Feel-Good Thursday

Welcome to "Feel Good Thursday."

Today, TigerBlog offers only feel-good stories. Of course, that's what he usually tries to offer, but hey, today he's putting a name to it. Feel-good stuff only, largely because the sun has finally come out in Princeton after a week of rain.

* TB starts with Aimee Jungfer, a sophomore on the field hockey team. Jungfer scored her first career goal in Princeton's 6-1 win over Yale this past Friday night in New Haven. 

That's feel-good enough, right? Well, no. After her goal, she came sprinting over to the bench and asked to come out of the game. When the coaches asked her if she had gotten hurt or something, her response was: "no, I'm too excited." 

Now that's a feel-good story. Even TB had to smile at that.

The field hockey team hosts Dartmouth Saturday as it looks to stay unbeaten in the Ivy League.

* TigerBlog was driving along the other day when he saw someone out jogging in the pouring rain. As he got closer, he saw it was Tom Krisak, who has a long-standing relationship with Princeton and the Department of Athletics as a printer. 

Krisak, though he might not look like it, is in his mid-60s. And there he was, on one of those miserable rainy days that have been too common the last week, out for his run. That has to make you feel good, no?

* Pietra Tordin earned Ivy League women's soccer Player of the Week and Rookie of the Week for her two goal/five point week in 2-0 wins over Bucknell and Dartmouth. 

More than just that, Tordin made herself the answer to a trivia question: Who scored the first goal in the new Myslik Field at Roberts Stadium? That's a feel-good fact that will last forever for her.

Next up will be the first doubleheader for the new facility. It comes up Saturday, and it's a big one. 

The first game is at 1 and features the Princeton women against Brown. A year ago, it was Brown who defeated Princeton to win the Ivy League title, though both teams reached the NCAA tournament. 

In fact, Brown's women have not lost an Ivy League game since the second-to-last game of the 2018 season. The Bears went 6-0-1 in 2019 and then 7-0-0 a year ago and are 16-0-1 in their last 17 Ivy games.

This year, they're 2-0 in the league, with wins over Dartmouth and Columbia. Princeton is 1-1 with a loss to Yale and a win over Dartmouth. 

Could Princeton end that long unbeaten streak? That would be very feel-good.

The second game of the doubleheader is the Princeton men against Yale at 4. The Tigers are one of three 1-0 teams in the league, along with Cornell and Penn. Yale was 4-0-3 on the year before a loss to Penn a week ago in its first Ivy game. 

The Princeton men have won eight straight Ivy games.

* Speaking of the women's soccer game and the "feel good" theme, the game Saturday will be part of the "Let Her Play" organization's promotion of getting girls involved in sports. The event is free, but registration HERE is required.

The leader of the group is a former Princeton athlete, Gia Fruscione, Class of 2000, who was a letterwinner in both field hockey and ice hockey as an undergraduate. 

She went on to a career in physical therapy, and that led her to become the champion of girls in sports that she is now. She founded the organization, whose mission statement from its website says this: We are getting girls and their support networks excited about sport through community engagement, mentorship and raising awareness of the values derived from sports participation.

TB had a chance to speak with Fruscione at the Princeton-Lehigh football game, and he'll have more about her and the organization on goprincetontigers.com today. It's the definition of a "feel good" story.

* Lucia Scalamandre can feel good about being named the Ivy League women's volleyball Rookie of the Week each of the last two weeks. Scalamandre leads the Ivy League in blocks per set and is second in the league in hitting percentage.

Princeton has a home weekend against Cornell and Columbia in Dillon Gym, with the Big Red here tomorrow at 7 and then the Lions Saturday at 5. There is a very long way to go in the volleyball race, but Princeton and Yale are currently the lone league unbeatens at 3-0.

* Lastly, when it comes to feel good, TB offers this, from FatherBlog. As TB wrote last week, his father has retired, at the age of 87, after 62 years in the insurance business in New York City. He sent TB a video of his final moments in the work force, and TB shares it with you. This has to make you feel good: