Almost An Anniversary

Were it not for the COVID-19 situation, the fall teams would be heading into the heart of their Ivy League seasons.

TigerBlog has said that he was not going to be spending the whole fall doing a bunch of "what ifs," because what would be the point.

While he's not writing those, though, he certainly hasn't gotten past the whole idea that there are no sports currently going on. For him, this is the first fall in nearly 40 years where he has not had games to cover. 

That is especially true on Saturdays. They're just weird now.

As he did all spring, he finds himself spending his Saturdays thinking about where he would have been and what he would have been doing. Last week, it was to have been the Ivy opener at Columbia. 

Speaking of Princeton football, TigerBlog has a good Bob Surace story. TB wrote earlier this week about the novels that he and Judd Garrett have published.

TB didn't mention that the lead character in his story is a fictional member of the Class of 1990 named Sam Wainwright. As he was writing it, TB needed to know what the Class of 1990 Reunions jacket looked like, so he texted Surace, a member of the class. 

All he said was that he needed a picture of Surace's Reunions jacket. And about 90 seconds later, Surace texted him back a picture of it, without ever asking why. It was pretty classic Surace. Happy to help. Literally no questions asked.

Anyway, the whole "what would TB have been doing today" thing will be even more acute tomorrow.

Tomorrow was supposed to be the day that Princeton played football at Army. Considering that the weather tomorrow in West Point will be sunny with highs in the mid-70s, yeah, it would have been a perfect day for the game.

TigerBlog has never seen a football game at Army. He was definitely looking forward to this:

Hopefully that game will be able to be played at some point in the near future. 

Speaking of the near future, there is something that definitely will be happening one week from tomorrow. It'll be the 50th anniversary of the first time that women competed in intercollegiate athletics for Princeton.

It was on Oct. 17, 1970, that Margie Gengler (now Margie Gengler Smith) and Helena Novakova represented Princeton in the Eastern Intercollegiate Tennis Championships in New Paltz. Not to give away the whole story, but it went well.

There is all kinds of content on its way from Princeton Athletics about the anniversary and about the first 50 years of women's athletics. The addition of women into athletics at Princeton is as big as anything else that has ever happened for the Tigers, and the women's teams have been a model of success and a representation of Princeton's Athletic values from Day 1.

Which, of course, was 50 years ago next Saturday.

TigerBlog has been spending most his time these days writing a book on the history of women's athletics at Princeton, and he's really happy with how it's progressing. He's very much looking forward to the finished product, which will be available in the spring, in conjunction with the first actual team event, which was a women's tennis match against Penn on April 12, 1970.

In addition to the book, there will be all kinds of additional information in the form of social media, written stories on the webpage, podcasts and videos. And, of course, here on TigerBlog.

You'll be able to start to see all of this beginning next week, including some book excerpts.

There really are no shortage of stories to tell, beginning with the way that athletics for women began at Princeton – fueled by the drive of the first female administrator, Merrily Dean Baker, about whom everyone TB has spoken with has raved – and continuing through the present day. 

TigerBlog's research has already taken him to so many impressive women who have represented Princeton as coaches and athletes, and their stories have been fascinating and inspiring. He still has many, many more to talk to as well. It began with a trip to Florida in January to meet with Baker herself, and it's continued since then.

It's an anniversary well worth celebrating.