The Poe-Kazmaier Trophy

TigerBlog was on his bike in Sandy Hook Saturday afternoon when he got an email from Gary Walters.

It was a perfect afternoon to ride and even nicer at the shore. There wasn't much wind. The sun was shining. The salt water smell off the water brought the usual smile to TB's face.

And of course it was warm, very warm for late November.

What did Gary's email say? It said exactly what TB was thinking.

Essentially, it pointed out that in a non-virus world, Princeton would have been playing Penn in football in the final game of the season. 

Beyond that, TB had already had the same thought that Gary had referenced in his email. The weather on each of the last 10 Saturdays had been nearly perfect for football. 

It just wasn't meant to be in 2020.

With the end of the season, that meant that yesterday would have been the football banquet. What would have been the mood? 

Celebratory after a championship? Appreciative of a good season that just fell a little short? Disappointment? 

TB will guess that given how 2020 figured to unfold for the Tigers, there would be no room for disappointment.

Would linebacker Jeremiah Tyler have won the Poe-Kazmaier Trophy as the team MVP again? Tyler shared the award last year with Kevin Davidson.

Had Tyler won, he would have become only the fifth Princeton football player to win the program's top award more than once. The other three?

Two are easy: John Lovett (2016, 2018) and Dave Patterson (1994, 1995). Who were the other two?

Hint: One was in the two years after Patterson won the award, while the other was long before that.

The 1998 Poe-Kazmaier Trophy was shared by Dan Swingos and Jim Salters. Swingos was the team captain that season, which was the first of the new Princeton Stadium.

TB last spoke to Swingos in the days after 9/11. Back then, Swingos, a defensive lineman, was in the second tower of the World Trade Center to be hit, and he told a harrowing tale of getting out alive, and what he encountered along the way.

As for Salters, he was a linebacker, a slightly undersized one at that. He also was a great player. 

Salters was featured the other day in Steve Verbit's #The40 series on Twitter:

#The40
”A spirited, determined All-Ivy 🐅 teammate that was always willing to lay it all on the line”
- 🐅 Captain Dan Swingos '99

Jim Salters '99, is currently the CO-Founder & CEO of Accelerators.#TheFreakShow l #NA22AUBound pic.twitter.com/E3kKVOQy42

— Stephen Verbit (@SVerbit) November 20, 2020

When TB saw that tweet, he immediately texted Princeton head coach Bob Surace to tell him that in TB's opinion, Jim Salters is the most underrated Princeton football player he's seen in all the years he's been around the team. 

Salters was seemingly in on every play. He played with so much joy, and he was a very humble, very soft-spoken player. 

TB hasn't spoken to him in years. It was good to see him in Verb's tweet.

Oh, and the other two-time Poe-Kazmaier Trophy winners? There was Tim Greene, in 1996 and 1997. Another linebacker. And there was Donold Lourie in 1920 and 1921. TB never saw him play.

Here's an interesting fact: Princeton's first two Directors of Athletics (Ken Fairman in 1933 and Royce Flippen in 1955) were Poe-Kazmaier winners.

When TB was looking back at the list of previous winners of the Poe-Kazmaier Trophy, he was struck by something pretty wild.

Jason Garrett won the award in 1988. The next quarterback who won? How about Jeff Terrell in 2006. That's 18 years between having a quarterback win the team MVP award?

In fact, from the time Garrett  won the award in 1988 until Lovett won it for the first time in 2016, a span of 28 years, Princeton has as many offensive linemen win the award as QBs. The offensive lineman was Dennis Norman in 2000.

Anyway, the 2020 season would have ended on a perfect Saturday afternoon for football. It would have been Princeton-Penn on Powers Field Saturday.

And then there would have been the banquet yesterday.

And, of course, in a perfect world?

The weekend would have ended with a bonfire.