Ivy Champs

Is there anybody at all out there who likes the first day after the clocks "fall back?"

If there is, TigerBlog has never met that person. If there is one thing that everyone seems to be able to agree on, it's that the first time it gets dark out before 5 pm stinks, right?

It was the middle of the night Saturday into Sunday when the clocks got turned back an hour. If the Princeton men's soccer team had turned the clocks back a full month, would things have looked remotely familiar?

There was a time this year when the men's soccer team was 0-2, not to mention 2-3, 3-4 and 4-5.

It seemed like Princeton spent the first month of the season in a win-one, lose-one situation. By late Saturday evening, that seemed like a long time ago. In fact, Saturday evening marked exactly one month since the Tigers had lost a game. They'd gone from 4-5-0 on Oct. 6 to champions on Nov. 6.

If you were looking for high drama with high stakes, then the men's soccer game at Penn Saturday night was perfect for you. Princeton went into the weekend unbeaten in the league with 15 points, while Yale was in second with 11, followed by Cornell at nine. With two games to play, Princeton had some margin of error to work with, but not much. 

For starters, Yale's game against Brown started earlier than Princeton's at Penn. Had Yale lost to Brown, Princeton would have been assured of no worse than a tie for the league title (Yale would have been eliminated but Cornell still could have tied) and even better would have meant the league's automatic NCAA bid (regardless if Cornell had ultimately tied Princeton in the standings).

Instead, Yale won that game 3-2, and suddenly the pressure was on the Tigers. The situation heading into the game at Penn was this: Win, and you're the outright Ivy champ and NCAA bound; lose or tie, and that would have set up this weekend's game at home against Yale as something of a championship game (Princeton would have needed only a win or tie, but still, that's a pretty high-pressure game).

As for the game at Penn, the Tigers had a miraculous turn of events in the first half, when a Penn chance at a mostly open net slammed off the post. Princeton had the better of play in the second half, but the score remained 0-0 as time went on ... and on ... and on. Both goalkeepers made big saves. Both defenses swarmed when the ball made it into the box. 

It was a riveting game to watch. In many ways, it reminded TB of a World Cup group stage game, where one team needed a win to move on to the knockout round and the other team simply wanted to prevent that from happening.

There were 25 minutes left, no score. Twenty minutes left, no score. Fifteen. Ten. Would this go to OT scoreless? Would it end that way? 

No, it wouldn't. A Princeton shot hit the crossbar, but fortuitously bounced to Walker Gillespie, whose header gently curled over the outstretched arms of the goalkeeper and found its ways into the corner of the net. It was 1-0 Princeton with five minutes left, and that's how it ended, touching off a massive celebration of the championship.

For Princeton, it is the second championship in three seasons. For Jim Barlow, it is is his sixth Ivy title as Princeton head coach.

Often the best teams are the ones that have the best culture, and in the case of Barlow and his staff (especially Associate Head Coach Steve Totten), building culture is a strength. Barlow is a model for what a head coach in the Ivy League should be, with players who develop as individuals both as athletes and people and teams that learn all of the lessons that "Education Through Athletics" represents.

That doesn't mean they win championships every year. It does mean that they run a high-quality program every year.

This year, that has resulted in another Ivy title. Princeton is now 11-5-0 overall and 6-0-0 in the Ivy League heading into that final regular season game against Yale, with the NCAA tournament to follow.

The 1-0 win over Penn ensured that the Yale game won't be the pressure-cooker it otherwise might have been. It was a riveting, highly dramatic game, won by a team that now has earned the right to be called champions.