Weekend Forecast

Snow again? Sigh.

It's enough already. Enough with this winter stuff.

Here's how it's gone around here since Tuesday afternoon. First it started to sleet, which made the ride home really icy. Then it snowed for awhile. Then it sleeted some more as it started to warm up.

Eventually, it got above freezing, so it was just rain. And it rained all day yesterday, on and off at least. Then the temperature fell again, so that snow began.

Of course, every school in the area was cancelled before the snow began. And for awhile, it looked like it might not snow at all. It finally started around 5 AM.

By the time it ends later today, there could be around eight inches on the ground here, though TigerBlog thinks it'll be a little less. And then it's supposed to get cold, record-setting cold single-digit cold.

So, yes. Sigh.

It actually hasn't been that bad of a snow winter around here. Not like it has in Boston, where that city is only two inches away from the all-time record.

There haven't been any complete blizzards in the Princeton area. There's been snow here or there, though never more than five or six inches at once.

What there's been has been cold. Lots of that. It's been below 30 endlessly, for weeks. The normal high right now for Princeton is 47 degrees. The high for this day is 72, in 1991.

Forty-seven? This area hasn't been near that, except for yesterday, when it was in the upper 30s while it rained. Sunshine and a temp in the 40s? Not since December.

Oh well. The 10-day forecast is for a bunch of days like that. Sunshine. 40s. It'll be heavenly.

TigerBlog emailed with his men's lacrosse counterpart at Maryland to tell him that he would be there Saturday. Usual stuff. Media list. Rosters. And parking information.

TB was told that because the Maryland high school wrestling championships will be going on at Cole Field House that he might have to walk a little further than normal. It'll be 43 and sunny? TigerBlog is fine with a little walk.

TigerBlog will be on the road this weekend. So will most of Princeton's athletic events.

The only home events are men's basketball, against Cornell tomorrow night and Columbia Saturday night. And men's volleyball, home with Juniata tomorrow night and NJIT Saturday night. And men's tennis, against Army and Binghamton Sunday in Jadwin Gym.

The men's basketball team is in third place in the Ivy League. Princeton cannot catch Harvard or Yale, who are both 10-2 and tied for first in advance of their showdown tomorrow night in Cambridge.

The Tigers are 6-5 in the league, with the games this weekend and then Tuesday's game at Penn remaining. Cornell, Columbia and Dartmouth are all 5-7. With one win in the last three, Princeton will be no worse than a tie for third.

There are some pretty important events on the road.

The EIWA wrestling championships are at Lehigh this weekend, beginning tomorrow at 10 with first-round matchups; quarterfinal matches and wrestlebacks will start at 12:30. The semifinals will begin Saturday morning at 10, with wrestlebacks scheduled for a 12:30 start. The EIWA Hall of Fame inductions follow, as do the the 1st, 3rd and 5th place matches.

The path to the NCAA championships goes through this event.

It's hard to overstate how solid of a job Chris Ayres has done as head coach of the Princeton wrestling program. Keep in mind, this was a program that struggled to win a single match, and it is in the same league as Cornell, who is to Ivy wrestling what Princeton is to Ivy field hockey (minus the NCAA title).

This season, Princeton finished third in the Ivy League. The program produced Jonathan Schleifer, Princeton's first ever Ivy League Rookie of the Year. As in ever.

And now Princeton heads to the EIWA meet with six All-Ivy selections, the most in Ayres' tenure.

In addition to the wrestling, the NCAA fencing regionals are this weekend. Princeton, the NCAA champ two years ago, will be looking to qualify the maximum 12 fencers for the NCAA finals.

TigerBlog has no idea how it works. He'll leave it at that.

If you're going to be in Hanover, N.H., this weekend, you're in luck. You can see the Princeton men's hockey team play at Dartmouth in the ECAC opening round, a best-of-three with games definitely tomorrow and Saturday at 7.

And, if you're there, the women's lacrosse team will play its Ivy opener at 1, also at Dartmouth. It's a chance to see both teams play without ever leaving the same parking lot.

Princeton's women's lacrosse team is off to a 3-0 start and is ranked 10th nationally. The Tigers and Dartmouth usually have played in April, but the game is now the league opener this season.

If you're going to be at Dartmouth, you'll also see a snow-lined field.

Of course, you can come here and do that. It's even worse now than it was last week.

Stop. Already.

Stupid groundhog. TigerBlog is ready for spring.

Underway At The NCAAs

The defending champ got off to a solid start on Day 1 of this year's NCAA event, even if there is a long, long way to go and repeating won't be easy.

TigerBlog is talking about fencing, of course. Not basketball.

Since you brought it up, though, Day 1 of the NCAA basketball tournament was pretty good, if not rivetingly great. And there's a reason for that.

Time was that wins by an 11 and two 12s on the first day of the tournament, as well as a third 12 who lost by only three, would have been epic. In 2014, it's happened so many times before and the gap between the seeds has narrowed so much that it's hardly shocking anymore.

In fact, the No. 12 beats the No. 5 so many times of late that all pre-tournament discussion is about which No. 12 seeds will win, not IF one can win.

Still, some of the games were great. The best one was 11th-seeded Dayton's win over Ohio State, which had a pair of big-time clutch shots in the final 15 seconds, first by Ohio State's Aaron Craft and then the winner by Dee Sanford of Dayton.

North Dakota State's win over Oklahoma was another great moment. The 12th-seeded Bison forced overtime with a late three-pointer and then pulled away for an 80-75 win.

One of the best parts of the tournament, far better than the Final Four, is the idea that teams from small conferences can beat teams from big conferences. During the season, the power conference teams have every advantage - their home court (Oklahoma would never play at North Dakota State unless it had a player from Fargo), their officials.

North Dakota State is having a pretty good year, what with another FCS footbal championship and now the win over Oklahoma. It was 10 days earlier, by the way, that NDSU thumped Denver and Princeton alum Joe Scott in the Horizon semifinals.

The Bison won the Summit League regular-season by two games. They then put the Summit League on the map with the win over Oklahoma. Can anyone remember who NDSU beat in the Summit final? No. The answer is IUPU-Fort Wayne. What is Ft. Wayne had won the Summit final? Hey, it would have been a 15-second highlight somewhere.

Could Ft. Wayne have won an opening round NCAA game? For starters, it would have been lower than a 12 seed, so it wouldn't have been as favorable a matchup. Did the Patriot League's American win? No offense to Mike Brennan, a TB favorite, but the Eagles lost by 40 in the first round to Wisconsin. Would regular-season champ Boston University have been a 15 seed?

The Horizon League representative was UW-Milwaukee, who went 7-9 in the league during the year, got hot and stole the tournament, earned a 15-seed and got blown out by 20 by Villanova. Wisconsin-Green Bay went 24-6 in the regular season and 14-2 in the league and probably would have been a 12 seed. How did the 12 seeds do again?

You get TB's point. If you don't, it's that conference tournaments in one-bid leagues are a dumb idea.

Harvard, the Ivy League champion, won again in the first round, defeating Cincinnati of the AAC. The Crimson win was no fluke; Harvard was in control the entire way. It shows what happens when you send your best team to the NCAA tournament.

As for the rest of the Ivy League, it's been a pretty good week.

Of the 16 Ivy League basketball teams, eight made it to the postseason. Harvard men and Penn women to the NCAA tournament, Princeton and Harvard women to the WNIT, Princeton men to the CBI and Columbia, Yale and Brown men to the CIT.

Of those eight teams, seven have already played - and six have won. The only loss was by Brown to Holy Cross 68-65 in the CIT opener. Everyone else has won, including the Princeton men and women.

The Tiger women, playing without a senior as Kristen Helmstetter and Nicole Hung were out with injuries, defeated a very good VCU team 94-76, advancing to Sunday's second round at Seton Hall. It was the first postseason game played at Jadwin Gym since the men's 2010 CBI against Duquesne and before that when the men defeated Georgetown in the 1999 NIT in a game where only five players played for the Tigers.

It was also the second postseason win for Princeton's women, who went 1-2 in the National Women's Invitational Tournament in Texas in an event that wasn't one-and-done.

While the Princeton women will be driving up the turnpike, the men will be flying to California to take on Fresno Monday night.

While Ohio State was losing to Dayton, it was also serving as the host school for the NCAA fencing championships. Princeton, the defending champion, is in first place after Day 1 of the four-day event, though repeating is hardly a guarantee.

The NCAA fencing championships are co-ed, something that TB doesn't quite understand.

The women complete their turn today, with the last two rounds for the team competition and then the individual national championships, which feature the top four in each of the three weapons. The men will then have the same schedule tomorrow and Sunday.

The NCAA champ will be the team that has the most combined points.

Princeton has the top women's program in the country and needs to have a solid lead after today for the team to win the combined team championship. The men are strong, but not the top team.

In the meantime, it's also the rest of the opening round for the basketball tournament.

There's one more No. 12 seed in action, Stephen F. Austin, who plays Virginia Commonwealth. SF Austin hasn't lost since November and is 31-2.

Good think for the Southland it didn't slip up in the conference tournament.

Going For Gold

The Winter Olympics from Sochi are underway.

The men's slopestyle qualifying kicked off the two weeks of the Games in the Russian resort town, which may or may not be ready for the crush. The answer to that would be not ready if you were to read the stories by reporters who are telling tales of showers with no curtains, toilets placed side-by-side (and with signs saying not to flush the toilet paper next to them), exhortations not to put the tap water on one's face due to their rather corrosive elements and other harrowing stories.

