Joy And Sorrow

This past weekend was a very good one for Princeton Soccer, both the men and the women. 

TigerBlog wants to talk about that, how both teams won and what the coming Ivy League tournament might look like.

First, though, he will share with you the feature story that he put up yesterday on goprincetontigers.com. It's title tells a great deal about it: Of Love, Sorrow And Cancer. 

You can read it HERE.

The piece tells the story of three women's soccer players — Esme Rudell, Ally Murphy and Summer Pierson — who have had someone hugely important to them have to deal with cancer. This became pretty personal for both women's soccer head coach Sean Driscoll, who lost his mother Patricia six years ago, and TB himself, whose mother passed away 30 years ago this December. 

Once the story was published, TB began to hear from people who also had been affected by cancer. As Sean says in the story: "Everyone knows someone who has gone through this."

The piece stretches through 4,500 words, and yet it is one of the pictures that was sent to TB that really hits home. Summer's best friend in high school outside of Boston was dealing with bone cancer, and the chemo caused her to lose her hair quickly. 

To show her love and support, Summer shaved her head as well. This is the picture after it happened:

If that doesn't touch your heart, what will? 

TB spoke to the three women before the Tigers played Dartmouth last weekend on Myslik Field at Roberts Stadium. 

This was the second-to-last game of the regular season. The last game of the regular season comes up this Saturday in New York City, where Princeton will play Columbia at 2.

The Tigers needed to take down Dartmouth to set up what is now a huge game this coming week. Columbia rallied past Yale to win 3-2 Saturday, leaving the Lions at 5-0-1 in the league for 16 points. 

Princeton and Dartmouth were scoreless at the half. A loss to the Big Green with the Columbia win would mean that the Lions would have clinched the league. 

Instead, Pietra Tordin scored twice and Brooke Dawahare and Drew Coomans scored once each after the break, and the Tigers sprinted away 4-0. Princeton is now 5-1-0, for 15 points. 

Both teams have clinched their Ivy League tournament spots. What's at stake Saturday? A Princeton win and the Tigers win the Ivy title and host the tournament. A Columbia win or a tie, and both of those go to Lions.

Who will be the other two teams? One will definitely be Brown, who has also clinched a spot. The fourth team will either be Harvard (if it beats Yale), Yale (if it beats Harvard) or Cornell (if it wins and Harvard and Yale tie). 

The Ivy League field hockey tournament will be in Princeton. Will the women's soccer tournament be there as well? They're both on Nov. 8-10.

The men's soccer tournament is a week later. That one too can be in Princeton. What will it take? 

Princeton defeated Yale 1-0 in the second game on Myslik Field Saturday, scoring the only goal it would need on a Jack Jasinski free kick midway through the first half. The win leaves Princeton at 4-1-0 with 12 points in the league and assured of a spot in the Ivy tournament.

Like the women, Princeton's men can win the league championship and host the tournament by winning out. In this case, Princeton's men have two games left — at Dartmouth Saturday and then home against Penn Nov. 9. 

The only team ahead of Princeton right now is Penn, who has 15 points at 5-0-0. The Quakers are at Yale Saturday.

Penn and Princeton are the only teams to have clinched ILT spots so far. It's possible that the game against Penn will be a winner-take-all game like the women's game this weekend is. 

Dartmouth comes into the game in fourth place with seven points, two behind Cornell and one ahead of Harvard in the race for the other two spots. 

Princeton, by the way, hosts Seton Hall tonight at 7 in its final non-league game. 

It's an exciting time for Ivy League soccer, and Princeton's two teams are right in the middle of it all. 

Before the games, though, check out the feature story. It was very personal for TB to write it — and it's likely that it's personal for most of the people who read it.