Seven For Seven

Here's a quick trivia question for you:

The Ivy League has expanded to seven conference tournaments in the 2022-23 academic year. What is the only school in the league to reach all seven? 

While you're thinking about ... oh, you already know the answer. It's Princeton.

Why would TigerBlog mention it if that wasn't the case? 

In case you're keeping track, that seven sports with league championships now: women's volleyball, men's basketball, women's basketball, men's lacrosse, women's lacrosse, baseball and softball.

There will be three other tournaments next year, when field hockey and men's and women's soccer get in on the fun.

The scoreboard looks like this:

Princeton - 7
Yale - 5
Penn - 5
Harvard - 4
Columbia - 2
Cornell - 2
Brown - 1
Dartmouth - 1

If you bothered counting, you noticed that this list adds up to 27 instead of 28, which would be seven tournaments times four teams. The final spot in the baseball tournament is still up for grabs between Columbia (11-7) and Yale (9-9 after defeating Princeton 7-6 in New Haven.

Columbia finishes the season at Penn this weekend for three. Yale is at Harvard for its final three. Columbia holds the tiebreaker after having swept Yale, so basically any combination of Columbia wins and Yale losses that equals two puts the Lions in the postseason as well.

The softball tournament will be held at Princeton in two weekends. The baseball tournament site is completely up for grabs, as Penn and Harvard are 13-5 and Princeton (three at home against Brown) is 12-6. Harvard has the tiebreaker over both Princeton and Penn, and Penn holds the tiebreaker over Princeton.

The only way the Tigers can host is to finish above, and not tied with, both teams. If they finish in a tie for first, then that would mean a share of the Ivy title. The tournaments only determine the automatic NCAA tournament bid.  

The baseball and softball tournaments will be double elimination events. The lacrosse tournaments are single elimination. 

The Princeton women will play Friday at 4 against Yale at Penn, with the games at Penn Park and not Franklin Field. The big stadium will be hosting the Ivy League Heps outdoor track and field championships.

Princeton went into Saturday still unsure of whether or not it would be in the tournament and then clinched a spot later that day. The curious part is that the Tigers didn't even play Saturday. They needed wins by Penn (over Dartmouth), Yale (over Columbia) and Brown (over Cornell) to secure their bid, and all three of those happened.

Princeton then went out Sunday and took down Harvard 17-13 on Senior Day. Even though the Tigers honored their seven seniors, it was a freshman, Amelia Hughes, who earned an Ivy honor, taking home the Defensive Player of the Week award with her 14-save effort in goal. The Ivy League does not have a Rookie of the Week in women's lacrosse, but this was the third time Hughes won the Defensive honor.

The Princeton men play against Penn Friday at 8:30 in New York City, as that event is being held at Columbia's Lawrence A. Wien Stadium. Can you get to both games? 

Well, the women's game figures to end right around 6 or slightly after. That gives you 2:15 or so to get to Columbia. You can do it. 

On the women's side, the top seed and host, Penn, plays the second game Friday. The Quakers will face Harvard, and that game will start around 7. On the men's side, the top seed is Cornell, and the Big Red take on fourth-seeded Yale at 6, in the first game. 

Whoever advances to Sunday's finals, you won't be able to see both of those games in person. They both start at noon.

By the way, the only time in the last two years that the Ivy League held a tournament and no Princeton team was there was last year in men's lacrosse. How did that work out for the Tigers? 

They made it to the NCAA Final Four instead. That puts Princeton in the very, very strange position of having a team full of players who have played on Championship Weekend but have never played in the Ivy tournament.