich or whatever else would be out there.
Back in 1985, when TigerBlog wondered what life in the mystical year of 2000 would look like, he wondered if sports would evolve to different kinds of games.
Really, though, sports are still sports, and have been for centuries now. They've changed a bit, but baseball is still baseball, basketball is still basketball. Boxing isn't nearly as big as it once was, and if TB had to guess a sport that could find itself in the same situation 30 years from now, it would be football.
He doesn't think the sport will disappear though. He thinks it'll do what it takes to make itself safer to play and will still be a huge part of the sporting psyche.
You could go back 30 years and only be a little more than halfway to where the parade of Princeton men's lacrosse captains began this past Saturday at the Hyatt Regency.
The line of captains, stretching back five decades, made for a great sight.
Of course, TigerBlog didn't actually see it. He wasn't there. He had a conflicting event, and so he missed the Friends of Princeton Men's Lacrosse Fall Celebration for the first time in a few years.
He didn't need to see it though. He knows it looked great. It's what Princeton does.
The University as a whole, and the athletic department as an extension, knows how to celebrate. Princeton knows how to celebrate the past and those who made it happen.
Anyone who has ever been to a Princeton event knows that. The sense of pride in the University and its institutions is overwhelming.
And so the fall celebration was right in the University's wheelhouse. Honor the past. Stress to those who make up the present that the program was here long before they showed up and that they are part of something bigger than just their four years here.
Each year the men's lacrosse team honors some part of its past. This year the idea was to bring all of the captains back together.
The group stretched all the way back to 1962 and Phil Allen. It extended to the announcement of the 2016 captains - Ryan Ambler, Austin deButts, Bear Goldstein and Matt O'Connor.
Princeton is often a multi-generational entity, and it wasn't lost on TigerBlog as he looked at the list of captains in attendance that two are fathers of current players, including the father of one of the current captains. Those two would be Boota deButts, Austin's dad, and Peter Cordrey, whose son Emmett is a current freshman.
The Friends of Men's Lacrosse event is always a TigerBlog favorite. As he sits there each year (other than this one), he knows that this is just one of 38 teams at Princeton that likes to do this.
TigerBlog loves the championships and the big wins and the great players that he's seen through the years here. More than that, though, he really loves this aspect of Princeton, the way the past is revered.
Maybe it's because he was a history major.
Whatever the reason, TB thinks it's an incredible part of the University. Those of you who are alums and who competed here don't know any different and might not realize just how special it is.
TigerBlog, a Penn guy, knows. And he doesn't see it changing any time soon.
Certainly not by Oct. 21, 2045.
He saw basically every movie that came out between 1979 and 1985. Why would he have missed that one?
He thought it was okay. Not great. It's not his kind of funny, not like "Caddyshack" or "Stripes" or "Animal House."
He never saw the sequel, so he missed the world that was created when Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd traveled 30 years into the future, arriving on Oct. 21, 2015.
That was yesterday. It seemed like it was a big deal to a lot of people, that it was Oct. 21, 2015, and that a movie 30 years ago predicted what the world would look like.
TB did see a youtube clip of "Back to the Future II" yesterday. In the futuristic world, there were cars that flew and all kinds of other science fiction-y type of things, and even Jaws 19 in the movie theater.
What was really interesting was that there was a United States Postal Service mailbox right there on the corner. TB takes that as an indication that the people who put the movie together assumed that people would still be using the U.S. Mail as the primary form of communication and therefore didn't see the internet coming.
Where was TB back then? He was in the newspaper business.
It's too bad he didn't give any thought to writing down what he thought the world would look like 30 years in the future back in 1985. On the other hand, what does he think the world will look like in 2045, 30 years from now?
TB's first thought is that he'll still be around to see it. He'll be in his 80s by then, but he likes his chances. And if he's wrong, well, then he won't realize it anyway.
What else will be going on in 2045? What will communication be like? Will the internet be obsolete, replaced by something that nobody today has even yet imagined?
This is all to metaphysical for TB right now. He has to give it more thought.
If he had to make one prediction for what life will be like in 2045, it'll be that American college sports will still exist and will be fairly similar to what it is today.
Professional sports figure to be more global, and sports in general figure to be more modern looking, in much the same way that pictures of games from 30 years ago seem dated and pictures from today seem new and fresh.
But the games? They'll still be similar. They won't be replaced by futuristic sports like Rollerball or Quiddich or whatever else would be out there.
Back in 1985, when TigerBlog wondered what life in the mystical year of 2000 would look like, he wondered if sports would evolve to different kinds of games.
