Sports: April 16, 1997
Women's Lax Works Out the Kinks, Men Roll
After difficult start, women win two; men's lacrosse misses Hubbard but wins anyway
What a wake-up call. Twelve minutes into the season, the women's lacrosse team (2-3 overall, 1-0 Ivy) was behind, 5-0, at Georgetown on March 6. Though Princeton rallied and held a 7-5 advantage in the second half, the Tigers ended up losing, 8-7. Then they lost again, falling 10-6 to Virginia on March 16. A difficult 9-8 defeat in overtime at the hands of James Madison came two days later, when Princeton lost a two-goal halftime lead and then gave up the winning goal with 27 seconds left in the extra period.
After a five-year stretch of dream seasons in which the women's lacrosse team earned three Ivy titles, five NCAA Final Four berths, and one national championship, 1997 was starting to look like a nightmare. Without six of its starters from last year, two pillars of its defense, goalie Erin O'Neill '96 and defender J. J. Lonsiger '96, Princeton had trouble keeping attackers out. Its goalie prospects, Laura Field '00 and Amber Mettler '99, were still making the adjustment to top-level college lacrosse. And the team had lost most of its scorers.
But in its next two games, Princeton showed success might just be a matter of time. This team wasn't asleep, it was just tuning up. In their first three games, the Tigers "had trouble at times," according to midfielder Janice Petrella '97. And against top-ten teams like Georgetown, Virginia and James Madison, that wasn't good enough. But in Princeton's next game-an 11-2 rout of Harvard on March 22-the team's offense, defense, and goal-tending all clicked together.
"Today we played well the whole game," said Petrella after the match. "We have the speed and the strength, we just have to play 60 minutes." Melissa Cully put it another way after an 18-3 demolition of Lafayette four days later: "This year we have a lot of moving parts, not like last year, when there were a few who would just take charge," said the junior attack, who had just logged three assists and two goals. "We've been trying to work out the kinks as far as knowing when to pass to whom and what cuts they like. It's been a process."
The games with Harvard and Lafayette showed that process was pretty far along, as the Tiger machine began to hum. On offense, sharp passing and sharper cuts made goal-scoring look easy, especially against Lafayette, when eight different Tigers found the net. Attack Casey Coleman '97 led the team, scoring four times. "We were really up today after our slow start, we knew we had to start getting some wins," she said. "We have to be on fire every time we play. We have to go out there thinking that no matter what the score is, we are down."
On defense, a forest of sticks warded off opponents' attacks. Captains Petrella and defender Carter Marsh '97, along with midfielder Johanna Deans '99, were especially ferocious, as Princeton consistently forced the Crimson and the Leopards behind and away from the Princeton net, waiting for their opponents to make a mistake. "We're looking for the defense to spur a lot of opportunities on offense," said coach Chris Sailer after the Lafayette game. When the mistakes came, the Tigers pounced, stick-checking and intercepting passes to get the ball and begin their counterattack.
Sailer also commended the play of Field, who claimed the starting role at James Madison. "Laura is playing much more consistently," she said. "These two games gave her some confidence, but she'll be challenged a lot more in the next few games."
To make the eight-team NCAA tournament, Princeton will have to prove it belongs with the opponents it lost to early on. To do that, the Tigers will have to be perfect, or nearly so, the rest of the way. They must prove they have the best team in the North by winning the Ivy title, according to Sailer. (A match on the road against Dartmouth on March 29 was the challenging beginning to the team's league slate.) She says the Tigers will also have to prove they're the best team in the mid-Atlantic region, making an April 3 match with Temple, a match at Delaware on April 16, and an April 19 match against Penn State extremely important.
But the team's tournament bid could hinge on a game outside its league and outside the region, when the Tigers visit defending-champion Maryland on April 30. The Terrapins, who knocked Princeton out of the tournament in a controversial national-semifinal game last year, will challenge the team's skill and its mental strength. According to Coleman, the Tigers will be ready: "I think Maryland is a team that can be beaten this year, because they've had a lot of close games," she said. "The title is there for the taking. Penn State started out 0-3 in 1995 and they made it to the Final Four. We can do that, too."
MEN'S LACROSSE
The men (4-0 overall, 0-0 Ivy) started their season with four wins against nationally ranked opponents, despite being without star attackman Jesse Hubbard '98 for three of them. Hubbard, who won first-team all-America honors last year in addition to scoring the game-winner in the national championship match against Virginia, injured his shoulder in a scrimmage on February 22. As a result, he sat out an overtime win over number-three Johns Hopkins, 7-6, on March 1; an overtime win over number-two Virginia, 14-13, on March 8; and a 10-9 victory at number-eight North Carolina on March 16.
