September Hockey

TigerBlog is not a fan of open heights. Not in the least.

One of his proudest moments came on the men's lacrosse international trip in 2016, when he summoned all his courage to do the zipline from Spain into Portugal over the Rio Guadiana. Thinking back on it, he's not sure how he did it.

At least on the zipline he was tethered to something, so even if his sweaty palms slipped off the metal apparatus he was holding, he presumably wouldn't have fallen.

That was not the case when it came to the hot air balloon TB saw the other day as it drifted leisurely through the late summer afternoon. Fortunately for TB, he was on the ground looking up at it, rather than the other way around.

He's never been in a hot air balloon. It would take a lot to get him to ever do this.

His guess is that the basket that you are in goes up to the upper chest, which in his mind greatly increases the chances of, well, you know. Splat.

He's not sure how high up the balloon was, but it was definitely high enough that TB was imaging cowering on the floor of the basket or something like that while everyone else was saying "wow, the view is amazing, come look."

In fact, TB looked it up and learned that balloons typically cruise between 500 and 1,000 feet. Also, the balloons can't really control their direction as much as they might want because of the wind, but the altitude is easy to maintain.

So yeah. Don't look up and expect to see TB in a balloon any time soon - even if he knows that yes, it's probably very safe. Probably.

The people in the balloon chose that ride over watching NFL football, since this was Sunday afternoon. As for TB, he's watched more college field hockey than college or pro football to date.

He hasn't had to watch any games to get the sense that it's not looking like it'll be a Dolphins-Giants Super Bowl this year. 

The Princeton field hockey team is 3-1, and all four of its games have been 1) decided by one goal and 2) against nationally ranked teams. This is something that bodes well for the Tigers as they chase a third Final Four in the last five years.

The next three games, by the way, are also against nationally ranked teams, and that stretch sees those three games played in a span of just five days. It starts with Friday evening's game against No. 21 Rutgers (6 pm start) and then continues with a home game Sunday against No. 3 UConn at noon and then a trip to No. 4 Maryland Tuesday (that game starts at 6 in College Park).

That's a pretty ambitious bit of scheduling, but it's also typical for Princeton field hockey. The Tigers, whose only loss so far was in the opening at No. 1 North Carolina, duck nobody. 

Princeton's most recent game was a 2-1 win over No. 17 Penn State, behind a pair of second-half goals by Clara Roth, after Penn State had taken the lead in the second quarter - field hockey is playing four quarters now.

And who scored the Penn State goal? TB was struck by the name - Abby Myers.

It's not spelled the same as the "other" Abby Meyers, the one that Princeton fans are much more familiar with, the one who is returning to the women's basketball team this year after a year off last year. The Penn State field hockey Abby Myers is from Wisconsin, by the way.

The Penn State Abby Myers got TB to think if he can remember another team who came here with an athlete who had the same name as a Princeton athlete, even if they spelled them differently. He'll come up with someone he's pretty sure.

The Tigers weekend began with a 4-3 win Friday afternoon over Albany. Roth, who had the two goals against Penn State, assisted on three goals in that game.

So far through four games, Princeton has had eight players who have at least one goal or one assist, which is pretty good balance throughout the lineup.

The upcoming stretch for Princeton will be challenging, and they'll also be the final games before the Ivy League opener at Dartmouth a week from Saturday, the 28th. That'll be the last game of the month of September.

Princeton, of course, is thinking about what it always thinks about this time of year - the games the team wants to play come November.