TigerBlog's prevailing theory is that sportswriters will always complain about a lack of amenities. Hey, he's seen them complain about free food for years.

And TB assumes that the average person's take on complaining sports media types is something along the lines of "shut up." The media is an easy target, with its free admission to events (often in the best seats), availability of prime parking and transportation and inside access to the athletes.

Still, this goes beyond the usual griping about cramped hotel rooms or spotty internet access. This could be an ominous sign for the Games, if the key infrastructure simply isn't ready.

That, of course, doesn't even take into account hovering threat of a terrorist attack, something that has scared off more than one visitor.

The Russians, too, are easy to blame. If there is a problem, then it must be because Putin did something to give his own athletes an advantage.

TigerBlog won't have to worry about any logistical problems for the 2014 Winter Olympics, other than more winter storms that bring more power outages. Yesterday, for instance, he was on his couch enjoying the ice storm by watching "Analyze That" when the power went out, and TB never found out what happened to Robert DeNiro and Billy Crystal at the end, though he assumes they lived happily ever after.

TB absolutely loved the Olympics as a kid. And anyone within a few years of TB's age or older knows they will never see another sporting event to rival the Miracle on Ice from the 1980 Winter Olympics.

He went through a phase were he wasn't that into it, and now he's back. He watched a ton of the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver and even more of the 2012 Summer Games in London, and he assumes he will watch a lot the next two weeks.

Of course, it's not his favorite international sporting event of 2014. That would be the World Cup. Or maybe the World Lacrosse Championships. Nah, the World Cup. 

As for the sports at the Winter Olympics themselves, TB doesn't like any events that are judged, rather than those that have a score or a time to determine the winner. This means that he's never been into the figure skating, and he doesn't like any of the X-Games-type events that 1) have an element of judging to them and 2) were added, he thinks, at the insistence of NBC to boost American medal totals and ratings (he has absolutely no proof of this and just thinks it's the case).

So what does he like?

He loves the downhill. He loves the snowboard cross, which he concedes is an added X-Games event but is just a wild scene. He'll be into the hockey. He is a big fan of the bobsled, luge and sledding events, and he'll be rooting for LoLo Jones.

He's not wild about the speed skating. He likes the giant slalom more than the slalom. He likes regular speed skating more than the short track kind.

Still, he'll watch most anything during the next two weeks, with the real exception of the figure skating. He's always struggled with that, as it's the most-watched event every Winter Olympics, which means there will be a lot of it on, and he just doesn't like it.

He's always liked the Summer Olympics better than the Winter Olympics, and he always chuckles at how important some of the events will be the next two weeks, only to be completely forgotten for four years after that. Like the downhill.

Princeton has no athletes in the Winter Olympics.

Princeton had 16 athletes in the 2012 Summer Olympics, and seven of them won medals.

Of those seven, one is still an active Princeton athlete.

Susannah Scanlan won a bronze medal in fencing at the Olympics two years ago. This weekend, she'll be at Brown along with the rest of the Princeton fencing team to compete in the Ivy League championships.

When Ivy fans talk about the best sport in the league, the one that makes the biggest splash nationally, fencing rarely comes up, probably because it's not exactly high profile.

Then again, in what other Ivy sport is every single league team among the men and women either ranked in the top 10 or receiving votes in the national poll? Fencing can make that claim.

The way the Ivy League awards its championship is fascinating, as each team will compete in a dual match against each of the other Ivy schools in a two-day stretch at the same venue. At the end of the weekend, the teams in first place will be the champions.

Princeton is the defending NCAA champion in fencing, which is also pretty unique, in that it's a combined men's and women's team championship, rather than a men's champion and a women's champion. Were that the case, then Princeton's women would be the two-time defending NCAA champion.

Princeton is the four-time defending Ivy women's champion and is riding a 41-match winning streak. The Tiger women are ranked No. 1 nationally.

The men are ranked third nationally, behind No. 1 Columbia in the Ivy League.

Don't carve Princeton's name on the trophy for the women so fast though. Princeton may be No. 1 in the poll, but Harvard is No. 2. On the men's side, Harvard is No. 5.

If you've never seen fencing, it's incredibly fast-paced and physical, and it'll be a challenging weekend for whichever teams win.

The Princeton-Harvard matches will be Saturday at 1:15. The Princeton-Columbia matches will be the final matches on Sunday (1:45).

When it comes to attention and public interest, fencing isn't quite the downhill or hockey or even figure skating. It's more like the nordic combined or something like that.

It doesn't mean that it's not intense, and it doesn't make whoever wins the gold this weekend any less deserving.

Eagles And Epees

Okay, so TigerBlog was wrong about his Georgetown-Gonzaga championship game prediction.

Gonzaga was done in by a ridiculous nine-possession spurt by Wichita State that saw the ninth-seed shockingly (get it? Wichita State is the Shockers, which actually is short for Wheat Shockers) score on all nine possessions, totaling 23 points. It was one of the great runs of all time anywhere on any level in any basketball game.

And Georgetown? The Hoyas were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

When the draw was announced eight days ago, Florida Gulf Coast was just another modified version of a major school, no different than North Carolina A&T or Western Kentucky or something like that, a school that nobody thought twice about when it's name was revealed.

Hey, for that matter, TigerBlog would have objected to FGCU's presence in the tournament at all, after Mercer won the Atlantic Sun Conference regular season title, only to lose in the conference tournament final to the second-place Eagles. Unless the A-Sun adopted the three plays two, winner plays one format, in which case then TB would be fine with it, especially since FGCU beat third-place Stetson in the semifinal.

So who could have guessed that FGCU would come into the NCAA tournament the way it has, like some combination of the Miami Heat and Harlem Globetrotters, that a team that lost twice to Lipscomb during the regular season would suddenly become not only a dynamic cohesive juggernaut but also quite possibly the most entertaining basketball team ever assembled.

That's the real lure of the Eagles. They are just so much fun to watch.

When FGCU had Georgetown on the ropes and there was a change of possession, did the Eagles pull the ball out and wait to get fouled? Oh no. Not this team. No, instead it was a one-handed semi-no-look alley-oop for a one-handed dunk by a player who seemed to come out of nowhere.

Actually, it's sort of a metaphor for the entire team. Players nobody heard of who came out of nowhere and dunked all over the tournament. The way that the Eagles put away San Diego State yesterday? It was mesmerizing.

TigerBlog had to spend six hours in the car Friday, and as he listened to sports talk radio, it was all about Harvard's win over New Mexico Thursday night. Now, after three days of FGCU, that seems like last year's tournament.

And there you have TB's thoughts on Florida Gulf Coast.

While FGCU was capturing the hearts of the basketball world, and even the casual sports fan, Princeton was busy capturing something that only one other Division I school has done this year.

While 99% of the college athletic world was focused on the basketball tournaments, Princeton was winning the NCAA fencing championship in San Antonio.

The fencing championship is a co-ed event, and Princeton figured to have an edge on the women's side, which meant that the men needed to keep it close enough before the women competed.

At least that's what the fencing coaches told TigerBlog in the mail room last week before they left.

The mail room is next door to TigerBlog's office, and is the home to mailboxes, a copy machine, a folding machine, sometimes leftover food - and the coffee machine. TB doesn't drink coffee and never has, but he understands that the fencing coaches make very, very strong coffee.

Anyway, that's exactly how it played out.

The men were in second place, trailing Penn State 94-83 (number of bouts won) when the women took over. And the women made up that difference and more, outscoring Penn State 99-69 on the women's side.

Actually, it was Notre Dame who made a run at Princeton and finished second, as Princeton won 182-175. Ohio State finished third.

Individually, Eliza Stone was Princeton's lone champion and the second individual woman champion in program history, after Eva Petschnigg in 2000. Susannah Scanlan was a runner-up, falling in the epee final to Notre Dame's Courtney Hurley, who had been Scanlan's teammate at the Olympics last summer, where both were part of the bronze medal-winning US team.

Oh, and what did Princeton accomplish that only one other Division I school has so far this year?

Princeton has now won two NCAA team championships.

The Tigers won the NCAA field hockey title in the fall and now have added fencing to the list. Only Oregon, which won women's cross country and indoor track and field, has won two NCAA team titles this year, besides Princeton.

And the Tigers also have the NCAA distance medley relay national champion as well.

Anyway, it was a great weekend for Princeton fencing. And for Florida Gulf Coast.

One may have gotten all of the attention, but they are both fabulous achievements.

Memory Lane

TigerBlog was at an event at TigerBlog Jr.'s school yesterday afternoon when he saw Christian Laettner catch the ball near the Kentucky foul line.

For a brief moment, TB had this thought: Maybe this time he'll miss.

Of course he didn't miss. He didn't miss anything that night, 21 years ago.

The sound on the television in the school cafeteria was turned off, so TB wasn't sure what documentary he stumbled on, though Jamal Mashburn was featured prominently. For those who don't remember, that was the game in the 1992 East Regional final where Duke beat Kentucky 104-103 in overtime in what many consider the greatest college basketball game of all time.

