Gotta See It

TigerBlog's glasses broke.

He went to clean them off, and snap. Instead of one pair of glasses, he now had two half-pairs of glasses.

TigerBlog can barely see without his glasses. He's not even sure what he's writing right now, since he's trying to get through this without them.

Wait, what did he just write?

TB first got glasses back in the 1990s, when he was in his 30s. He was getting headaches, and he went to an eye doctor. Turned out, his vision was really bad, and the headaches were coming from having to squint to see things clearly.

Since then, whenever he starts to get headaches again, it's sign that he needs to get a stronger prescription.

He's never had contact lenses. He doesn't think he'd be able to touch his eyeball, so why bother. Plus, glasses are so easy. Put them on. Take them off.

Until yesterday, he'd never had a pair that broke. He also doesn't have a backup pair, so getting new glasses is now high on his list of things to do this week.

He does remember when he first wore glasses. They made everything look clear, for starters.

He first got them on the night of a Princeton-Cornell men's basketball game at Jadwin Gym. He remembers this, well, clearly, and not just because he could see.

What really sticks out most for him about that night is that nobody noticed he was wearing glasses. He does remember one person who asked him if he had gotten new glasses, which was sort of an acknowledgement at least that something was different.

That person? Brian Earl, who was then a Princeton player and is, ironically enough, now the head coach of the men's basketball team at Cornell.

Actually, TB's glasses are now being held together by white tape, which 1) makes it at least a little easier to see and 2) makes him look ridiculous. Oh well.

In other news, remember Friday when TB mentioned that the "Top Gun" sequel was going to be released soon and he had seen the trailer? Well, guess what was on TV Saturday night on the IFC channel?

Yes. The original "Top Gun." When TB first got to it, most of the movie was over. Maverick had just decided to attend the graduation, and well, TB doesn't want to ruin it for you if you've never seen it, beyond pointing out that Mav does say "Talk to me Goose" in there.

And now everyone has to wait six more months for the sequel? C'mon now.

If you can watch movies over and over - knowing full well how they turn out - can you also watch games over and over, knowing how they'll turn out too?

TB has watched a bunch of old games of late, mostly old college football games, "old," in this case, defined as pretty much any time in the last 25 years. It's incredible, as TB has said before during this pandemic, how different games from even just a few years ago looked as compared to these days.

The best part of watching old college football game is seeing the players who ended up being impact NFL names. There's always a few in each game.

TB was scrolling through the listings the other day when he came upon a Princeton-Penn men's basketball game. This was on Comcast in Philadelphia, which meant it was going to be a game Penn won.

As suspected, it was. Comcast showed the 2018 game from the Palestra, which Penn won 76-70. As TB has documented a few times, finding a game that Mitch Henderson either played in or coached against Penn where Princeton lost can be difficult.

In fact, this was from January, after Princeton finished a season-sweep over the Quakers:

Princeton head coach Mitch Henderson has an extraordinary record against Penn, as both a player and coach. In fact, the win Friday was his 20th against the Quakers, against eight losses. That's a winning percentage of .714 in games in which he has either played or coached. If you take the rest of the series, all of the games without Mitch Henderson, then Penn leads 122-97, or a winning percentage for Princeton of .443.

Mitch is 15-4 against Penn as a head coach. The only other time Princeton ever won 15 of 19 against Penn in the entire history of the series was back in the late 1950s through most of the 1960s, when Princeton had a run of 21-5, with two 15-4 runs overlapping in there.

As for Penn since 2012, exactly one-quarter of its league losses in that time are against Mitch Henderson-coached teams. That's a pretty good run by Mitch.

As for the game from 2018, TB decided not to watch.

And now, until he gets his glasses fixed, he couldn't see it even if he wanted.

Pete Carril always talked about the importance of being able to "see it." TB hopes to return to being able to do so today.