Outright Champs

Forget your birthday.

Forget Christmas. Forget Thanksgiving — and Valentines' Day, your anniversary, your kids' birthdays. Forget all of that. 

Everybody's favorite day was yesterday. It was, after all, the first day of Daylight Savings Time.

Still light out after 7? Knowing that it's only going to keep staying light out longer and longer for the next few months? Who could be against that? 

Throw in how warm it was, at least in the Northeast, and it was a great day, right?  

By the way, remember that pesky rodent named Punxsutawney Phil? He was the one who said six more weeks of winter, as opposed to an early spring — and that was only 37 days ago. TigerBlog won't get into his big problem with that whole scam again. Actually, yes he will:

There are supposedly only two possible outcomes for when Punxsutawney Phil emerges from his slumber: either an early spring or six more weeks of winter. This is dependent on whether or not said groundhog sees his shadow. TB's problem with this is that six weeks from now is March 16. Spring doesn't begin until five days later. Presumably an early spring would mean warmer weather would arrive before spring actually does, and both outcomes are saying the same thing. It should say "eight more weeks of winter."

There was more to celebrate yesterday than just springing ahead for the women's hockey team. The NCAA tournament bids came out yesterday, and the Tigers — who dropped a tough overtime ECAC semifinal game to Quinnipiac Friday night — found themselves on the right side of the bubble. 

Princeton will be playing UConn Thursday night at 7 at Penn State, and the winner of that gets the host Nittany Lions (coached by former Princeton head coach Jeff Kampersal) Saturday. 

TB will have much more on hockey, both men's and women's, as the week goes along. As a reminder, though, the Princeton men will host Union in a best-of-three ECAC quarterfinal series Friday through Sunday (if necessary), with all games at 7. 

Meanwhile, back on Saturday, there was quite a bit of drama in the afternoon in Jadwin Gym. 

The final day of the Ivy League women's basketball season saw Princeton and Columbia both at 11-2, with Harvard confirmed as the No. 3 seed and Brown as the No. 4 in the upcoming Ivy League tournament. The No. 1 seed, and the league champion or champions, were still to be determined. 

As far as the championship, if both teams won, they would be co-champs. If one team won and the other didn't, the winner would be the outright champ. Columbia had the edge to the No. 1 seed with its season sweep of the Tigers. 

Both teams were playing at home — Princeton against Yale and Columbia against Harvard. Yale got out to a 16-2 lead. Columbia led by 12 at the half and by 16 in the second half. 

So what happened? 

First, Princeton came back to take an eight-point halftime lead for what became a 78-55 victory. With that, the Tigers had clinched at least a share of another championship. 

Ah, but Harvard came charging back against Columbia. Suddenly it was tied at the end of the third quarter. 

For TB's part, he was driving home after the men's lacrosse team's 20-9 win over Rutgers. As he did so, his friend and devoted Princeton Athletics fan Duncan Yin of the Class of 1982 kept him updated on the doings in Levien Gym. 

The extent to which Duncan was rooting for Harvard is hard to explain, and it wasn't due to the fact that he also has a degree from the Harvard Business School. He just really, really wanted Princeton to get that outright championship. 

In the end, that's what happened. At least, that's what TB thought happened. It was hard to tell over the joyous exaltations that were coming through the phone. 

Yes, it was true. The final was Harvard 68, Columbia 64. Princeton, 12-2, was the outright Ivy League champion. 

It got TB to wondering — exactly how many times has Carla Berube cut nets down, with all her championships at UConn, Tufts and Princeton? 

That can wait a few days. First, there is Ivy Madness at Cornell. 

Princeton is the No. 1 seed and will play Brown at 4:30 Friday, followed by Columbia and Harvard. The winners play at 5:30 Saturday for the league's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament, somewhere Princeton figures to be no matter the outcome this weekend. 

In the meantime, congrats to the Tigers on another Ivy championship.