TigerBlog was there. He sat right behind the Kentucky bench, on press row, covering the game for the Trenton Times. If you look closely in the background, he's clearly visible behind Kentucky's then-coach Rick Pitino. TB is wearing a black sweater that was fairly stylish in 1992 and would be ghastly ugly today.

Two years earlier, TigerBlog was at the Meadowlands for the East Regional as well, also covering the games for the newspaper.

For everyone who remembers the Duke-Kentucky game, there are only a fraction who remember that an equally amazing shot by Tate George of Connecticut - off a ridiculous length-of-the-court pass by Scott Burrell - defeated Clemson in the Sweet 16, only to have Laettner beat UConn with another buzzer-beater in the regional final.

When Burrell took possession of the ball from the ref before his pass to George, TigerBlog was the person on the planet closest to him, from his seat in the press section, directly under the basket. He sat in the same seat two days later when Duke knocked off UConn.

And TB obviously was in the RCA Dome in 1996, when Gabe Lewullis' layup beat UCLA for Princeton.

Those four games are always among the list of great endings in NCAA history, and TB was lucky enough not only to be at all four but to have a front row seat for all four.

TB was thinking back to his NCAA tournament experiences yesterday as he watched the games.

What he never considered back when he was watching Laettner torture him twice was that in 2013 he would see No. 1 seed Gonzaga hold off 16th-seeded Southern on his iPhone.

As he watched Cal take out UNLV, TB couldn't help but remember back to 1997, when Princeton played Cal - led by unstoppable forward soon to be unstoppable NFL tight end Tony Gonzalez - and Cal knocked off the Tigers in the first game Thursday afternoon.

By 2 or so, Princeton was eliminated. That game was in Winston-Salem, N.C., and Princeton was playing lacrosse at North Carolina that Sunday.

TB thought it would be different, that the Tigers would beat Cal and then play Saturday in the second round, so he arranged to fly back after the lacrosse game Sunday. Instead, he ended up going to the regional in Charlotte the next day, where he bought tickets with then radio man Tom McCarthy, now the TV voice of the Philadelphia Phillies, and then OAC intern Manish Mehta, now the national football writer for the New York Daily News, and sat in the stands at the Charlotte Coliseum.

Then he went back to watch the second round games in Winston-Salem the next day and went to lacrosse Sunday.

Before he ever got to TBJ's school yesterday, TigerBlog was listening to McCarthy do the regional from Auburn Hills with Kelly Tripuka on the radio.

While the games were going on, TB was thinking about all the times he went to the tournament, all the times he'd hang out and watch the early games when Princeton played late, how cool it was to be in the media room and outside the locker rooms before heading out to the court.

Maybe because he's been to so many NCAAs, TB was content to simply watch these games.

In fact, the last time Princeton went to the NCAAs, in 2001 against Kentucky, TB simply watched it on TV.

He watched the Harvard game last night, falling asleep at halftime and waking up at the under-four media timeout of the second half, just in time to see the Crimson win. Congrats to the Crimson on an outstanding win.

This weekend, the NCAA game he's looking forward to the most is the Princeton women's game against Florida State. He's hoping that the Tigers can get a win, to cap the wondrous career of Niveen Rasheed and the rest of the Class of 2013.

And oh by the way, the men's and women's fencing teams are competing for the NCAA championship in Texas this weekend as well.

As for the game he's actually going to see live, TB will be at Sherrerd Field at Class of 1952 Stadium later today, 5, actually, for the Princeton-Yale men's lacrosse game. It's a big one for both teams, though TB expects both the winner and loser to be in the hunt for the Ivy League and NCAA tournaments.

Still, he'll watch as much of the men's basketball tournament as he can.

And he fully expects to have the same reaction as he did today, which is to remember the great good luck he's had to be able to go to so many of them.

And to have a flood of memories - great memories, even if the team he was rooting for didn't always win - come flying back.

Five From The Weekend

TigerBlog was in the sports information office at Johns Hopkins University Friday around 8:15.

Princeton's impressive 11-8 win over the Blue Jays in men's lacrosse had ended a little more than an hour earlier, and TB was basically done with everything he had to do. All that was left was to remember that University becomes Roland and that he needed to turn left on Cold Spring to get to I-83.

Of course, Princeton was playing Harvard in men's basketball, Game 2 of the Princeton ESPNU doubleheader from Friday. And the second half was just starting.

TB had DVRd the game, and his plan was to try to get home to see it without finding out what happened. That plan went by the wayside, though, when TB decided to watch the end of the game before he hit the road, even though it backed him up another hour - and cost him a chance to get food at the team postgame reception.

So, while Ernie Larossa - JHU's venerable and universally well-liked head of athletic communications - hardly glanced at the game on the TV in his own office, TB sat and watched the second half.

The ESPNU doubleheader couldn't have gone much better for Princeton.

Actually, the whole weekend was a pretty good one, with a few setbacks along the way. Hey, even one of the big setbacks was a team that was a pretty big winner anyway.

The men's lacrosse team had itself a great win over Hopkins. The Blue Jays were ranked third coming in and playing on their home field. It was a great challenge for the Tigers and their rebuilt team, with so many new faces playing so many key roles, especially on defense.

And yet Princeton looked great, from start to finish. Princeton handled every challenge, from winning only 7 of 22 face-offs to being outshot 17-5 in the first quarter to giving up three goals in three minutes in the third quarter to fall behind. When the polls came out this morning, Princeton had jumped from 12th last week to fifth this week.

And for all that, TigerBlog ranks Princeton as the fifth-biggest winner among Princeton teams this weekend.

TigerBlog will put the men's lacrosse team fifth. And here's the rest of the top five:

4. Women's basketball

Huh? The Tigers lost. Yet the Princeton women are so good that even when they lose they win.

Princeton lost to Harvard Friday night and came back to defeat Dartmouth Saturday in a tough, tough game. And yet the women still won big, as big as they do when they blast teams by 40 or 50 or more.

How so? Three ways.

First, because Harvard defeated Penn Saturday night, Princeton has a two game lead over both the Quakers and Crimson. Wins this weekend at home against Yale and Brown, both of whom Princeton defeated easily on the road earlier this year, will wrap up a fourth straight Ivy title and NCAA tournament berth.

Second, the Tigers waited until after they'd won 33 straight Ivy League games, setting a new record, to finally lose one.

Third, Princeton learned a valuable lesson, that nothing can ever been taken for granted, not on any possession, let alone any game. The loss will clearly refocus the Tigers as they head down the stretch.

3. Women's fencing

Princeton was the prohibitive favorite to the win the league - and then the Tigers went out and swept through the league, running their streak to 25 straight matches at the Ivy League dual meet championships.

Princeton has now won four straight Ivy women's fencing titles, something that hadn't been done since Penn won six straight from 1983-88. That's a quarter-century ago.

2. Men's basketball

The men's basketball team did not win the Ivy championship this weekend. And, for that matter, there's no guarantee that what happened this weekend will carry over through a very challenging rest of the season.

Still, this weekend could not have been better. Princeton gutted out a 58-53 win over Harvard, led by a hop-on-my-back performance from Ian Hummer (23 points, 14 rebounds), Friday night. Had Princeton lost, it would have had almost no chance in the Ivy race.

Then, to top it off, Penn rose up and beat Harvard Saturday night. Now, Princeton - who beat Dartmouth Saturday - finds itself one game ahead of Harvard in the loss column with games at Yale, Brown and Penn remaining. Harvard is home for Columbia and Cornell.

Princeton lost to Yale the first time around. Harvard lost to Columbia.

1. Women's swimming and diving

While the fencers were expected to roll, the swimming and diving team wasn't. Princeton actually had lost to Harvard in a dual meet during the season and trailed for a small time during Saturday's final session, but it was all Tigers in the end.

Princeton, who did not win last year, won its 21st Ivy League title - and 11th in the last 14 years.

In many of those years, Princeton was just get-off-the-bus-swim-take-the-trophy-go-home better than everyone else. Not this time around. Princeton had to scramble for every point, and this meet clearly could have gone against the Tigers just as easily as it went for them.

In the end, Princeton defeated Harvard by nearly 100 points. 

USA? USA?

TigerBlog isn't all that crushed that Honduras beat the U.S. in the World Cup qualifier yesterday.

Hey, the U.S. fired Bob Bradley, Princeton Class of 1980, a head coach of the men's national team, and TB is holding that grudge. On the other hand, the Americans have Michael Bradley, and well, we are talking about the United States, which is by far TigerBlog's favorite country.

So he's back to where he's been with the U.S. soccer team since Bradley was let go. And TB now founds himself closely following the Egyptian scores, to see if Bradley's new team can reach the World Cup next summer in Brazil.

Of course, TB couldn't watch the Americans play yesterday, since the game was on beIN Sports, which is owned by Al Jazeera and which has the rights to the U.S. qualifiers.

At the same time, ESPN has the rights to the Mexican games for this final CONCACAF round of qualifying. There are six teams remaining: the U.S., Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama, Jamaica and Honduras.

As an aside, TB is definitely rooting for Costa Rica to reach the World Cup. He could picture Diego, his guide when the men's lacrosse team was in Costa Rica last June, and his father Don Carlos - not to mention the rest of the country - living and dying on every minute of "Los Ticos" game at Panama yesterday, which ended at 2-2. TB went to the Costa Rica-El Salvador game in the first round of qualifying and has seen very few sporting events quite like it.

