Michael Sowers, And An Ivy Opener In Football

If you were on goprincetontigers.com yesterday, perhaps you noticed TigerBlog's nearly 4,000 word feature on Sowers. If you didn't, you can read it HERE.

Of everything that TB has done here at Princeton and even with the changing world of how people consume information now (often in 280 characters or less), his favorite is still writing feature stories.

HERE'S another one, on football offensive linemen Brent Holder and Alex Deters. 

He was planning on writing one on Sowers in the spring before Inside Lacrosse approached him about the idea of doing one as fall ball is beginning. TB jumped at the chance.

The result is a story that he thinks pretty much tells you who Sowers is. As TB says in the story, he's the single most polite Princeton athlete he's ever met and he's the best lacrosse player he's ever seen.

That second statement is pretty bold, considering, he's seen, among others, Tom Schreiber, Jesse Hubbard, Kevin Lowe, Ryan Boyle, Scott Bacigalupo, David Morrow and Zack Currier. That group is either already in the Hall of Fame, about to be inducted or pretty much a lock to get there one day.

One thing TB didn't include in the story was that Sowers enters his senior year fifth in Division I history in points per game (6.07), which is the best total in 38 years, and that he already ranks 20th in Division I history in career assists. That's with a full season to go.

Should he match his point total of last year, he'd move up to seventh all-time.

Here's something else TB had to cut from the story: A few years ago, TigerBlog Jr. decided he wanted to put together a team to play in the Philadelphia summer box lacrosse league, and so he did. 

Then, the next year, he decided he wanted to win the league, so he went out and recruited Michael Sowers to be on his team. Box lacrosse is a very, very physical version of the sport.

This is what TigerBlog had to say to his son when he told him the news that Sowers was going to play with him, knowing that his son had already had four shoulder dislocations in his lacrosse career: "If you get hurt, I'm going to be mad. If Sowers gets hurt, I'm going to be really, really mad."

Fortunately, neither would end up getting hurt. And, along with Princeton's George Baughan, they would in fact win the championship that summer.

Hey, like he said, it was getting up around 4,000 words.

Speaking of TBJ, he used to play Pop Warner football before middle school, and he played on a team in fifth and sixth grade that include a kid named Dylan De Iuliis. That "kid" went on to become a linebacker on Colgate's NCAA quarterfinal team last year.

When TBJ's Pop Warner team would practice, TB clearly remembers Dylan's younger brother, who would have been in second or third grade at the time. He'd stand on the fringes of practices, hoping the ball would roll to him or something.

You could tell he wanted to be a football player.

These days, Dawson De Iuliis is a Princeton sophomore. He's also a defensive back and key member of the Tiger special teams.

Dawson's father, Dino, was one of the Pop Warner coaches back then. He also played football at Middle Tennessee State.

TB hadn't seen him in years before he saw him before the Bucknell game last week, along with his wife Kathy and Dylan. It was great to see them and catch up.

Next up for Dawson and his teammates is tomorrow's home game against Columbia, which kicks off tomorrow at 1 on Powers Field. It's the Ivy League opener for both.

Princeton has won 12 Ivy League titles. It has won its Ivy opener in all 12 of those seasons - and only three times this century has a team lost its Ivy opener and won at least a share of the title, with two of those a co-championship with the team it lost to in that first game.

Princeton is 2-0, averaging an FCS-best 52.5 points per game, with a quarterback (Kevin Davidson) who is completing 81 percent of his passes and four receivers who have combined for 10 TD receptions.

Columbia on the other hand has one of the best defenses in the FCS, a top five statistical defense. Columbia also has a great set of wide receivers with Ronald Smith and Josh Wainwright.

On top of that, Columbia is in the year after the year with all of the injuries. The Lions had a ton of injuries in 2018 and still went 6-4.

Like Princeton, Columbia is thinking about playing for an Ivy League championship next month.

There's no chance that you were at the first Princeton-Columbia game, since it was back in 1874. You might have been at the last Princeton-Columbia game in Princeton, two years ago, when the Lions stunned the Tigers on a 63-yard touchdown catch by Smith with 1:12 to play.

As TB said, kickoff is at 1. It should be a pretty good matchup.