Oh So Close

Did you see the crash at the Tour de France the other day? 

It started when a woman who was holding a sign stepped out onto the course, apparently to get her picture taken. In doing so, she unwittingly got in the way of one of the riders, who then started a chain reaction that left at least two riders unable to continue for the rest of the month.

You can see it for yourself here:

Huge crash on stage 1 of Le Tour de France today.

pic.twitter.com/yQpKHN2Jg1

— MUHQ News (@MUHQNews) June 26, 2021

That was nasty. The riders were lucky that more of them weren't seriously hurt.

TigerBlog can tell you that even at the speed at which he rides, which isn't anywhere near what the riders at the Tour de France do, there is almost no reaction time if some unexpected obstacle comes along. He was riding the other day when a car came over a hill and was across the center line by a few inches. The driver quickly went back to the other side, but TB figured that if the car came at him, there was absolutely nothing he could have done to get out of the way in time.

TB cannot imagine what it must be like to see the Tour de France riders up close. He's often overtaken by riders who are much faster than he is on the roads where he goes, and they seem like they're going lightning quick. What must the professionals be like?

On one of TB's recent rides, a woman rode up next to him. She and her husband live down the street from TB, and the two rode together for awhile. She can ride faster than TB, and it was something of a sprint for him to keep up with her - for about 15 miles. He was wiped out after that.

The women is a graduate of Butler, in Indianapolis. When she first mentioned that to TB, the first thing he said was the first thing everyone must say to her when they meet her: "It would have been amazing if that shot went in."

The shot he refers to, of course, was from Gordon Hayward, whose potential game-winning shot from half court against Duke in the 2010 NCAA men's basketball championship game hit the backboard and rim and did just about everything except go in. Had it fallen, it would have easily been the greatest moment in college basketball history. 

TB was trying to think of something similar in Princeton athletic history. It can't just be a buzzer-beater that didn't fall. It has to be something where the play itself would have been a one in a hundred play, and it would have to have been at the perfect moment.

The closest TB came to thinking of one was the ending of the 2002 NCAA men's lacrosse championship game. Princeton trailed Syracuse 13-12 with around five seconds to go. It would be Princeton ball, off a restart, just across midfield.

The ball was in the stick of Sean Hartofilis as play started again, and as TB remembers it, he almost made something huge happen. Maybe if there had been another second or two, which was the same as with Hayward.

That 2002 championship game, in which Hartofilis scored four times, saw Princeton fall behind 12-7 before rallying. The Tigers had won the 2001 title game against Syracuse in overtime, and Cuse had beaten Princeton in the 2000 game as well. 

Hartofilis, for his part, is one of the great clutch players NCAA men's lacrosse has ever seen. When he graduated, he was eighth all-time in NCAA tournament goals, and he seemed to be at his best when the stakes were biggest. 

When Hartofilis graduated in 2003, he ranked third all-time in goals in a career at Princeton with 126, trailing only Jesse Hubbard (163) and Chris Massey (146). Michael MacDonald, who had 132, is the only player in the last 18 years who has caught Hartofilis.

He's gone onto a career in movie making. His wife Liza, a Princeton women's lacrosse alum and also an NCAA champion, is a doctor who was featured as part of the "Tiger Heroes" series.

As for Sean Hartofilis, he had something of a Gordon Hayward moment long before Hayward did. 

Of course, Hartofilis, an all-time Tiger great, is known far more for the ones that ended up in the goal.