Anyway, ESPN, because it is showing the games involving Mexico but not the U.S., the overwhelming promotional arm of the network kicks in, so that it's all Mexican highlights and analysis, as opposed to just a small amount of attention paid to the Americans, which is sort of funny.

But hey, if that's how international soccer is going to be, then TB can at least consider not rooting for his home country.

Yesterday's game was tough on the U.S. players, most of whom are currently playing in winter leagues in Europe. And then they suddenly found themselves in Honduras, where gametime temperature was 93.

TB is sure he'll be disappointed if the U.S. doesn't reach Brazil, though right now the team is the only one in the group of six without a point. Not that TB knows a lot about it, but he assumes you're not really in trouble until you lose at home.

Still, you need some ties at least on the road (like Costa Rica and Jamaica got yesterday). On the other hand, because there were two ties, then the U.S. is only one point back of second.

The next qualifiers for this group are on March 22, when TB will really be torn, as the U.S. either hosts Costa Rica or is at Costa Rica, depending on whether the home team was listed first or second in the schedule he saw.

With a break of more than a month til the next games, TB can focus on more immediate concerns. In this case, it's squash and fencing.

The Ivy League squash season finishes up this weekend, and Princeton is in a very enviable position for both the men's and women's championship.

Both the men and women are 5-0 in the league with matches against Columbia and Cornell remaining this weekend. Should the teams do not worse than split, they would have at least a share of their championship. A sweep guarantees an outright title.

Of course, Princeton has never lost to Cornell or Columbia in women's squash. Columbia is winless in the Ivy League, and while Cornell is 3-2, one of its losses is by 9-0 to Harvard, a team that Princeton has defeated.

On the men's side, Cornell poses a legitimate challenge, though Princeton will be the favorite. And a huge favorite against Columbia.

Both teams have three huge events left after this weekend, with regular season matches against Trinity, the national team championships and the national individual championships. But the Ivy League is always goal No. 1.

As for fencing, the entire Ivy League round-robin will be contested this weekend at Harvard, and the men's and women's champions will be crowned by Sunday.

Princeton is a favorite for both the men and women, though not a prohibitive favorite for either.

TigerBlog is a huge fan of the way Ivy League fencing is decided, with two days of intense matches and then a champion.

Of every sport at Princeton, TB understands fencing least of all. What he does know is that Zoltan Dudas and his staff have done a great job of turning the Tigers into perennial contenders both in the league and nationally.

Last weekend, Princeton's men defeated the No. 1 team in the country, Ohio State, while also losing to No. 3 Notre Dame. Both matches were 14-13. The one thing TB does know is that you need 14 points to win the match.

The other thing TB knows about fencing is that the coaches make coffee in the mailroom next to TB's office. They make very, very strong coffee apparently.

TB doesn't drink coffee. Never has. Can't get past the smell, the same smell that comes soaring into his office as a way of letting him know the fencing coaches are there.

He forgives them for that and still roots for him.

USA soccer? That's a little more complex.

Do You Hear The People Sing Of The Top 10 Moments In 2012

As TigerBlog said yesterday, he went to see the "Les Miserables" movie.

As a result, he will have the song "Do You Hear The People Sing" stuck in his head the entire time he runs down what are, in his opinion, the top 10 moments in Princeton's 2012 athletic year.

Again, as he said yesterday, this is a tough year to pick the top Princeton moment from the last 12 months. Since then, he's heard from a few people and has gotten no consensus on what the top story is.

That, alone, shows you what a great year it's been.

So, understanding that at least three national champions couldn't be No. 1, TigerBlog gives you his list of the top 10 Princeton athletic moments from 2012, with the full acknowledgement that not everyone's would be the same.

Oh, and the only caveat is that only what was done in a Princeton uniform counts, which eliminates the seven Olympic medals won by the Tigers. Otherwise, it's possible that Diana Matheson's goal in the bronze medal game or Caroline Lind's gold medal in rowing or Donn Cabral's eighth-place finish in the steeplechase might have been No. 1.

And with that said and the words "will you join in our crusade" playing over and over, here we go:

No. 10 - Men's swimming and diving wins fourth straight Ivy title.
Princeton's men's swimming and diving class of 2012 became the first in the program in 20 years to win the Ivy title all four years. John Christensen went 3 for 3 in finals at the Ivy championships as Princeton defeated runner-up Harvard by 79.5 points.

No. 9 - Men's lacrosse wins the Ivy League championship
Princeton, one year removed from an injury-destroyed 4-8 season, went a perfect 6-0 in the Ivy League to win the 26th league title in program history. Princeton, which outscored its six league opponents by a combined 81-35, defeated Cornell 14-9 on the final day of the regular season to clinch the title. 

No. 8 - Men's cross country wins the Ivy League and finishes 11th at the NCAA championships
Princeton went 1-2-4-7-12 to run away with the Heptagonal title, held on Princeton's own home course, as Chris Bendtsen and Alejandro Arroyo Yamin were the ones who finished 1-2. Princeton went on to finish 11th at the NCAA championship race, as Bendtsen (43rd), Arroyo Yamin (58th) and Tyler Udland (79th) all finished in the top 100.

No. 7 - Women's basketball reaches the national Top 25
The women's basketball team became the first Ivy League team ever to reach the national Top 25, as the Tigers moved into the No. 24 spot in the final poll of the regular season. Princeton went 14-0 in the Ivy League and was the only team in Division I - men's or women's - to have a perfect league record while winning every game by at least 10 points; Princeton, in fact, won 11 of its 14 league games by at least 20 points. The season ended with a three-point loss in the first round of the NCAA tournament to Kansas State.

No. 6 - Women's soccer goes a perfect 7-0-0 in the league and wins its opening round NCAA tournament game
The women's soccer team had the second-best season in program history (behind the 2004 NCAA Final Four team) and did something that no other Princeton team had ever done before. The women's soccer team, like men's lacrosse one year removed from a very rare losing season, had an 11-game winning streak in midseason that included a perfect run through the Ivy League, including a 4-2 win over Penn on Myslik Field at Roberts Stadium to clinch the outright championship and automatic bid to the NCAA tournament. Princeton then defeated West Virginia at West Virginia, winning on the road in the NCAA tournament for the first time.

No. 5 - Jonathan Yergler wins the NCAA epee title; Princeton finishes second
Jonathan Yergler earned a spot in the epee playoffs by the complex tiebreakers after the long qualifying session and then took full advantage, becoming the first Princeton fencer in 11 years to win an individual championship. Princeton also had its best finish in the combined team championship, finishing second behind Ohio State. Princeton swept the Ivy League championships for both men and women.

No. 4 - Donn Cabral wins the NCAA steeplechase championship
Donn Cabral ran away from the field at the NCAA's 3,000-meter steeplechase final in Iowa and in doing so, he became the first Princeton runner since 1934 to win an NCAA championship. Cabral's Princeton resume featured Ivy League championships and All-America honors in both cross country and track and field, and he went on from graduation to qualify for the Olympic team, reach the steeplechase final and then ultimately finish eighth.

No. 3 - Princeton defeats Harvard 39-34 in football
This football game is the only event on the list that didn't directly result in a championship, which shows you just how great a football game it was. Princeton trailed heavily favored Harvard 34-10 with 12 minutes to play and then came flying back, scoring three touchdowns with two two-point conversions to make it 34-32 and then having the dramatic final drive, which ended with Quinn Epperly's 36-yard touchdown pass to Roman Wilson with 13 seconds to play. It was a total classic, one of the greatest football games ever played in the history of the Ivy League.

And so this brings us to the final two, and TigerBlog is relatively sure that just about anyone's list of top events at Princeton in 2012 would end with these two. He's also reasonably sure that it would be split 50-50 as to which is No. 1.

This is how TB sees it:

No. 2 - Men's squash wins the national championship, ending Trinity's 13-year title streak
Trinity had won 13 straight national championships and had defeated Princeton to end the regular season. When the teams met again in the national final at the jammed courts in Jadwin Gym, Trinity held a 4-2 lead after the first two shifts and needed only one win in the final three matches to get its 14th straight title. Only it never came. Princeton won all three, with the deciding point from senior Kelly Shannon, to win 5-4 and spark a wild celebration. The party turned bittersweet when Princeton's beloved coach Bob Callahan was diagnosed with a brain tumor shortly after his team won the championship and then became an inspiration to everyone with the way Callahan continues to fight it.

No. 1 - Princeton wins the NCAA field hockey championship
Princeton had four players - Michelle Cesan, Julia Reinprecht, Katie Reinprecht and Kathleen Sharkey - miss the 2011 season as they trained for the Olympics. Their return for 2012 made Princeton immediately one of the main contenders for the NCAA title, but it would not be simple. Princeton stormed through the Ivy League at 7-0, outscoring its league opponents 45-1, but winning a national championship was going to be another matter. The previous 11 championships had all been won by teams from the Atlantic Coast Conference, and Princeton had to defeat three ACC teams in its final three games, knocking off Virginia in the quarterfinals, two-time defending champ Maryland in the semifinals and then No. 1 seed North Carolina in the final. It was the first NCAA field hockey championship in Ivy League history.

Anyway, that's how TigerBlog sees it for 2012.

Hopefully it'll be just as tough in 2013 - and for the same reason.