Princeton was far from infallible over that stretch, however. In the first two games, the Tigers were shaky on defense late in regulation, giving up solid leads to let its opponents come back to tie. Against the Tar Heels, Princeton was behind, 8-4, in the third quarter before rebounding for the win.
Hubbard returned to the field March 22 and led Princeton to a 18-6 tromping of number 19 Penn State in State College, Pennsylvania, with four goals and two assists. The win was coach Bill Tierney's 100th as a coach and stretched the Tigers' winning streak to 17. They last lost to Virginia, 12-9, on March 9, 1996, in Charlottesville.
Princeton will play at Cornell on April 19. When last the Tigers played there, in 1995, the Big Red scored a 9-8 upset victory. Princeton hosts Dartmouth on April 26 and plays at Penn on April 30.
-Paul Hagar '91
Successful Seasons End in Slumps for Winter Sports
If success in the regular season was the rule for most of Princeton's winter sports this year, so were disappointing finishes. High hopes for men's basketball (24-4 overall, 14-0 Ivy) in the NCAA tournament ended March 13 with a 55-52 loss to California in the first round. An exception was women's basketball (7-19 overall, 6-8 Ivy), which reversed its early-season struggles to win four of its last five games.
In women's squash (10-2 overall, 7-2 Ivy), team captain Katherine Johnson '97 won the individual national title on March 2, leading a strong contingent that placed three other Tigers into the quarterfinal round. But in Howe Cup competition on February 14 to 16, the Princeton team fell short. The Tigers had wanted to end a Crimson dynasty, but were edged out by Harvard, 5-4. The men's squash team (8-4 overall, 5-1 Ivy) had also hoped to upset Harvard in the Intercollegiate Squash Team tournament on February 21 to 23, but ended up in fourth after losing to Trinity and Amherst.
Ivy champion men's fencing (12-2 overall, 4-0 Ivy), wanted to follow up its league title with a team victory at Easterns title, but instead came in second. The Tigers also aimed to better last year's fourth-place finish nationally, but ended up placing 10th among the 27 teams at the NCAA Championships, which were held March 20-23 in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Defending sabre champion Max Pekarev '99 finished in 10th place, just ahead of teammate Graham Brooks '98, in 13th. For women's fencing (10-7 overall, 1-4 Ivy), épée Caitlin Rich '99 came in seventh at nationals.
Harvard was also the nemesis of men's swimming (10-0 overall, 9-0 EISL); Princeton lost, 839.5-701.5, at the Easterns tournament (February 26 to March 1) on its home "turf" of Denunzio Pool, after having beaten Harvard in the regular season. Senior Tom Pierce led the Tigers by winning the 50 freestyle and the 100 butterfly and swam on the victorious 200 freestyle relay team. women's swimming (6-2 overall, 5-2 EWSL) came in second as well, losing to Brown at Denunzio, 738-681, at the Easterns tournament, held February 19 to 22.
women's track (3-0 overall, 3-0 Ivy) won indoor Heps in February. The team sent a middle-distance relay team (Tanya Baker '97, Nyaka Niilampti '97, Michelle D'Agostino '98, and Katie Talarico '97) and sprinter Nicole Harrison '98 to NCAAs on March 7 and 8, but they exited early. men's track (5-0 overall, 3-0 Ivy) came in second at indoor Heps and 28th at the IC4A meet.
women's ice hockey (13-16 overall, 6-4 Ivy, 12-10 ECAC) showed signs of resurgence behind the scoring of Karen Chernisky '97. Under first-year coach Jeff Kampersal '92, Chernisky and classmate Mandy Pfeiffer tallied 36 and 37 points, respectively. Princeton lost to New Hampshire, 5-4, in overtime in the quarterfinals of the ECAC tournament.
Men's Ice Hockey Slips in ECAC Final Four
It began with an ecstatic celebration in Burlington, Vermont. It ended with a dejected handshake in Lake Placid, New York. With a late-season surge, men's hockey (18-12-4 overall, 11-10-3 ECAC) blew into the postseason, knocking off the University of Vermont in the quarterfinals of the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) playoffs (March 7 to 9). With the win, Princeton headed to the tournament Final Four for the second time in three years, before losing to top-seed Clarkson in the semifinal round on March 14.
After a strong start, the second half of the Tigers' season was a rough one. A four-game winless streak in February put them in danger of falling into seventh place. But with three regular-season games left, Princeton got a pair of inspired wins, beating Vermont, 2-0, on February 22 and Union, 3-2 in overtime, on February 28, to set up a battle for fourth place against Rensselaer (RPI) in the regular-season finale on March 1. When the Tigers lost, 3-2, they missed getting home-ice advantage for the quarterfinal round of the playoffs.
