Almost Time

TigerBlog figured there'd be a day this summer when he desperately needed a topic and that's when he'd tell you about the thing that's really been messing with his head lately.

The paper towel dispenser in the D level bathroom in Jadwin Gym.

And yet he never got the chance. Something else always came up to discuss, and the paper towels had to wait their turn.

Now, as the athletic year for 2017-18 is two days away, the Princeton Athletics summer is basically over. TigerBlog has something he wants to talk about today anyway, but hey, might as well get that whole paper towel thing out there first.

So there's a paper towel dispenser in a lot of bathrooms. You pull the towel down and tear it where it's perforated. You've done this a million times.

What's the common denominator? Each paper towel is the exact same size.

In D level, the paper towels come out at different sizes. Some are huge. Some are small. It's like the random paper towel machine.

The part that's confusing is that they're all perforated. Aren't they perforated in advance? Or do they go through a piece of the dispenser that perforates them there? And if they do, why wouldn't they all be the same size anyway?

It's been a very confusing summer for TB. The paper towels, you know. They're messing with TB. They're probably laughing at him every time he goes in there. Hey, let's make one towel huge and the next one tiny. That'll show the humans.

Anyway, that's the paper towels.

With the start of a new athletic year, what else would TB want to share but paper towels and Princeton men's basketball?

There was a video posted yesterday that counts down the top 10 plays for the Tigers from the 2016-17 season.

Want to see it? Click HERE.

The video isn't really about which play was No. 4 versus No. 7 or so. It's more about another look back at the extraordinary season that was 2016-17 for Princeton.

The Tigers went 16-0 in the league a year ago, something no other team had ever been asked to do, what with the Ivy tournament. The video recounts just how close Princeton came to not making it past the semifinal at fourth-place Penn, but then you can see all the major steps to the final and then the NCAA tournament.

Yes, but now it's time for 2017-18.

There was a story on goprincetontigers.com posted Monday that previewed the first game of the year, the women's soccer game at home Friday night between Princeton and Monmouth. In a blink, it appears, another summer has zoomed past.

Monmouth leads the all-time series with Princeton 9-4, but most of those games were played long ago. The teams have only played twice in the last 15 years, and Monmouth has never played on Myslik Field at Roberts Stadium.

The Tigers feature junior Mimi Asom, who already ranks 13th all-time in goals scored at Princeton with 21. Only five Princeton players have ever reached 30 for a career, so it won't take that many more for Asom to reach some really rare company.

Princeton is also at Villanova Sunday.

Playing games again. Wow. It's hard to believe.

There was another story on the website yesterday about the field hockey team, about how the Tigers are ranked eighth in the preseason. Princeton went to the NCAA Final Four a year ago in the first year with head coach Carla Tagliente and assistant coach Dina Rizzo.

Want to talk about tough scheduling? Princeton is ranked eighth in the preseason. How many teams ranked ahead of Princeton do the Tigers play this season?

How about all seven. And it begins with No. 1 North Carolina, coming up on Sept. 1 (which is a week from Friday) on Bedford Field. Wait, a week from Friday is September already?

What the heck?

For the record the other top seven teams Princeton will play are: No. 2 Duke (Sept. 17), No. 3 - the defending NCAA champ - Delaware (Sept. 3), No. 4 UConn (Oct. 8), No. 5 Syracuse (Oct. 1), No. 6 Maryland (Sept. 19) and No. 7 Penn State (Sept. 10).

The Penn State and UConn games are at home. The Delaware game is in Newark on Sept. 3, which means that Princeton opens its season with the two teams who played in the NCAA final a year ago.

Ambitious. But it's also good to challenge a team with high expectations that way. It's part of what has always made Princeton field hockey so special.

Anyway, if you have summer plans that you haven't gotten to yet, you better get on them. You're running out of time.

How is that even possible?