Officially Proclaimed

The 1919 Princeton football team opened its season with a home game against Trinity.

In fact, the 1919 Tigers were home for the first six games of their seven game season, and the only away game all year was a trip to Yale for the final game. TigerBlog supposes that's what you did back then, when you had a five-year old jewel called Palmer Stadium.

TB looked up that game in the Daily Princetonian archives, which are an awesome tool, by the way. If you've never seen them, click HERE to check them out (they go all the way back to 1842).

From the Prince, TB learned that the game had a fifty-cent admission charge, that it rained the day before and that both teams were playing for the first time since welcoming back players who had been serving in World War I. There were two things that weren't referenced at all.

First, this was the first game Princeton would play after the death of Hobey Baker 10 months earlier in France. Baker, of course, was a legendary football and hockey player at Princeton, and he is in the Hall of Fame for both sports.

Second, it didn't make any reference to the fact that this was the start of the 50th anniversary season for Princeton football, after the Tigers and Rutgers had played in Game 1 of college football back on Nov. 6 1869. Hey, if 2019 was the 150th anniversary season, then 1919 was the 50th anniversary.

Was it just not that big a deal? Was a statement on how sportswriting worked back then? Was it referenced anywhere during the season?

Princeton defeated Trinity 28-0 that year and then followed that with wins over Lafayette and Rochester, losses to Colgate and West Virginia, a tie with Harvard and then a win over Yale to end the year at 4-2-1.

This past season, Princeton played three of those teams - Lafayette, Harvard and Yale. 

The Prince pregame story for that Yale game - the 43rd in the series - centered on the size advantage on the lines that Yale had. What were the average weights on those lines?

For Yale, it was 191 pounds. For Princeton it was 183.

Forget the comparison to this year's offensive and defensive lines. Princeton's kickers this past year - placekicker Tavish Rice and punter Will Powers, both of whom were second-team All-Ivy League selections - both stand 6-2 and average 205 pounds.

Rice and Powers were two of Princeton's 14 All-Ivy League selections this year, including first-team picks Jeremiah Tyler (linebacker), Delan Stallworth (cornerback) and Alex Deters (center).

The 2019 Princeton Tigers finished 8-2, winning their first seven to run their winning streak to 17 straight games. They finished third in the league at 5-2, a game back of co-champs Dartmouth and Yale, but Princeton came very, very close to snagging a share of that championship on the final day of the season.

This was also the 150th anniversary of that first game, and that anniversary was celebrated all season. Princeton-Dartmouth was played in Yankee Stadium as part of that celebration, and that game was a huge party for the very loyal Tiger alumni group.

The Empire State Building was lit up on the actual anniversary in orange (for Princeton) and red (for Rutgers). Princeton wore 150th patches on its uniforms and had that logo on its field all season.

And yesterday, there was another honor and another piece of the celebration added in. Princeton and Rutgers were honored at the New Jersey Statehouse in Trenton for their participation in the first game and for the anniversary.

The official proclamation was introduced by state assemblyman Erik Peterson, and Princeton and Rutgers were both well-represented yesterday. Princeton's contigent included head coach Bob Surace and sophomore wide receiver Dylan Classi.

The proclamation spoke to New Jersey's roots in the sport's origins and commemorated the two schools. It was a very nice moment for both programs.

The highlights were the proclamation and what happened in the room off of the floor a few minutes before, when Surace met with the Elizabeth Little League team that was also honored and posed for a great picture with the boys, all of whom were wearing their Mid-Atlantic shirts. 

It's hard to sum up the entirety of Princeton football in a few sentences, but here is some of what Surace said in his short remarks:

Since 1869, Princeton has produced 28 national championship teams, 12 Ivy League championship teams, 72 first-team All-Americans, 44 NFL players and even one Heisman Trophy winner, and generations of Tigers have taken the lessons they’ve learned as football players at Princeton and gone on to do great things in fields like medicine, law, the military, education and business – all while living lives of service and loyalty to their communities. This lineage traces its way all the way back to that first game, as Princeton’s captain that day, William Gummere, went on to spend more than 30 years as the Chief Justice of the New Jersey State Supreme Court.

Yeah. It's certainly been quite a run for the last 150 years of Tiger football.