The Tigers' opponent in the best-of-three series was third-seeded Vermont, which featured all-America forwards Martin St. Louis and Eric Perrin and a stellar goalie, Tim Thomas. The team was also faced with a loud, dedicated crowd at the Catamounts' arena, Gutterson Fieldhouse ("the Gut"), where the wait for season tickets is 15-20 years and spectators run to their seats when the gates open. In the first game, the Tigers used the hostile surroundings as motivation, overcame a shaky first period and Vermont's partisan fans, and used a neutral-zone trap to shut down the Catamounts' potent offense. In the third period, right wing Jean Verdon '97 scored twice to give Princeton a 3-2 win.
Vermont would not lose the series without a fight, blitzing the Tigers, 7-1, in the second game to set up a deciding game on March 9. Princeton was up for the challenge. The Tigers dominated through the first two periods with solid passing and forechecking and took a 3-1 lead into the locker room at the second intermission. They then had to withstand a spirited counterattack from Vermont, which rattled off 19 shots in the third. The barrage thrilled their fans, but only resulted in a single goal.
Goalie Erasmo Saltarelli '98 started all three games and was outstanding in two of them. Saltarelli, who saw his playing time increase dramatically near the end of the season, improved his play as well, finishing with a stellar .904 save percentage and 2.64 goals-allowed average, ranking him among the ECAC leaders.
Lake Placid, best remembered for the U.S.'s "Miracle on Ice" win over the Russians in the 1980 Olympics, hosted the ECAC Final Four. The Tigers got there with hopes for a miracle of their own and memories of 1995, when Princeton ended up in second place after finishing its regular season with a losing record.
But the weekend turned out to be a disappointment for Tiger fans. On March 14, Princeton turned in an uninspired performance against the tournament's top seed, Clarkson, in the semifinals, losing 5-1. The Tigers could never seem to catch fire against the Golden Knights, and Clarkson's Todd White got a hat trick against a sloppy Princeton defense. "We tried to spread the ice with our speed," said head coach Don Cahoon, who was one of eight coaches nominated by the American Hockey Coaches Association as Coach of the Year. "But I don't know if we had the jump. They wore us down on a couple of forechecks." Fourth-seeded RPI got its revenge on Princeton in the consolation game, winning 8-4.
Despite the results of the championship weekend, Princeton surpassed the expectations of many this season. Preseason polls had predicted a ninth-place finish for the team. The Tigers will lose five seniors, including captains O'Connor and Tony Ranaldi, but they return a strong core of players. The defense, anchored by Steven Shirreffs '99 and Auger, should be solid, and the Tigers' top offensive line returns as well.
If the cadre of returnees plays well, their season may not end with a somber handshake. They may not need a miracle. The Tigers could be the team to beat.
-Shirley Wang '99
Scoreboard
Baseball
(2-9 overall, 0-0 Ivy)
Citadel 16, Princeton 10
Charleston So. 9,
Princeton 4
Princeton 4,
Charleston So. 1
Citadel 8, Princeton 4
Coll. of Charleston 14,
Princeton 5
Coll. of Charleston 5,
Princeton 3
Coll. of Charleston 7,
Princeton 2
Coll. of Charleston 8,
Princeton 0
Women's Lacrosse
(2-3 overall, 1-0 Ivy)
James Madison 9,
Princeton 8 (OT)
Princeton 11, Harvard 2
Princeton 18, Lafayette 3
Men's Lacrosse
(4-0 overall, 0-0 Ivy)
Princeton 18, Penn St. 6
Men's Tennis
(2-5 overall, 0-0 Ivy)
San Diego 7, Princeton 0
San Diego St. 6,
Princeton 1
Pepperdine 6, Princeton 1
UC-Santa Barbara 7,
Princeton 0
UC-Irvine 6, Princeton 1
Princeton 4, Minnesota 3
Women's Tennis
(2-3 overall, 0-0 Ivy)
Princeton 8,
N. Colorado 1
San Diego St. 6,
Princeton 1
Princeton 9,
Illinois-Chicago 0
San Diego 5, Princeton 4
Softball
(9-10 overall, 0-0 Ivy)
Princeton 8,
UNC-Charlotte 0
UNC-Charlotte 4,
Princeton 3
Furman 4, Princeton 3
Princeton 6, Furman 4
S. Carolina 2, Princeton 0
S. Carolina 8, Princeton 0
Ill.-Chicago 10,
Princeton 0
Princeton 6, Ill.-Chicago 3
Princeton 4, Winthrop 3
NLU 3, Princeton 0
Princeton 3,
Coll. of Charleston 0
Princeton 6, Furman 1
Princeton 3,
UNC-Charlotte 2
Akron 7, Princeton 0