Not Live, From London

Raise your hand if you're one of the thousands of people who tweeted something along the lines of "Hey, NBC, people will watch live sports on Sunday afternoons. Signed - the NFL."

NBC refuses to do so. NBC refuses to do anything that might compromise its primetime ratings, which, by the way, have been up substantially over the Olympics of four years ago in Beijing.

And why? Because the Olympics have succeeded in attracting viewers who traditionally don't watch sports on TV - mostly women and BrotherBlog - and many of these viewers either aren't going to check who won an event in advance or know the outcome and will watch the primetime package anyway.

And what are these non-traditional viewers watching?

In order, it probably goes like this:

1. gymnastics
2. gymnastics
3. gymnastics
4. Michael Phelps
5. beach volleyball

TigerBlog actually wonders what NBC would have done had these Games been awarded to New York City. Would the network have been okay with having these events live in primetime, even though that would mean that the drama couldn't be pre-packaged?

TB thinks not. He thinks that to NBC, primetime at the Olympics is meant to be something along the lines of a reality show, and to see who the last one voted off is is what holds the audience. Live events don't always fit nicely into time slots, especially in gymnastics.

This decision by the network might be unpopular. Actually, it is unpopular - but that's just among sports fans.

It's not going to change, however.

TB gets that. What he doesn't understand is how NBC could show on tape delay the U.S. vs. South Korea in the women's epee fencing semifinal, a match that the U.S. was clearly losing, while at the exact same to-the-second moment, the U.S. and Russia were heading towards overtime in the bronze medal match.

And you want to talk about pressure? How about a bronze medal match?

You get to the semifinals and you have to win one of the next two to win a medal. Except if you lose the semifinal, you go from the verge of competing for a gold medal to the reality of having a loss deny you any medal.

That's why the fencing match against Russia was so heart-stopping. And only available online?

The U.S. won that match, giving Princeton two more bronze medals, with Susannah Scanlan and Maya Lawrence on the team.

Scanlan and Lawrence were part of a three bronze-medal day for the U.S. Saturday, along with Glenn Ochal, who won a bronze in the fours rowing.

Princeton's Donn Cabral didn't win a medal, but he did some extraordinary things in his two Olympic races, first earning a spot in the final and then leading for three laps and ultimately finishing eighth. Expect Cabral to be back in 2016.

TB was a bit frustrated with the steeplechase final. He went to NBC's website for the stream and was stuck with some buffering for awhile, so there were only three laps to go when he finally was able to see Cabral.

The Princeton medal count - which can be seen in a graphic on the main webpage - now stands at one gold, two silvers and three bronzes.
Still with a shot at a medal is Princeton's Diana Matheson, whose Canadian women's soccer team is in the dreaded semifinal against the U.S. today at 2:45. Japan and France meet in the other semifinal.

This, of course, begs the question of which team to root for, the Americans, because they're the Americans, or the Canadians, because they have a Princeton alum.

TigerBlog has loved the Olympics, even if things like the 100 meter final aren't being shown live and even if the announcers at beach volleyball insist on calling them Kerry and Misty, instead of by their last names, something that has tortured TB to an extent that surprises even him.

And hey, it's been a great Olympics for Princeton. Six medals. Maybe another one.

Go Canada.

Fencing Lessons

TigerBlog is learning more and more about fencing every day.

Among the things he's learned? Princeton is really good at it. And so is Jonathan Yergler.

What else does TB know now about the sport?

There are three weapons - the epee, sabre and foil. There are subtle differences in the swords themselves and also in where on the opponent's body where a touch equals a point.

Still, fencing remains mostly foreign to TB, though he can appreciate the job that Zoltan Dudas and his staff have done in establishing Princeton as a national power.

Princeton had its highest finish ever in the NCAA championships in their current format (the 1964 men won the title), finishing second to Ohio State. Yergler became an NCAA individual champion, as he won the epee title.

It's a huge accomplishment - and it's one that leaves the door open to take the last step.

The women's team would have taken that step each of the last two years had there been separate championships for the men and women. Instead, the NCAA fencing championships combine the two sexes into one, so Princeton had to settle for second behind the Buckeyes.

Princeton's women actually tied Ohio State on points. A year ago, Princeton's women would have been outright champ.

As for Yergler, he qualified for the individual championship by essentially point differential after his 23 bouts during the team event.

TB also learned about this.

Each team could qualify two fencers per weapon, for a total of 12 per team. There are 24 fencers per weapon, and they all go head-to-head, with bouts up to five points.

The top four fencers in the standings for each weapon go to the semifinals for the individual championships.

Yergler was tied for fourth after 23 bouts but got in on the tiebreaker, which is the scoring of each of the 23 bouts (think point differential). Once there, he won the title.

Here's another thing TB learned from the fencing championships:

Twitter is great.

TB kept checking Twitter on his iPhone to see how Princeton was doing. No muss. No fuss. Simple and easy.

Yeah, there are too many retweets going on that clutter up the medium, but TB doesn't follow that many people.

TB thinks that Princeton isn't using its Twitter feed enough. For that matter, he's not using his own TB Twitter feed enough.

Moving forward, we'll have to look into it and see what can be done.

Of course, TB also fears that the 140-character limit is having really negative effects on the way that people write, use grammar, spell and all.

For a college athletic department, though, Twitter is here to stay and needs to be maximized. It was great for the EIWA wrestling and the national squash championships as well.

As for fencing, it's a pretty fascinating sport.

TB wonders what kind of specific athletic skills are necessary to be a great fencer and how they'd carry over to other sports.

In the meantime, Princeton continues to excel at the sport, with an NCAA individual champion and an NCAA runner-up finish.

At least that's what it said on Twitter.

Winter Wonderland

Well, the long harsh winter is officially over. And now it's spring.

Of course, living here in the tropics, it's hard to differentiate between the two.

TigerBlog remembers when he used to live in an area of the country where there was a change of seasons, where each season flowed one to the other and the coming of spring was a time of rejuvenation and rebirth.

Of course, TB still lives in the same area.

This year, winter lasted from the overnight hours of Oct. 29 until the early evening of the same day. During that time, about five inches of snow fell on Princeton, and it destroyed what would have otherwise been some well-attended events, such as Princeton-Cornell football and Heps cross country.

Within three days of the snowstorm, temperatures reached the 50s, the snow disappeared, and spring was essentially here.

Oh, sure, there were a few flurries here and there, though nothing that required a snow shovel.

Spring lasted through December, January and February. And of course, now it's summer. High temperatures today, tomorrow and Friday will be in the 80s.

And there is the whole tropical nature to Central New Jersey as well, since it rains overnight and into the early morning, clears up and becomes sunny and hot - just like it does in the Virgin Islands.

If you're keeping score, TigerBlog wore his heavy winter coat once in the months that used to be considered winter. He cannot remember one day where he walked outside and said "holy shimolly, it's freezing out here."

In fact, there were probably more "no jacket" days than "jacket" days.

And there's your weather update.

The winter athletic season isn't quite over, and it could go out in a big way.

The NCAA fencing championships begin tomorrow at Ohio State, and Princeton has as good a chance as anyone to bring home the biggest trophy.

TigerBlog isn't exactly a fencing expert, but he did learn how the championships work.

Basically, there are three fencing weapons: sabre, epee and foil. Each weapon has 24 fencers who qualify for the NCAA event, and no school can have more than two fencers per weapon.

The men and women are counted together, and there is one NCAA team championship. That means the maximum number of fencers a school can qualify is 12 (two men and two women per weapon times three weapons), and Princeton is one of five schools to have qualified the maximum (St. John's, Harvard, Ohio State and Notre Dame are the other four).

Each fencer has a bout against the other 23 fencers in that weapon, and the first one to five touches wins a point for his/her team. Add up all the points, and there's your winner.

The top four in each weapon advance to the individual weapon championships.

The job that Princeton's fencing staff of Zoltan Dudas, Hristo Hristov and Szilvia Voros have done is remarkable. The Tigers have won five Ivy titles in the last three years between the men's and women's programs, and they head to Columbus with a legitimate chance of winning the NCAA title.

TB wonders how some of these athletes got into fencing in the first place. He knows little about the sport, and he wonders what the specific skills that it requires.

Fencing 23 bouts in two days seems like a lot. Is it? Is it an endurance contest, or are they so quick that 23 bouts is pretty much standard?

TB knows the answer to none of those questions. Seems like a pretty interesting sport, though, no?

In fact, basically all he knows about fencing is that he's rooting for the Tigers.

Grammys And Tigers

TigerBlog did something the other night that he can't remember ever doing before.

He watched the Grammy Awards.

The show started at 8:00 Sunday night on CBS. Of course, TB couldn't have avoided knowing that, since he got four identical text messages within five seconds of each other, all announcing that Bruce Springsteen was going to be opening the show.

And so TB tuned in to see The Boss, and he stayed tuned in for most of it.

This came on the heels of a pretty strong weekend of Princeton Athletics, and it all left TB with these thoughts:

* The new Springsteen album comes out in a few weeks, and TB has pre-ordered it on iTunes. Springsteen could put out an album of Gregorian chants and TB would pre-order it.

* The men's basketball game against Harvard featured a great atmosphere in Jadwin Gym. The building was designed to be a multi-purpose facility and as such sacrificed some of the amenities that a basketball-only building would have (not to mention it's 43 years old), but when it's nearly filled like it was the other night, it's still a great place to see a game.

