Dazzling, Before And During The Game

There are a lot of athletes who can dazzle during games.

There aren't as many who can dazzle during a game AND before the game. Kyla Sears is one of the ones who does.

One of the most astonishing parts of a Princeton women's lacrosse home game is watching Sears sing the national anthem. It's not just she can sing. It's that she's a show-stopper. 

If you doubt it, just watch the reaction of the other team's fans. When Sears is introduced, you can tell that they're not expecting anything special. By the end, they're giving her a big-time ovation. It happens every time.

It's like the live version that Bruce Springsteen and the E Street band did of the song "Jersey Girl." When it starts, almost nobody in the audience has ever heard it before. When it ends, there's a deafening roar.

Your next chance to hear Sears sing the national anthem comes up today at 5, when the Tigers host Penn on Sherrerd Field (and on ESPNU). 

Then you can watch her play, as she and her teammates continue their chase for an Ivy League championship and Sears continues her march through the record book.

When you think of Kyla Sears, you think of goal-scoring. You also think of her incredible ability to draw free position opportunities and convert them.

Sears already holds the school record for free position goals in a career, with 59. Who is second? Olivia Hompe, with 35. That's a huge gap. If you watch Sears play, she just has this uncanny way of slicing through the defense and drawing fouls.

In all Sears has 174 career goals, which leaves her one away from Lindsey Biles for third all-time at Princeton. Up next would be Crista Samaras (189) and Hompe (198). 

For career points, Sears is has 260, which leaves her 10 from Samaras for second and 25 from Hompe for the record. Princeton has four more regular season games and then in all likelihood the Ivy League and possibly NCAA tournaments. 

What you don't necessarily think of Sears as is a feeder, and yet she is only five away from Erin McMunn's school record (she trails Hompe by one for second place).

Sears had six assists in Princeton's most recent game, a 17-5 win over Dartmouth Saturday. Those six assists set the program single-game record, and with her two goals she equaled her career high of eight points. Those numbers brought her the sixth Ivy Offensive Player of the Week award for her career.

Right now, Princeton is one of two unbeaten teams in the Ivy League, along with Yale. Princeton is 3-0, and Yale is 5-0, with a game against Columbia (0-4 in the league) Saturday.

Before the Tigers can worry about their game against Yale as the second game of a doubleheader on Sherrerd Field on April 30, there's the matter of the Quakers tonight, a trip to Harvard Saturday (also a doubleheader with the men) and a trip to Columbia a week from today.

Penn is 1-3 in the league, but the Quakers have two one-goal losses and can still get into the Ivy tournament by winning out. Plus, it's Princeton-Penn, which is always a big game in Ivy women's lacrosse.

Right now, there are two teams with two losses: Cornell and Harvard at 3-2. Harvard still has to play Princeton, but it has one of the one-goal wins over Penn (Yale as the other). 

Princeton would clinch a spot in the Ivy tournament with a win. The short math is that Princeton would have its fourth win, which would eliminate Penn, Dartmouth and Columbia, who would all have four losses. Brown could still get to four wins but would only do so by winning its last two, which are against Harvard and Cornell, and that would give them four wins as well. If there is a four-way tie at 4-3 between Princeton, Cornell, Harvard and Brown, Princeton would get one of the spots, with the first tiebreaker head-to-head and Princeton with wins over Cornell and Brown already.

Penn could still get in if it wins its last three (Princeton tonight, at Dartmouth Saturday and Columbia at home the following Saturday) and gets a little help in some other results.

Chris Sailer talks about Sears the singer and Sears the player in this week's Princeton Laxcast. 

By the way, this week's women's podcast has one of the seniors as the player guest. TigerBlog will say that this interview was a bit different, largely because he already knew all the answers.

You'll see why if you click HERE.