Really, though, sports are still sports, and have been for centuries now. They've changed a bit, but baseball is still baseball, basketball is still basketball. Boxing isn't nearly as big as it once was, and if TB had to guess a sport that could find itself in the same situation 30 years from now, it would be football.
He doesn't think the sport will disappear though. He thinks it'll do what it takes to make itself safer to play and will still be a huge part of the sporting psyche.
You could go back 30 years and only be a little more than halfway to where the parade of Princeton men's lacrosse captains began this past Saturday at the Hyatt Regency.
The line of captains, stretching back five decades, made for a great sight.
Of course, TigerBlog didn't actually see it. He wasn't there. He had a conflicting event, and so he missed the Friends of Princeton Men's Lacrosse Fall Celebration for the first time in a few years.
He didn't need to see it though. He knows it looked great. It's what Princeton does.
The University as a whole, and the athletic department as an extension, knows how to celebrate. Princeton knows how to celebrate the past and those who made it happen.
Anyone who has ever been to a Princeton event knows that. The sense of pride in the University and its institutions is overwhelming.
And so the fall celebration was right in the University's wheelhouse. Honor the past. Stress to those who make up the present that the program was here long before they showed up and that they are part of something bigger than just their four years here.
Each year the men's lacrosse team honors some part of its past. This year the idea was to bring all of the captains back together.
The group stretched all the way back to 1962 and Phil Allen. It extended to the announcement of the 2016 captains - Ryan Ambler, Austin deButts, Bear Goldstein and Matt O'Connor.
Princeton is often a multi-generational entity, and it wasn't lost on TigerBlog as he looked at the list of captains in attendance that two are fathers of current players, including the father of one of the current captains. Those two would be Boota deButts, Austin's dad, and Peter Cordrey, whose son Emmett is a current freshman.
The Friends of Men's Lacrosse event is always a TigerBlog favorite. As he sits there each year (other than this one), he knows that this is just one of 38 teams at Princeton that likes to do this.
TigerBlog loves the championships and the big wins and the great players that he's seen through the years here. More than that, though, he really loves this aspect of Princeton, the way the past is revered.
Maybe it's because he was a history major.
Whatever the reason, TB thinks it's an incredible part of the University. Those of you who are alums and who competed here don't know any different and might not realize just how special it is.
TigerBlog, a Penn guy, knows. And he doesn't see it changing any time soon.
Certainly not by Oct. 21, 2045.
Wednesday, October 21, 2015
A No-Decision
Hey, Ned Yost. Would it have killed you to let Chris Young pitch to Josh Donaldson with two out in the fifth?
Young, the 2003 Princeton grad, was the starting pitcher for the Kansas City Royals in Game 4 of the American League Championship Series yesterday afternoon. This wasn't just any start. This was the pivotal game of the series, with KC up two games to one over the Toronto Blue Jays, who had won Game 3 at home Sunday night after the Royals won the first two.
As it turned out, Kansas City would win Game 4 by a 14-2 count over the Blue Jays to go up 3-1 and move within a game of a second straight World Series.
Yost, though, had no way of knowing his team had nine more runs in the tank when he had a decision to make about Young in the fifth.
Kansas City had scored four times in the top of the first, before Young ever went out to the mound. Then he promptly got three strikeouts in the bottom of the inning.
The lead grew to 5-0 after two, even though a base-running blunder may have cost the Royals even more. Then Young gave up two in the third, making it 5-2 Kansas City. He had an easy fourth, and it was 5-2 into the bottom of the fifth.
Young got two outs and then gave up a single, which brought Donaldson - probably the American League MVP when the award is announced next month - to the plate. Donaldson had mashed a Young pitch for a ground rule double in the two-run third, and that's probably what Yost was thinking.
And so he took Young out. One more out, and Young would have gotten the win. Instead, he finished with 4 2/3 innings, three hits, two runs, two walks and four strikeouts. Then four Royals relievers allowed one hit and no runs each the rest of the way.
Oh, and the KC offense added four in the seventh, three in the eighth and two in the ninth. Final, 14-2.
So Young got a no-decision.
If this had been a regular season game, there is no way the manager would have taken him out there. In a pivotal ALCS game, with the World Series looming and the memory of Donaldson's shot two innings earlier, then Yost made the change.
Was that the right move?
It depends. Even if Donaldson had hit the ball 20 miles, it still would only have been 5-4. And TigerBlog isn't a huge fan of going to the bullpen that early unless it's necessary.
