Big plays on defense lead football team to victory over Brown

In a game that boasted the top passing offense in I-AA football, one would expect that the Princeton-Brown game played Saturday would be filled with huge offensive plays in the air. But no matter how good the Bears' passing attack may have been, it met a brick wall in the Tigers' passing defense.

The Bears boasted top rankings in several categories in I-AA football: the top receiver was Chas Gessner, who averaged 11.75 receptions per game; the top passer was Kyle Slager, who averaged 25.5 completions per game; and the top passing offense was Brown, averaging 344.3 yards per game. Gessner has been playing with a shattered finger, and yet still the pro scouts came to see him play against Princeton. But the picture the scouts got was one of a much-improved Tiger team, now on a four-game winning streak, the longest of head coach Roger Hughes' career at Princeton.

In a surprisingly low-scoring game, it was the Tiger defense that once again came up big. It allowed the Bears 150 yards on the ground and a mere 222 yards in the air — over 100 yards less than Brown's average.

While some analysts would say that those stats are not all that impressive, big defensive plays decimated Brown's offensive drives.

These big plays were especially key down the stretch for the Tigers, as in the second half, Brown's offense got a jump-start from freshman quarterback Nathan Poole who played all of the second half. He connected with his receivers and put 14 points on the board for the Bears, bringing the team to within two of Princeton. But the Tiger defense found a hero in sophomore cornerback Jay McCareins.

With less than four minutes to go in the game, Brown had a second down with nine yards to go. Poole dropped back, looking for a big play, only to be intercepted by McCareins, seemingly putting the nail in the Bear's coffin. But another failed offensive drive put Brown back in position to win the game, with barely two minutes to go.

From his own 47, Poole looked for Gessner, the sure hands on the team. He found him streaking down the Brown sideline. He hurled the ball, but it was slightly short, and it became a jumping contest between the 6'5" Gessner and the 6'0" McCareins. And coming down with the ball, once again, was McCareins for his second interception of the day.

While those were the most dramatic defensive stops of the day, it was something that the Tiger defense had been doing all day. Going into halftime, Princeton found itself holding onto a shutout. Although Brown had managed to move the ball fairly well in the middle of the field, each of the Bears' four offensive drives of the first half were halted.

The Bears came out fired up, receiving the ball first. On the ensuing drive they marched the ball from their own 44-yard line down to the Princeton seven before the drive was stuffed by defensive pressure epitomized in junior defensive end Joe Weiss' stop of Brown running back Joe Rackley four yards short of the first down and seven short of the end zone. Each of the subsequent Brown drives were stopped before the Bears could even enter into Princeton territory.

But why was the Tiger defense so successful throughout most of the game at stopping Brown drives?

Simply put in almost every case, Princeton found ways to step up its play when it was faced with a tough situation — its back was against the wall. In each case, the Bears were threatening. They had managed to engineer a good drive that allowed them to move the ball through the middle of the field. But when they tried to strike for the big play — like the drives in the first half that ended in Brown territory — the Tigers were there to defend it.

Princeton was running the same defense that it had in the last four weeks, and this week, plays like senior cornerback's Paul Simbi's interception early in the second half were made because the defensive mentality was ready to make those stops.