* The song "We Take Care Of Our Own" that Springsteen has released and then performed with the E Street Band at the Grammys is pretty good, and TB can see himself using it for the Princeton Varsity Club senior banquet video in a few months. When the band plays live, it just looks like they're having an insane amount of fun, as opposed to trying so hard for the right look or statement or whatever so many other groups try to do. It's part of what makes them by far the best.

* TB isn't a huge fan of the rushing the court phenomenon, but he understands why the Princeton students did so after the win over Harvard, a it was a very spontaneous expression of excitement. As with the four text messages that he got about the Springsteen appearance, TB got four text messages from people watching on TV who wondered why Princeton would rush the court after beating Harvard, something Princeton has now done 23 straight years at Jadwin.

* There is no doubt what the highlight of the Grammys was (shockingly, it wasn't Springsteen), and TB will get to that in a few paragraphs. Hint - it wasn't the appearance by Super Bowl champs Victor Cruz and Mario Manningham, but that was fun to write.

* Harvard has to really hate Princeton when it comes to men's basketball, after the way Princeton beat the Crimson last year in the Ivy playoff and then this year at Jadwin, knocking Harvard out of the Top 25 like that. From the opening tip-off Saturday, it was clear that this was not just another game, and the electricity was present in the building from start to finish. From what TB understands, the ESPNU broadcast did a great job of capturing it.

* While not THE highlight of the Grammys, TigerBlog thought the Beach Boys tribute was outstanding. Maroon 5 did a great job on "Surfer Girl," especially lead singer Adam Levine, who was handed a song that is not easy to do. And then the group that TB had never heard of - Foster the People - did an even better job on "Wouldn't It Be Nice." When the original Beach Boys came out for "Good Vibrations," TB thought there was no way they'd be able to harmonize the way they used to, but they came close enough for it to be impressive. Except for Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, the Beach Boys are up there with any musical act TB has ever heard.

* The Princeton win over Harvard might not derail the Crimson from the league title and NCAA tournament, but it did make the challenge much greater. A Harvard win would have left the Crimson two games clear of the field, instead of the one-game edge that the team has over Yale and Penn (and two on Princeton and Cornell). Harvard has to play all four again, and Yale and Penn now know that if they win the rest of their games, they're assured of at least a tie for the league title. Had Harvard beaten Princeton, the race was over.

* Taylor Swift's performance was, well, impressive. As anyone who has a current middle school daughter can understand, TB has heard a million Miley Cyrus songs (from the days when elementary school girls couldn't get enough Hannah Montana) and very little Taylor Swift. Taylor Swift is a way better performer and doesn't appear to be heading towards the same train wreck that Miley seems to be embracing these days.

* Had Harvard's women beaten Princeton Saturday in Cambridge, then things would have looked much different in that race. Instead, Princeton defeated Harvard by 28 after leading by as many as 45, running its record to 7-0 in the league and, unlike the Harvard men, going up two games (in the loss column) on the field. Princeton has won its first seven league games by these margins of victories: 12, 25, 28, 29, 31, 35 and 59 points. TB is pretty sure that this year's Harvard and Yale women's teams are comparable to many teams that have won the league title; it's just that this Princeton team is extraordinarily special.

* TB has always been a Glen Campbell fan, and that part of the show was tremendous. Even if he's never heard of the country singers who did "Southern Nights" and "Gentle On My Mind," they were both awesome. Seeing Paul McCartney mouth the words of "Rhinestone Cowboy" was a little weird, and TB actually thought McCartney was borderline awful in his performances.

* Niveen Rasheed scored her 1,000th career point in the win over Harvard, which for any other player is a great accomplishment. For Rasheed, she can score two points or 30 points; she's the best Ivy League women's basketball player that TB has ever seen. And were it not for her torn ACL last year, she'd be at about 1,400 points right now. Still, scoring points isn't just what she does. She plays with ferocity, and she imposes her will on every aspect of every game she's in.

* TB was at the men's basketball game Saturday night when he found out that Whitney Houston had died. The Jennifer Hudson tribute at the Grammys was extremely well done, under difficult circumstances no less. When TB thinks of Whitney Houston, he will think of the inspirational version of the national anthem she sang at the Giants-Bill Super Bowl shortly after the start of the 1991 Gulf War. No other national anthem version has ever approached what she did.

* Princeton won the men's squash Ivy title with wins over Cornell and Columbia this weekend, and now attention turns to this weekend's national championships, here at Jadwin Gym. Princeton has as good a chance as anyone of coming away with the title, which Trinity has won 13 straight years.

* What in the world was Nikki Minaj thinking? And it was a little too much Chris Brown. And TB is not a fan of Bruno Mars, though he was pretty good in his performance. And Katy Perry fell into the category of "trying too hard."

* Princeton swept the fencing titles this past weekend, winning the women's championship as expected and defeated Harvard and Columbia 14-13 each to win the men's. That's five Ivy fencing titles between the team in the last three years.

* The duet of "It Had To Be You" with Tony Bennett and Carrie Underwood? Pretty close to perfect. TB would love to be able to croon.

* Princeton now has five Ivy titles for the academic year. Reaching the 15 that set the record a year ago is probably not going to happen, but the goal is always double figures. Can the Tigers get there? TB thinks so, though he doesn't want to get too far ahead of anything with any team.

* Finally, the highlight of the Grammys was without a doubt the performance of Adele, who sang "Rolling In The Deep." Adele won basically every award there was to win, and why not? She is a startling talented singer whose voice overwhelms the audience from the second she opens her mouth. Add in the fact that she's just singing her song while wearing a nice, simple outfit and without having to perfect some "look" or "brand" or without having to be a jerk about it, and she's even more impressive. It was impossible to watch/listen to her without being mesmerized.

Bird Watching

TigerBlog remembers reading somewhere that there are something like 100 billion birds on Earth, which means there are way more birds than people (seven billion or so).

Of the seven billion people, about a little more than 300,000,000 live in the United States.

Of the 100 billion birds, about six billion live in this country.

In other words, there are about 16 birds out there for every person in the United States.

Ever see the Hitchcock movie "The Birds?" It's a bit freaky, the way the birds seem to band together to attack humans, even as science suggests that is an impossibility.

As an aside, TB's favorite Hitchcock movie is "North by Northwest," though he's never seen a Hitchcock movie he didn't like.

At the end of "The Birds," the situation is very unresolved. Yes, the birds have done some serious damage, but have they really united, or is it all just coincidence that breeds paranoia?

There was one bird this morning - a red-tailed hawk - who sat perched above the dinky, looking down on the train and then flying away as it passed by.

TB would have assumed that the noise of the train would have frightened the bird away. Instead, the bird was mesmerized by the train, and it was only after the train left that the bird went on with its day.

Is this how it starts? Should TB worry about some kind of unifying bird situation that is it its infancy?

Nah, TB isn't too concerned that the 16 birds out there with his name on them are going to turn violent. Maybe messy, but not violent.

Still, if the birds are morphing into a higher form of intelligence - and if the red-tailed hawk wants to linger on campus for a few days - then he (or she) can see something that hasn't been seen at Princeton since, well, a long time ago.

The Princeton men's basketball team is at home this weekend, playing Friday night against Dartmouth and Saturday against Harvard.

The last time the Tigers were home? January 78, against the College of New Jersey.

The last time the Tigers were home against a Division I team? Not in January. Not in December, even. Nope, you have to go all the way back to Nov. 30, when the Tigers hosted Lafayette.

Princeton is now home for seven of its final nine games, but all of the travel - especially with five straight league games away from home - have taken a toll (and a lot of tolls), as the Tigers are 2-3 in the league.

Yes, Princeton dug an early hole with its loss at Cornell in the league opener, but coming out of exams at Penn Monday and then at Brown/Yale last Friday/Saturday was a bit much. In fact, it was fairly unfair.

The return of the men's basketball team to its home court is not the only big story for this coming weekend.

In fact, Princeton will have home events in men's squash, women's squash, men's swimming and diving, women's swimming and diving, wrestling, women's water polo, women's hockey and women's tennis. Between all those teams, there will be a total of 18 home events between Friday and Sunday.

And, of course, except for men's basketball, admission to all is free.

Between now and Sunday, the first four Ivy League champions of the winter will be crowned.

The Ivy League fencing championships (a two-day round-robin event being held at Yale) are Saturday and Sunday. Princeton is the defending champion and favorite on the women's side; the men's side is wide-open, with Princeton in the mix.

The men's and women's squash regular seasons end this weekend as well.

On the women's side, Harvard and Yale will play for the championship.

On the men's side, Princeton has already defeated Harvard and Yale and stands at 5-0 before hosting Cornell Friday and Columbia Saturday. One win means at least a share of the title, while two guarantees an outright title. Cornell, a much-improved team, is the clear No. 4 team in the league and will be a legitimate challenge.

And of course, lacrosse season is out there, just two weeks away for Princeton's men and women - and actually underway as of last weekend.

But hey, that's another story for another day.

For this weekend, there'll be plenty of in-season sports to watch around here.

And, presumably, plenty of birds, if that's preferable.

All Things Being Equal

As TigerBlog remembers the sweater, it was definitely something out of the early 1990s. It was black, and it had all kinds of color to the front.