Of course, TB isn't a fan of having relievers go one inning each either for that much of a game. All it takes is one to have a bad inning to change the game in the wrong direction.
On the other hand, scoring nine runs in the final three innings changes all of that.
Now it looks all the world like Young and Kansas City are going to make it to the World Series. They need to win just one of the final three.
TigerBlog has no idea if a Princeton player has ever played in the World Series before. He's going to have to check on that, unless he's overlooking someone completely obvious.
When the Mets-Cubs game began, TigerBlog got a text from his former colleague Yariv Amir, who said that this had to be the first time that two Ivy Leaguers started league championship series games on the same day. Chicago starter Kyle Hendricks is a Dartmouth grad.
Yariv is a huge Mets fan. He's not one of the bandwagon types that are coming out of the woodwork these days.
Yariv had a partial season ticket plan during the leanest of years for the team. He and Jon Kurian from the business office are definitely not bandwagon jumpers.
TigerBlog grew up a Mets fan. He went to Shea Stadium for the first time back in 1970 or so. He hasn't been a huge Mets fan for years though.
Yariv and Kurian have been. So has Jim Barlow, the men's soccer coach. He didn't want anyone spoiling the results of Mets games that he'd DVRd, even when the Mets were far, far away from contention.
Peter Farrell, the women's track and field coach, came in the other day wearing a Mets jacket. He claims to be a longtime Mets fan, and maybe he was, back all the way to 1969.
Still, in all of the time that TigerBlog has known Farrell, he's never once mentioned the Mets. So, uh, yeah, TB believes you Peter.
Yariv, in addition to being a big Mets fan, is a former baseball contact at Princeton. So would he root for Young or New York if the World Series becomes a matchup between the two?
Yariv said the Mets. So did Kurian.
TigerBlog would have to go with Young, one of his all-time favorite Princeton athletes, back when he played basketball and baseball here. It's hard to think that he's 36 now, a veteran of more than a decade in the Major Leagues.
He would have figured out a way to get one more out.
Oh well. He didn't get the win. He may get a bigger prize though.
A chance to pitch in the World Series.
Young, the 2003 Princeton grad, was the starting pitcher for the Kansas City Royals in Game 4 of the American League Championship Series yesterday afternoon. This wasn't just any start. This was the pivotal game of the series, with KC up two games to one over the Toronto Blue Jays, who had won Game 3 at home Sunday night after the Royals won the first two.
As it turned out, Kansas City would win Game 4 by a 14-2 count over the Blue Jays to go up 3-1 and move within a game of a second straight World Series.
Yost, though, had no way of knowing his team had nine more runs in the tank when he had a decision to make about Young in the fifth.
Kansas City had scored four times in the top of the first, before Young ever went out to the mound. Then he promptly got three strikeouts in the bottom of the inning.
The lead grew to 5-0 after two, even though a base-running blunder may have cost the Royals even more. Then Young gave up two in the third, making it 5-2 Kansas City. He had an easy fourth, and it was 5-2 into the bottom of the fifth.
Young got two outs and then gave up a single, which brought Donaldson - probably the American League MVP when the award is announced next month - to the plate. Donaldson had mashed a Young pitch for a ground rule double in the two-run third, and that's probably what Yost was thinking.
And so he took Young out. One more out, and Young would have gotten the win. Instead, he finished with 4 2/3 innings, three hits, two runs, two walks and four strikeouts. Then four Royals relievers allowed one hit and no runs each the rest of the way.
Oh, and the KC offense added four in the seventh, three in the eighth and two in the ninth. Final, 14-2.
So Young got a no-decision.
If this had been a regular season game, there is no way the manager would have taken him out there. In a pivotal ALCS game, with the World Series looming and the memory of Donaldson's shot two innings earlier, then Yost made the change.
Was that the right move?
It depends. Even if Donaldson had hit the ball 20 miles, it still would only have been 5-4. And TigerBlog isn't a huge fan of going to the bullpen that early unless it's necessary.
Of course, TB isn't a fan of having relievers go one inning each either for that much of a game. All it takes is one to have a bad inning to change the game in the wrong direction.
On the other hand, scoring nine runs in the final three innings changes all of that.
Now it looks all the world like Young and Kansas City are going to make it to the World Series. They need to win just one of the final three.
TigerBlog has no idea if a Princeton player has ever played in the World Series before. He's going to have to check on that, unless he's overlooking someone completely obvious.
When the Mets-Cubs game began, TigerBlog got a text from his former colleague Yariv Amir, who said that this had to be the first time that two Ivy Leaguers started league championship series games on the same day. Chicago starter Kyle Hendricks is a Dartmouth grad.
