Women's lacrosse captures outright Ivy title with 10-6 win over Brown

There's an old sports saying: "It's not whether you win or lose, but how you play the game."

Luckily for women's lacrosse, that saying isn't exactly true. As long as you win, it doesn't really matter how you do it.

When Princeton headed to Providence, R.I., to take on Brown — tied for sixth in the Ivy League — the first-place Tigers were expected to blowout the Bears. Saturday's game was certainly no blowout — the Tigers only led by one point at halftime — but the final score was Princeton 10, Brown 6, giving the Tigers their fifteenth straight win and the Ivy League championship.

"Although we won the game, we did not play as well as we would have liked," senior attack Charlotte Kenworthy said.

"Defensively, there were some great plays made that unfortunately the attack could not end with a goal. To Brown's credit, they have a great goalie [senior Niki Caggiano] who stepped up and played a great game."

Indeed, Princeton took 39 shots to Brown's 17, giving Princeton a much lower shooting percentage than its opponent — partly because of Caggiano's impressive 18 saves.

Brown, although the underdog, was unwilling to go down without putting up a fight, which it did for most of the first half. Princeton freshman attack Lindsey Biles opened up the game with a goal at three minutes, 11 seconds, assisted by junior defender Rachael Becker. Less than a minute later, Brown's sophomore midfielder Laurel Pierpont reponded with one for the Bears.

The Tigers answered back with a 3-0 run, led off by senior attack Lauren Simone scoring her team-high 40th goal of the season. Once again, though, the Bears were unwilling to die quietly, scoring back-to-back goals of their own and narrowing the score to 4-3.

It went that way for the rest of the half. Princeton sophomore midfielder Mary Beth Hogan scored off an assist from senior midfielder Mimi Hammerberg at 25:31, followed quickly by a goal by Kenworthy at 26:45, to give Princeton a 6-3 lead. But then Brown scored two goals of its own at 27:49 and 28:52. At the halftime buzzer, Princeton led 6-5.

However, the Tigers came out firing in the second half with senior attack Kim Smith's goal less than a minute into play.

Where the first half had been an unlikely quid pro quo between the two teams, the second half was somewhat more characteristic of the dominating play the Tigers have demonstrated all season.

"Brown was a really fast and strong team," Becker said. "Their goalie was also very good and we struggled a little bit in the first half. We played hard and stepped it up in the second half and played much better."

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After Smith's goal, neither team scored for 17 minutes, but Princeton came back with three straight goals to bring the tally to 10-5. Brown did have one final statement, scoring the final goal of the contest with about two minutes left in play, but Princeton took home the win.

The victory, capping off what has been a wildly successful regular season for the Tigers, was the team's 15th win in a row, extending what was already the longest winning streak in the nation and breaking a school record for the longest streak in program history.

This year's title marks Princeton's sixth Ivy championship, second in a row, and first outright title since 1996. Last year the Tigers shared the title with Dartmouth.

"It was really exciting to win the title outright," Becker said.

Princeton, ranked No. 1 in the nation for the past three weeks, finishes its season 15-1 (7-0 Ivy) and now turns its sights to the national tournament, which begins May 9.

Because it holds the conference title, Princeton earns the Ivy League's automatic bid to the tournament.

It will be the team's fifth straight NCAA tournament appearance and 12th overall. The bracket will be announced next Sunday, with the Tigers looking for their first ever No. 1 seed. If it's true that history repeats itself, Princeton has history on its side heading into the tournament. The last time the Tigers won back-to-back Ivy titles, in 1993 and 1994, they went on to win the 1994 national title. Nevertheless, the team is confident, but not overconfident.

"While we have set our goals high, we know how challenging the tournament will be," Kenworthy said. "Every team comes in with a blank slate and to go 4-0 will be a battle.

"I am very confident in my teammates that we can continue the great play and disciplined mentality that has contributed to such an amazing regular season."

"We need to stay focused going into the tournament," Becker said, "because anything can happen, and we are just really excited at the possibilities that lie ahead."