When the 1992 Duke-Kentucky game was on ESPN Classic the other night, TigerBlog could see the sweater looking back at him from behind the Kentucky bench. TB was there covering the game for the newspaper, and he saw what is widely considered the greatest college basketball game ever played from a seat that put him almost in the middle of the Wildcat huddle, basically able to hear every word Rick Pitino said all night.

All while wearing what now would be considered a ghastly black sweater.

TigerBlog still gets rolled eyes and strange looks from people when he tells them that, if all sports were judged equally, then the 2009 national squash championship match between Princeton and Trinity would be considered among the greatest, if not the greatest, collegiate championship event of all-time.

In that match, Princeton fell just short of ending Trinity's winning streak, which had reached 202 at that point. The match took more than six tense hours in Jadwin Gym, and the team in control seemed to go back-and-forth every minute of those six hours.

Duke-Kentucky ends up on ESPN Classic. Trinity-Princeton gets rolled eyes.

Why? Because long ago, basketball became a mainstream sport, while most of the general sporting public doesn't know what squash is and has never seen it.

When TB worked at the newspaper, he found maybe the only person he's ever seen who looked at every sport as exactly equal, and that was Harvey Yavener. To Yav, a big squash match was equal to a big basketball game, and to some extent, it was that logic that led Yav to pass on Duke-Kentucky and send TB in the first place.

At Princeton, the mandate has always been to treat every sport equally, and for the most part, that's how it's done around here.

For instance, a look at the top seven stories on goprincetontigers.com at this moment shows that tennis, rowing, basketball, lacrosse, track and field, fencing and golf are all represented. No decision is ever made to feature one sport over another.

Of course, not everything is completely equal. For instance, Princeton only charges admission for five sports - football, men's and women's basketball, men's hockey and men's lacrosse, and almost all of the in-game promotions are centered around those five.

And back when media guides were produced, some sports had much bigger ones than others. And the football game program isn't quite the same as the one for, say, soccer or baseball or track and field.

Still, things around here at more egalitarian than they are at many places, and that's one of the best parts of working here. As TB loves to say, the football coach doesn't run the University.

And hey, let's pretend for a minute that everything is equal. In that case, today's bury-the-lead question is: In which sport is the Ivy League strongest nationally?

The usual answers are sports like squash and lacrosse and rowing, which make up the majority of the national championships Princeton has won during its current 40-year streak of having at least one team or individual win one.

TB will put men's soccer out there as well, with four teams having made the tournament a year ago and two of them having advanced to the quarterfinals.

Some others are as well, including wrestling and hockey.

One sport that gets overlooked, though, is fencing. Ivy League fencing is up there with any other sport.

As TB writes, the NCAA championships are just getting underway at Ohio State. Two things jumped out at TB from the release on goprincetontigers.com:

"In the final USFCA poll released Tuesday, March 22, the Ivy League champion Princeton women's team was ranked second behind Notre Dame, which received top billing in both polls. The Princeton men's team was ranked sixth. All seven Ivy League women's teams were ranked or receiving votes, as were five of the six Ivy men's programs."

and ...

"Princeton has had a Top 10 national finish in 18 straight trips to the finals."

TigerBlog will be the first to admit that he doesn't know much about fencing. Still, he has great respect for how competitive the Ivy League is and what a great job Zoltan Dudas and his staff have done of bringing Princeton back to the sport's elite.

Princeton has qualified the maximum number of fencers (12) that a school can, and it should be an interesting weekend in Columbus.

No, it'll never make ESPN Classic, and yes, the NCAA basketball tournaments, especially the men's, will completely eclipse the fencing as far as the public is concerned.

But in the Ivy League, it's different, and so fencing will have its share of the spotlight this weekend.

As it should be. It's part of why the Ivy League is a unique place.

Defending Champs

It was back in eighth grade, TigerBlog believes, that he had to memorize maps of the different continents for social studies. It might have been seventh, though TB is positive it was in middle school and pretty sure it was in eighth.

The map of Europe, for some reason, was always a bit problematic for TB, maybe because there were so many small countries as opposed to, say, Asia or South America. This was especially true of Central and Eastern Europe, and TB has strong memories of taking forever to figure out which country was which.

The funny part in looking back on it is that at the time, TB probably figured that the European borders were set in stone and couldn't possibly ever change. And now, the part of the map that TB struggled to learn hardly exists anymore.

The Soviet Union has split into 15 different countries. What was then Yugoslavia is now seven independent countries - TB will give extra credit if you can name five of the seven.

Czechoslovakia is gone as well. At least it's a less confusing outcome, with the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

One country that has enjoyed relative stability - except for an unfortunate alliance with Austria that sort of dragged the whole world into war back in 1914 - is Hungary.

In fact, Hungary is also one of the oldest countries on Earth, dating back to the year 895, and it has a culture and history that is to be expected of a nation that old.

Its role in the collapse of communism in Europe and in bringing down the Iron Curtain is very significant, particularly with its 1956 revolution against the Soviets and the decision to open its border with Austria in 1989.

It is bordered by seven countries, though that number was five when TB was learning the map.

Oh, and what was then Yugoslavia is now these countries: Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovena, Croatia, Kosovo, Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia. And back when TB was learning the map, he also had to learn that capitals, so the whole process is now that much more difficult.

If TigerBlog is correct, then all but three of Princeton's head coaches are Americans, many of whom, by the way, were All-Americas.

Of the remaining three, two are Canadians - men's hockey coach Guy Gadowsky and men's tennis coach Glenn Michibata.

The third is men's and women's fencing coach Zoltan Dudas, who is Hungarian.

Dudas is in his fifth season as the head coach of the two Princeton teams, and this coming weekend is a huge one for Dudas and his programs.

Princeton will be defending both the men's and women's championships at the Ivy League fencing matches, which will be held at Jadwin Gym Saturday and Sunday. The Ivy League fencing titles are decided by this format, with each team fencing each other over a two-day span at one site, which rotates among the seven fencing schools (no Dartmouth). This year happens to be Princeton's turn.

Of all of the sports at Princeton, fencing is probably the one that TigerBlog understands the least. About all he knows is that points are awarded for touches, there are three weapons and the team scores add up to 27 for a match, meaning that a team needs to win 14 bouts to get the win.

TB sat in the event meeting this week and heard about how the fencing strips would be brought from the fencing room on C level up to the main floor for the event and how each strip weighs 1,000 pounds.

Another thing that TB knows about fencing is that Ivy League teams are very good at it.

On the women's side, Harvard is ranked third nationally, followed by Princeton at fourth, Columbia sixth and Penn eighth.

The men also have four of the top eight teams. Harvard is ranked second nationally, while Princeton, Penn and Columbia go 6-7-8.

Still, Princeton is at home, and the Tigers went unbeaten on both sides a year ago. And with such a strong field, it's possible that no team will go through undefeated.

Jadwin Gym will be hosting all kinds of events this weekend, including squash, tennis and of course two big women's basketball games.

Fencing, as it often does, may drift into the background, a little off the radar for most people.

Still, it'll be worth checking out.

Two Ivy League champions will be crowned here at Jadwin this weekend. It could be Princeton on both sides - but it certainly won't be easy on either.

Five In 19

Okay, everyone, repeat after TigerBlog: "While the 2010 Olympic men's hockey final was a great game, it was not in the same universe as the 1980 U.S. win."

TB couldn't take it anymore. National heroes? National pride? In yesterday's game? No way.

Canada's overtime win over the U.S. was an exciting game, filled with drama and huge swings in emotion. It was also great to see professionals playing so hard on teams filled with guys they'll be playing against and against guys they'll be playing with starting tonight. As sporting events go, you couldn't have asked for much more.

Still, to hear the studio commentators gush over this game - TB believes Jeremy Roenick was near tears - was ridiculous. One called it "the most anticipated hockey game of all time."

Sorry, but unless you're at least 40, you missed out on the 1980 "Miracle on Ice." And, as such, you should know that no sporting event will ever be able to recapture that magic, not only as sport itself but also in context of the international events of the day.

This game was American pros and Canadian pros. That game was American college kids and Soviet pros. Not Russians. Soviets. All while Americans were being held hostage in Iran and American national pride was at perhaps an all-time low. The hockey gold medal began to reverse that tide and helped propel Ronald Reagan into the Presidency nine months later.

And, if you're an American living in Pittsburgh who is a huge hockey fan, can you be that upset that Sidney Crosby scored the game-winning goal?

And, if you're a Princeton sports fan, how could you be upset about anything that happened this weekend?

Princeton did something amazing this past weekend. In a span of 19 hours beginning Saturday night, Princeton teams combined to win five Ivy League championships. Five Ivy championships in 19 hours.

It's a ridiculous achievement. Five teams - 192 total athletes - who won Ivy League titles this weekend.

It started with the women's swimming and diving team, who wrapped up the program's ninth league championship in 11 years Saturday night. Then, on Sunday, both indoor track and field teams and both fencing teams won their league titles.

The winter, of course, isn't over, and Princeton has a chance for two more league titles in the next week-plus as the men's swimming and diving team looks to repeat last year's title and the women's basketball team looks to close out its marvelous run this winter.

The men's swimming and diving team hosts the Ivy League championships at DeNunzio Pool beginning Thursday.