Yariv is a huge Mets fan. He's not one of the bandwagon types that are coming out of the woodwork these days.
Yariv had a partial season ticket plan during the leanest of years for the team. He and Jon Kurian from the business office are definitely not bandwagon jumpers.
TigerBlog grew up a Mets fan. He went to Shea Stadium for the first time back in 1970 or so. He hasn't been a huge Mets fan for years though.
Yariv and Kurian have been. So has Jim Barlow, the men's soccer coach. He didn't want anyone spoiling the results of Mets games that he'd DVRd, even when the Mets were far, far away from contention.
Peter Farrell, the women's track and field coach, came in the other day wearing a Mets jacket. He claims to be a longtime Mets fan, and maybe he was, back all the way to 1969.
Still, in all of the time that TigerBlog has known Farrell, he's never once mentioned the Mets. So, uh, yeah, TB believes you Peter.
Yariv, in addition to being a big Mets fan, is a former baseball contact at Princeton. So would he root for Young or New York if the World Series becomes a matchup between the two?
Yariv said the Mets. So did Kurian.
TigerBlog would have to go with Young, one of his all-time favorite Princeton athletes, back when he played basketball and baseball here. It's hard to think that he's 36 now, a veteran of more than a decade in the Major Leagues.
He would have figured out a way to get one more out.
Oh well. He didn't get the win. He may get a bigger prize though.
A chance to pitch in the World Series.
Tuesday, October 20, 2015
4-0-0 vs. 4-0-0
TigerBlog's colleague Andrew Borders was thinking way ahead.
What if, Andrew asked, Princeton and Harvard both finish 6-0-1 in Ivy League women's soccer? Then what?
TigerBlog believes that in that case, there would be a random draw to determine who would get the Ivy League's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.
Of course, there is a long, long way to go until that point. Well, maybe a long way.
TigerBlog will say that with three weeks to go in the regular season, it's looking very much like it'll be Princeton or Harvard with the automatic bid. Not that TB would ever count anyone out before the end, but yeah, it looks like it'll be one of those two.
Princeton and Harvard are both 4-0-0 in the league. In Ivy soccer, like the EPL, you get three points for a win and one for a tie, so Princeton and Harvard have 12 points each. Cornell is next with seven. Columbia is next with four.
In other words, should someone win the Princeton-Harvard game, then every other team other than Cornell would be eliminated. The Big Red could still win the last three to get to 16 points, meaning there's a chance that 15 wouldn't be enough. And TigerBlog will get back to the Big Red shortly.
In the meantime, Princeton and Harvard have basically run away from the field here. And the teams meet Saturday in Cambridge (start time is 1:30).
So that's a big game obviously.
Princeton has won nine straight to get to 11-3 on the year under first-year head coach Sean Driscoll. The Tigers are led by the 1-2 scoring punch of Tyler Lussi and Mimi Asom, who were honored again by the league with its weekly awards.
Lussi was the Player of the Week, something she's done three times this year and six times in her career. Both of those tie all-time league records.
Still only a junior, Lussi has 39 career goals, 11 of which have come this year. With one more, she'll become the third player in Princeton soccer history - male or female - to reach the 40-goal mark, leaving her behind only Esmeralda Negron (47) and Linda DeBoer (41).
Asom was the Rookie of the Week for the fifth time this year, already a league record. She has nine goals, leaving her three away from DeBoer's freshman record (and one from Lussi for second). In other words, if you figure Lussi has a great chance of catching Negron, then you also have to figure that Asom one day will have a shot at whatever number Lussi puts up.
Lussi and Asom rank 1-2 in the Ivy League in points and points per game. Lussi leads the league in goals and goals per game, and Asom is tied for second in goals and third in goals per game.
For that matter, Lussi is 14th in goals per game and 18th in points per game in Division I .
Records and stats, though, aren't the story this week. No, this time it's Harvard.
Only once since 2007 has Princeton or Harvard not been the Ivy League champion. In the last 22 years, only Princeton (twice) and Harvard (three times) have gone 7-0-0 in Ivy women's soccer.
One thing the Ivy League has never had is a tie at 6-0-1. Should Princeton and Harvard tie this Saturday, that would keep the possibility of that outcome alive.
Princeton finishes its league season with Cornell at home and Penn away. Harvard finishes with Dartmouth home and Yale away.
Oh yeah, about the Big Red? Well, give TB another minute.
Princeton has the highest scoring offense in the league, with 2.71 goals per game. That actually ranks the Tigers sixth in Division I.
