Opening Night

Welcome to Opening Day.

Tonight at 7 on Sherrerd Field, it'll be Princeton and Colgate in women's soccer. It's the first Princeton athletic event for the 2022-23 academic year. Admission is free.

The second will be the women's soccer game against Fairfield Sunday at 7. Fairfield, by the way, is the school that Tiger head coach Sean Driscoll coached before he came to Princeton.

The women's soccer team is coming off a season that ended in the second round of the NCAA tournament, though it also ended one game short of an Ivy League championship. Princeton spent most of last season in the national rankings, and this year's team will have every chance to get back.

Princeton returns 13 different players who scored at least one goal a year ago. The games this weekend are the first two of five home games before the Sept. 24 Ivy opener at Yale, and there is also a game at Rutgers Sept. 4.

The goals are to win an Ivy title (something Driscoll's Princeton teams have done three times in six seasons) and reach the NCAA tournament again (Driscoll is 4 for 6 there).

So that's a little backdrop for when the curtain rises this weekend. About 700 more events from now, it'll be June, and the NCAA track and field championships, which will be the final event of the year. Between now and then, who knows what might happen.

Will it be like last year, when Princeton won 16 total league championships, including 13 Ivy titles? That would be nice.

There are all kinds of obvious storylines for some of Princeton's teams. Others? It could be anything.

Some of the obvious ones? 

It's the first year of varsity women's rugby, bringing the number of varsity teams to 38. The new kids on the varsity block open their season next weekend against Sacred Heart.

It's also the first year for two new head coaches. 

Jamea Jackson takes over for Laura Granville as the head coach of the women's tennis team. Jackson inherits a program that has won three straight Ivy championships, as well as six of the last seven.

Speaking of coaches with big shoes to fill, Jenn Cook is now the head coach of the women's lacrosse team, taking over for retired Hall of Fame coach Chris Sailer. The last time Princeton had a new women's lacrosse coach was when Sailer took over in 1987.

For women's basketball, the question will be is it no-Abby-no-problem, as the Tigers return everyone else from last year's team that went unbeaten in the league and reached the second round of the NCAA tournament, not to mention the addition of a highly regarded recruiting class. 

The men? They're in Spain now. They go back to Europe to play in England in November. If you're making flight arrangements, the Tigers will be in London for games on Nov. 24 and 26.

The biggest basketball games, though, will be at home for both teams, as the Ivy League tournament comes to Jadwin Gym this coming March.

Will six Ivy teams make the NCAA men's lacrosse tournament again? Speaking of sports in which every league win is tough, what will November look like for the football team? Will there be another "triple crown" for men's cross country and track and field? 

Is there another national title on the horizon for the women's lightweight rowers, who have won the last two? Can the women's open crew return to the NCAA championship regatta, keeping alive its streak of never having missed one?

These are some obvious ones. There are others. There are also the ones that will come out of nowhere.

Anything is possible now, and that's the exciting part about a new year. Almost nothing is predictable.

Tonight is your first chance to see a Princeton team play this academic year. There will be many more to come. Still, it's like New Year's Eve, only the ball will get kicked off, as opposed to dropping in Times Square. 

Kickoff at 7.