Court Report

For the second time this week, TigerBlog has had someone text him about a bucket list accomplishment.

This time, it was his cousin Nicole who texted him. It started out with her saying "guess what I did" and then sending this picture:

She won and everything. Okay, maybe she didn't win. But she did finish, which is very impressive.

Then she said this: "It was amazing just running through the boroughs, all the different ethnicities and DJ/bands in every neighborhood cheering you on with signs."

And then: "It was on my bucket list."

Congrats to Nicole. TigerBlog didn't even realize she was a runner. Nicole says that she's pretty happy, especially since she was always picked last in gym class as a kid.

As for TB, he has a very short bucket list. Like, maybe five things or so. Running a marathon is not one of them.

He has no way of knowing this for sure, because he's never asked her about this, but his sense is that Courtney Banghart has in fact at some point of her life run a marathon. TB can ask her about this next week when the two of them sit down for Episode 2 of the weekly podcast that debuted yesterday.

You can listen to it HERE.

It's called "The Court Report." That's the whole Courtney/basketball court thing. Pretty clever, no?

The first episode talks about a bunch of subjects, including Courtney's work with USA Basketball this past summer, the coming season, her kids' Halloween's costumes, the alumni base, why her freshmen will be wearing uniform numbers 1, 2, 3 and 4.

Oh, and there was also the part of the conversation about how the basketball season is a marathon here. It starts on the first day of classes, and it keeps going well into March if things go right. TB asked Courtney about the mental part of that, as well as the physical part, of trying to stay strong throughout the grind.

Think about it. The football season lasts 10 weeks. The basketball season lasts 17 or so; the hockey season is even longer than that. 

The Tigers will host George Washington at 6:30 tomorrow on Carril Court in the season opener. Princeton is looking for its ninth straight postseason appearance under Banghart (six NCAAs, two NITs), who has built the program into one of the models in all of women's hoops.

Think about it.  

The game tonight starts things out, a little less than two weeks before Thanksgiving. The plan is to be playing at your best, and most important, around St. Patrick's Day. That's a lot.

As for the on-court product, this will be Year 2 for Bella Alarie, who like Courtney had experience with USA Basketball this past summer. Alarie had an unbelievable freshman year on both ends of the court, and she will now be one of the leaders - along with senior captains Leslie Robinson and Tia Weledji, who played for the national team in Cameroon over the summer - of a team whose four freshmen figure to also make an immediate impact.

If you want to see more about the international basketball experience of the player and coach, click HERE for a video that TB's colleague Cody Chrusciel put together.  

When TB watched the video, he forgot that Banghart had gone to Italy to watch Alarie play for Team USA (at the World U19 Championships). You can tell by Alarie's comments as she discusses it how much it meant to her to have her coach there.

The start of women's basketball season is also the start of a really busy weekend for Princeton Athletics. And a really busy Friday, for that matter. 

In addition to women's basketball, there will also be the NCAA women's soccer game against Monmouth and the women's hockey regular season game against RPI, all of which start at 7. Nothing like a little crossover, right?

Hey, there are actually nine events tomorrow alone. That's an unusually busy Friday.

The women's volleyball team will be playing this weekend for at least a share of the Ivy title. The men's and women's cross country teams will be running tomorrow at Lehigh in the NCAA regionals. The men's hockey team is on the road. 

For that matter, so is the men's basketball team, which opens its season at Butler Sunday night, closing out the busy weekend.

TB will have more on all of those things tomorrow. He doesn't have to throw everything at you today.

It's a marathon, after all, not a sprint.