You know what Harvard has yet to do in its four league games though? Allow a goal. Harvard has four Ivy League shutouts in four outings.
And Cornell?
The Big Red is 2-1-1 in the league but 9-1-4 overall. Cornell is unbeaten outside of the league.
And more than that, Cornell has allowed only three goals in 14 goals. Three goals, 14 games. That's ridiculous. TigerBlog had to check that a few times to make sure he was seeing it right.
Of course, two of those goals came against Harvard in a 2-0 game. The other goal came in a 2-1 win over Wagner, in the 10th game of the year. In other words, Cornell did not allow a goal in its first nine games. Oh, and all four of the team's ties are 0-0.
So that's lingering out there for Princeton. But first, there's Harvard.
And that's 4-0-0 against 4-0-0.
That's a big one.
What if, Andrew asked, Princeton and Harvard both finish 6-0-1 in Ivy League women's soccer? Then what?
TigerBlog believes that in that case, there would be a random draw to determine who would get the Ivy League's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.
Of course, there is a long, long way to go until that point. Well, maybe a long way.
TigerBlog will say that with three weeks to go in the regular season, it's looking very much like it'll be Princeton or Harvard with the automatic bid. Not that TB would ever count anyone out before the end, but yeah, it looks like it'll be one of those two.
Princeton and Harvard are both 4-0-0 in the league. In Ivy soccer, like the EPL, you get three points for a win and one for a tie, so Princeton and Harvard have 12 points each. Cornell is next with seven. Columbia is next with four.
In other words, should someone win the Princeton-Harvard game, then every other team other than Cornell would be eliminated. The Big Red could still win the last three to get to 16 points, meaning there's a chance that 15 wouldn't be enough. And TigerBlog will get back to the Big Red shortly.
In the meantime, Princeton and Harvard have basically run away from the field here. And the teams meet Saturday in Cambridge (start time is 1:30).
So that's a big game obviously.
Princeton has won nine straight to get to 11-3 on the year under first-year head coach Sean Driscoll. The Tigers are led by the 1-2 scoring punch of Tyler Lussi and Mimi Asom, who were honored again by the league with its weekly awards.
Lussi was the Player of the Week, something she's done three times this year and six times in her career. Both of those tie all-time league records.
Still only a junior, Lussi has 39 career goals, 11 of which have come this year. With one more, she'll become the third player in Princeton soccer history - male or female - to reach the 40-goal mark, leaving her behind only Esmeralda Negron (47) and Linda DeBoer (41).
Asom was the Rookie of the Week for the fifth time this year, already a league record. She has nine goals, leaving her three away from DeBoer's freshman record (and one from Lussi for second). In other words, if you figure Lussi has a great chance of catching Negron, then you also have to figure that Asom one day will have a shot at whatever number Lussi puts up.
Lussi and Asom rank 1-2 in the Ivy League in points and points per game. Lussi leads the league in goals and goals per game, and Asom is tied for second in goals and third in goals per game.
For that matter, Lussi is 14th in goals per game and 18th in points per game in Division I .
Records and stats, though, aren't the story this week. No, this time it's Harvard.
Only once since 2007 has Princeton or Harvard not been the Ivy League champion. In the last 22 years, only Princeton (twice) and Harvard (three times) have gone 7-0-0 in Ivy women's soccer.
One thing the Ivy League has never had is a tie at 6-0-1. Should Princeton and Harvard tie this Saturday, that would keep the possibility of that outcome alive.
Princeton finishes its league season with Cornell at home and Penn away. Harvard finishes with Dartmouth home and Yale away.
Oh yeah, about the Big Red? Well, give TB another minute.
Princeton has the highest scoring offense in the league, with 2.71 goals per game. That actually ranks the Tigers sixth in Division I.
You know what Harvard has yet to do in its four league games though? Allow a goal. Harvard has four Ivy League shutouts in four outings.
And Cornell?
The Big Red is 2-1-1 in the league but 9-1-4 overall. Cornell is unbeaten outside of the league.
And more than that, Cornell has allowed only three goals in 14 goals. Three goals, 14 games. That's ridiculous. TigerBlog had to check that a few times to make sure he was seeing it right.
Of course, two of those goals came against Harvard in a 2-0 game. The other goal came in a 2-1 win over Wagner, in the 10th game of the year. In other words, Cornell did not allow a goal in its first nine games. Oh, and all four of the team's ties are 0-0.
So that's lingering out there for Princeton. But first, there's Harvard.
And that's 4-0-0 against 4-0-0.
That's a big one.
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