The women's basketball team takes a two-game lead into the final three games, a trip to Dartmouth (Friday) and Harvard (Saturday) before a home game against Penn next Tuesday. The women would have to lose all three and have Harvard win all three of its games (Penn, Princeton, Dartmouth) for the Tigers not to get at least a share of the title; the magic number is two for the outright title and NCAA berth.

But that's for the future. Let's get back to this past weekend.

Trying to get some historical perspective, let's go back to the eight league schools and their Ivy title totals for the last 10 academic years. That's eight schools x 10 years, for a total of 80 academic years.

Of those 80 academic years, a total of 46 ended up in fewer than five Ivy titles for the year. Another 12 ended up with exactly five. Factor out Princeton, and that's 70 years, with 46 having fewer than five for the year and 11 having five.

That's for a whole year. Not a season. And certainly not a 19-hour stretch.

Heading into the weekend, the 2009-10 academic year had Harvard in the lead with three Ivy League titles, while Princeton, Cornell and Penn had two each. Now, Princeton has seven, while Cornell (added men's basketball) and Harvard have three each (Yale joined the group with two by winning men's hockey).

Princeton had a 4.5-point lead over Harvard in the unofficial Ivy League all-sports points standings prior to the weekend. Today, with those five sports (plus men's hockey) added in, Princeton's lead stands at 24 points over Harvard and 36.5 points over third place Penn and Cornell. Should that lead hold up, it would be the 24th straight year that Princeton will have won.

TigerBlog often thinks of Princeton's sustained athletic success as remarkable and at the same time cautionary. It is not Princeton's birthright to win every year. It takes a strong commitment, especially from the coaches and athletes who make it happen.

And, don't forget, every other school in the league knows full well what Princeton has done, this past weekend and for the last 23+ years. And, TigerBlog suspects, they don't like it very much.

But that's for another time. Today is all about a remarkable weekend.

As TB was writing, an assistant coach stopped in the doorway and asked if five Ivy titles is a record for a weekend.

TigerBlog can't really look that up, but he's going to assume it is. And whether it is or not, it's still a great Monday to be a Princeton fan.

On The Fence

TigerBlog is often asked by non-lacrosse fans if teams ever pull their goalies when they're down at the end, like they do in hockey. The answer is: sort of.

Lacrosse goalies come out and try to double-team the ball and force turnovers late in games when their team is down. At the same time, you can't achieve an offensive advantage like you can when you pull your goalie in hockey, because you have to keep four players on defense and three on offense at all times. If you sent an extra offensive player across midfield, it'd be offsides, change of possession.

TB considers himself to know a great deal about the rules of lacrosse, and other sports, especially football, basketball and baseball. At one time, TB was a high school baseball umpire; had he stayed in the newspaper business and had several afternoons free, he'd still be doing it.

As an aside, it is TB's contention that there are a ton of professional athletes who don't know all the rules of their sport, and situations in which highly paid pros obviously don't know how to play a particular moment because they don't know the rules comes up all the time.

It doesn't seem like soccer has that many rules. Field hockey does have a lot of rules, many of which are somewhat complicated, but TB learned them a long time ago from Beth Bozman, the former Princeton coach.

Some sports are relatively easy to figure out. Track and field, cross country, swimming, rowing - hey, whoever wins wins. Squash? Hit it above the red line into the other box on the serve, and keep it off the tin. Water polo? Anything goes under the water.

The points system in wrestling is fairly straightforward. Tennis couldn't be easier to figure out, once you give up trying to figure out why it goes love-15-30-40. Volleyball is a bit challenging at first, but the scoring is basic.

Golf has very complex rules that TB doesn't know that well, but it's a somewhat straightforward game.

And then there's fencing, a sport that TigerBlog knows almost nothing about. About all that TB knows is that there are three weapons (epee, sabre, foil; they all have very unique features to them), that during a match each team has three fencers compete in each of the three weapons for a total of 27 bouts and that the first team to 14 points will win.

Another thing he knows about fencing is that Princeton had a pretty good weekend last week.

Both the men and the women went 3-0 in the league after beating Yale, Brown and Penn in Ithaca last Sunday. The men are the only unbeaten in the league; the Princeton and Columbia women are both 3-0, and they will meet this coming Sunday at 11 a.m. as part of the final day of Ivy competition at Penn.

TB watched the video of the clinching point Princeton had against Yale from last Sunday, and he honestly can't figure out what was happening. Either way, it made the final score 14-13.

TigerBlog ventured down to the fencing room yesterday to congratulate head coach Zoltan Dudas, who is in charge of the men's and women's teams. Along the way, TB figured he could learn a little more about the sport.

TB and Dudas go back a few years, when Dudas asked TB to play squash with him. TB happily accepted, only to have Dudas tear his Achilles tendon on the first point, an injury that sent the coach to surgery and about a year of recovery. These days, TB mostly sees Dudas and his assistants, Hristo Hristov and Szilvia Voros, when they come up to the mailroom next to HQ to make coffee.

Anyway, TB's conversation with Dudas yesterday was in the fencing room, located on C level of Jadwin next to the Zanfrini Room. It features fencing strips across the long room, which features numerous pictures on the wall of past fencing greats and great fencing moments. There is a huge picture of Michel Sebastiani, the longtime Princeton coach, on the wall next to Dudas' office.

Dudas is Hungarian, and he was introduced to the sport when he was seven. Proudly, Dudas pointed out to TB that Hungary has won more Olympic medals in fencing than in any other sport. It ranks up there in Hungary with water polo and team handball as the most popular sports.

Dudas came to this country 10 years ago to coach, and he ended up at Notre Dame as an assistant before succeeding Sebastiani at Princeton.

Unlike years past, Princeton's roster is comprised of recruited fencers rather than sprinkled with walk-ons. Dudas said that fencers come to excel at one of three weapons somewhat randomly, as most clubs where young fencers are first exposed to the sport don't offer all three.

An amiable sort, Dudas appears to have forgiven TB for taking out his Achilles. These days, he's coming off one big weekend and heading towards another, with a pair of Ivy League titles to be decided.

But that was still six days away when TB went to visit Dudas yesterday afternoon. His fencing room was quiet, the coach was happy to talk about his sport with a novice, one who might not know too much about fencing, but one who knows that good things are happening in the sport at Princeton.

In a Little-Known Corner of C-Level in Jadwin...

Third-year fencing coach Zoltan Dudas picked up the TigerBlog line yesterday seeking some results of the Princeton-Penn women’s fencing matches from the recent past.

There’s a trophy that alternates between the winners, Dudas said, and the engraving on the front hadn’t been updated in several years, from 2004 forward.

TigerBlog had no knowledge of this trophy, and for good reason. It hasn’t been in Jadwin Gym since it left in 2004, instead making a home for itself in Penn’s Hutchinson Gym.

In 2004, Penn won 18-9. In 2005, Penn won 20-7. In 2006, it was Penn 16, Princeton 11. In 2007, Penn 18, Princeton 9. Last season, Penn 20, Princeton 7.

In 2009, Princeton 15, Penn 12.

With everything that goes on this time of year, spring sports beginning and winter sports winding toward their conclusions, such impressive achievements sometimes slip by in everything that goes into keeping the news around a 38-sport varsity program up to date. But the fencers have earned a nod for their achievements this season, and it’s a notably youthful cast turning around history like the Princeton-Penn series.

Less than two weeks ago, the men’s and women’s teams each posted third-place finishes at the Ivy League round-robin event. The women hadn’t finished third since 2004 and the men since 2006. There is still work to be done, as the women haven’t won an Ivy League title since 2001 and the men since 2000, but it’s moving in the right direction.

Five Tigers, all freshmen, earned All-Ivy honors. (There’s only one All-Ivy team in fencing, no second team as in other sports.) That’s the most since 2005.

Even more impressive news came this week, when Princeton earned the maximum 24 bids for the NCAA Regional, to be held this Saturday at Drew University in Madison, N.J. With the records available, TigerBlog isn’t sure of the last time that happened, but it’s quite high compared to recent years.

Last season, 15 Tigers went to the NCAA Regional. It was 15 as well in 2007 after 13 in 2006.

The 2009 regional group counts 10 freshmen, six sophomores, seven juniors and just one senior, which looks to give the Tigers some staying power as the improvement continues. The lone senior is Jasjit Bhinder, a four-time NCAA Regional participant who has earned NCAA Championship bids in each of the past two seasons.

There are 12 schools in the Mid-Atlantic/South region that will send fencers (some as many as Princeton's 24) to Saturday’s meet, and of those, five to seven individual fencers from each of the six weapons will earn bids to the NCAA national meet at Penn State in two weeks.

Princeton has had individual success almost annually at the national meet in recent years. Graham Wicas won a bronze medal in the épée as a freshman last season. Ben Solomon ’06 did the same as a senior, the same year Jacqueline Leahy ’06 won silver in the foil.

But the NCAA Championships are decided on points based on the total finish of everyone at the championships from a particular school, men’s and women’s combined. Last season’s champion, Ohio State, had the maximum 12 fencers (two per weapon) qualified for the national final, which is a good place to start if a team has designs on the national title. Princeton finished 10th and had six fencers in the national event.

Since the NCAA began sponsoring a national championship in 1990, Princeton has qualified fencers every year since 1992 with a high team finish of fourth in 1994, 1996 and 1999.

It remains to be seen whether and by how much Princeton’s finish will improve at the final this season. But as they say in the sport, en garde!