Banquet Time

There was a time when TigerBlog used to attend the annual kickoff luncheon late in August at Trenton State College, which is now the College of New Jersey, which, of course, is what Princeton was at one time.

Each year, as the summer began to wind down, TB would find himself at this luncheon, where the president of the college used to say the same thing each time: "I predict each Trenton State team will go undefeated this year."

He was wrong, of course. It never happened, though that school has always been something of a Division III version of Princeton in terms of athletic success. 

Each time TB went to the event, he used to have the same two thoughts: 1) he's going to make the same joke about going undefeated and 2) another year has come and gone already?

In TB's modern era, such as it is, he's had the same feeling at a different annual event. Each year, as he walked to the Grad College or into Jadwin Gym for the Gary Walters Princeton Varsity Club Awards Banquet, he's had that same feeling.

Another year has come and gone? Really?

Through the years, the banquet has always been one of TB's favorite nights on the Princeton Athletics calendar. It's a great night of celebration of all the great things about Princeton, with a focus on the senior athletes of that particular year. 

They would gather together, with only a few days left until graduation. And they'd all say the same thing on that night: "I can't believe four years went by so fast."

TB has also always been struck by the difference between the banquet and the freshman orientation nearly four years earlier. They're both gatherings of the entire athletics class, but that's really the only similarity. 

At freshman orientation, they're wide-eyed, with no idea what to expect. At the banquet, they've all gone down the path of their athletic experience, with championships and individual honors for so many of them, and others who had to deal with adversities they never would have imagined when they started.

The adversity that the Class of 2021 had throw its way extends far beyond anything that was even remotely on anyone's radar on that day of freshman orientation. The Class of 2020 also had to deal with the COVID pandemic, and TB wrote this a year ago on the day of the banquet. 

That's an 8 pm start tonight. It's another chance to celebrate Princeton's great class of 2020, a class whose careers did not end in a manner any of them could have foreseen not that long ago - and a class who will be even stronger down the road for having gone through this.

Before any of that, though, they all deserve the recognition that awaits them tonight.

The same applies to the Class of 2021.

And so it will be another virtual banquet tonight. Again, it begins at 8. You can get more information about it HERE.

The virtual banquet will have the same elements of the in-person one. It celebrates the class, presents the major awards, has a few laughs and mostly reinforces the great spirit that defines Princeton Athletics.

As he did last year, TB wishes the absolute best to the members of this class. They have had their experiences disrupted, and they've powered through in a way that is inspirational. Just as he said last year, he's pretty sure the members of this class will draw on the way they handled things often as they move through their lives.

Princeton Athletics is about a lot of things. It's about competition and athletic excellence. It's about service. It's about learning lessons of leadership.

More than anything else, though, it's about education. That's what Princeton Athletics is all about. Education Through Athletics. It speaks to the life lessons that are learned through competing in intercollegiate athletics at Princeton.

They're not all easy lessons. They're not always the lessons they might want. But they are valuable, every one of them.

So tonight at 8 it's a time to celebrate the great Class of 2021. 

Every member of the class deserves to be saluted.