Establishment of running game is football's best gauge

Football stands at 5-4 overall and 3-3 in the Ivy League, which already makes it the best statistical year under third-year head coach Roger Hughes.

What separates those five wins from the four losses? The most glaring statistic is the presence of a 100-yard rusher.

When senior running back Cameron Atkinson has gone over 100 yards, the team has won. When he has not, the team has lost. This does not mean that if he breaks 100 yards on Saturday, the team will automatically jump into the lead if it is not already there, but odds are that the team will already be there.

The important part about the statistic is not the number, but the concept behind it — Princeton has established its running game.

While establishing the run is the biggest cliché in football history, it got that way for a reason. Two positions other than running back itself significantly impact the establishment of a running game — offensive line and fullback. Both of these positions have had injuries this year, which coincided with a drop-off in team performance.

After the first five games of the season, the Tigers were 4-1, looking forward to their annual clash with Harvard, but then the injury bug hit.

For the first time, the offensive was not the same as it had been all year. Paul Lyons had been injured the previous week against Brown, and, as a result, Atkinson was only able to ground out 34 rushing yards on 10 carries.

The two quarterbacks in that game — junior David Splithoff and sophomore Matt Verbit — had a combined 76 yards on 19 carries. Nearly all of that was on broken pass plays in which the offensive line could not protect long enough to allow the gunslingers to get the ball off. Splithoff and Verbit both scrambled often, and a hit on one of those plays cost Splithoff the last half of the season.

Splithoff is out, and Lyons has not been back. The offensive line changes personnel every few plays. The dreaded "I" word — inconsistent — now describes the Princeton offense.

The Tigers were able to save the win the following week in overtime at Cornell, but they lost their starting fullback, sophomore Joel Mancl, now ambling around campus on crutches.

In the two ensuing games, Princeton averaged only 51 yards rushing, with Atkinson only gaining 49 yards on average. The team lost both games.

Penn marched up and down on the usually strong Tiger defense, but the offense could not do anything. It only gained two first downs in the first half, before Penn brought in its backups.

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The defense was stellar at Yale for all but one drive. That drive would not have mattered had the offense been able to get anything going.

The Tigers scored in the first quarter and then proceeded to make Yale's defense look as good as their own.

With losses to the three biggest Ivy opponents of the year — Harvard, Yale, and Penn — plus another to I-AA powerhouse Lehigh, Princeton has slipped to mediocrity after looking like a real Ivy title contender.

The offense is patched together with backup players starting at six positions who have not started every game this year at six positions, going into the last game of the season versus Dartmouth.

"I'm excited to end my career against a good team," Atkinson said. "A win would mean we could start a turnaround and bring back the tradition of Princeton football."

Winning on Saturday will give the Tigers their first winning season since 1997, and their first Ivy League record over .500 since 1998.