The Busy Weekend

Once again, the men's basketball game starts at 6 tomorrow night.

That would be the one against Yale. There was a late time change, made necessary last week, when the game was moved from 7 to 6.

TigerBlog has continued to mention the time change because he doesn't want anyone to show up at 7 and wonder why it's early in the second half. He figures if he mentions it enough here, and it's mentioned enough on social media and the web page, then that won't be the case.

In fact, the first announcement was made Sunday during the Princeton-Rowan game, when the audience consisted largely of people who might be interested in that sort of information. TB, though, wants to be able to say that everything was done to make sure nobody missed the start of the game.

And why was it moved?

The game is being televised by NBC Sports Philadelphia +. The short story is that there is Eagles Super Bowl coverage starting at 8, so the game had to either be moved to 6 or not shown live.

Ah, the Eagles.

The Princeton-Yale game will tip off roughly 48 hours before kickoff for the Super Bowl, between the Philadelphia Eagles and the New England Patriots. The local Princeton area is divided relatively equally between fans of the Eagles, Jets and Giants - with the occasional Redskins, Cowboys and Steelers fans thrown in.

If you're an Eagles fan, then you're simply ecstatic. Your team is in the Super Bowl for the third time, looking for its first win. You're all in.

If you're a Jets or Giants fan? The prevailing logic is that Giants fans will root for New England and Jets fans will root for the Eagles. That's probably right. If you're a Giants fan, you'd probably rather hold onto the notion that your team beat Belichick and Brady twice and nobody else ever has.

If you're a Jets fan, you hate all things New England.

TigerBlog? He'd like to see the Eagles win. It's part of his new anti-Giants thing, stemming from the firing of Princeton alum Marc Ross. And the general unrootable nature of the team right now.

Who will win? TB can see the Eagles do it. In fact, he'll pick Philadelphia, maybe in the 28-21 range?

Keep in mind he's never been right.

The Super Bowl, of course, means that the start of lacrosse season is here. For Princeton's men and women, it means the start of practice today. For Division I, it actually means there are real live regular season games starting today actually, with Vermont at Furman.

Princeton's lacrosse season opens two weeks from Saturday. That's both exciting and nuts at the same time.

In the meantime, there's this weekend, which is one of the busier ones you'll ever see. There are 36 events, featuring 15 different teams.

You can see the whole schedule HERE.

There is something for everyone on that list. 

Among the teams playing will be the men's hockey team, who is home this weekend against St. Lawrence tomorrow and Clarkson Saturday. Both of those games face-off at 7.

Princeton returned from its long first semester break Tuesday night with a huge win, beating Quinnipiac 5-3. Max Veronneau had three assists in that game, which isn't a hat trick. That would be goals. Are three assists some sort of slang thing? TB doesn't know.

He does know, even with his limited hockey experience, that Veronneau is a unique player. When you watch Princeton play, one of the things you're drawn to, or at least TB is drawn to, is the way Veronneau sees the play unfold and gets the puck to the right person.

The game against Quinnipiac was the third time in his career that Veronneau has had three assists. For the season he has a team-best 19 assists, to go along with nine goals, for a team-best 28 points. He's tied for second in the ECAC in assists, and his next assist will be the 50th of his career.

Princeton's win over Quinnipiac was huge, in that Princeton hadn't played in 17 days and, more than that, came into the game one point back of the Bobcats and two points back of Brown for eighth place. That's a big number, since the top eight teams get home ice in the ECAC playoffs.

St. Lawrence and Clarkson are right around .500 between them in the league, with St. Lawrence at 2-11-1 and Clarkson at 11-1-2. Princeton will make the long road trip to the two New York schools for the final weekend of the regular season, which means that four of the final eight games are against those two.

If the last two years have shown anything about Princeton men's hockey, it's that the Tigers can beat anyone and can take no one for granted. Last year showed that Princeton was playing its best down the stretch and into the ECAC playoffs, with a first round win over Colgate at Baker Rink.

So there's home men's hockey this weekend, and big games too. And a ton of other events, most of which are on the road.

Men's basketball is home, of course. Against Yale tomorrow and Brown Saurday.

And both games are at 6. But you already knew that.