Men's club lax beats Penn, earns Final Four spot

Forget Dartmouth. Forget Cornell, Syracuse, Georgetown, Virginia and all the teams that may stand in the way of Princeton lacrosse capturing national titles this season. One Tiger lacrosse team — the men's club team — is already well on its way to a national title and will continue its quest this weekend with the National College Lacrosse League Final Four at the Naval Academy.

The Tigers (11-1 overall) earned the right to go to the Final Four with a convincing 11-4 victory over a talented Penn squad last Wednesday.

"This year we really focused on dedication and working together," junior captain Chris Jaeger, who manages the team along with junior president Amit Koren, said. "You can't be a hot shot in this league. That's what happened with Penn, they have a lot of guys with a lot of talent but they weren't working together [Wednesday]. We all have a goal beyond ourselves."

Princeton has had to clear many hurdles simply to get to this point in its season. First, the Tigers needed to win their Garden State Division of the National Conference in order to qualify at all. This earned them the opportunity to host Metro New York Division-champion Fordham in the first round of the playoffs — a game Princeton dominated, 14-5.

After dispatching Penn, the Tigers now will take on Lehigh in the national semifinals this Saturday to determine the National Conference champion. The winner of that game will take on the victor of the American Conference championship — being played between Navy and the winner of Thursday's West Virginia/Miami of Ohio quarterfinal — with the national title on the line.

"Navy is well-coached, in fantastic shape, and they're a gritty team," head coach Pete McGraw said. "To me, they seem to be the biggest threat and are a concern." The Tigers will take on the Midshipmen in the championship game if both teams make it that far. But only a year ago, a trip to the Final Four would have been almost inconceivable to Princeton.

The Tigers have climbed in the rankings from No. 49 at the close of last year to where they currently sit at No. 2. Much of that leap in the standings has come thanks to a newfound dedication and commitment on behalf of each member of the team.

"We really wanted to make it more serious this year," Jaeger said. "This season has been special in that everybody has been really committed and we've all come together as a team. We've got a great group of guys and we all love spending time together, so that just makes this even better."

Along with renewed resolve on the part of the players has come a new coach to crack the whip. Princeton found a head coach in McGraw, and the team has committed to his serious practice regimen in order to take its play up a level. McGraw was a member of last year's NCLL-champion Ohio State team.

"I saw that they had enough talent to be very good and I asked them to buy into this," McGraw said. "Serious practice isn't always the most fun thing but they were willing to do it and now they're really poised to win the national championship."

In order to do this, the Tigers will rely on solid communication and team play. In addition to fundamentals such as ground balls, Princeton has focused on transition offense and defense.

If mastery of the fundamentals is not quite enough to lift Princeton over Lehigh on Saturday, the team will take a page out of fellow Tiger Donald Rumsfeld's book.

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"We call it our 'shock and awe' strategy," McGraw said. "As soon as our face-off specialist, [freshman] Phillip Solomond, wins possession, we take our whole face-off lineup off the field and replace them with middies. Then they immediately take the ball to the cage and get a few goals in there before the defense knows what hit them."

With a talented freshman class and dedicated older players, Princeton's new position atop the NCLL may be one that the Tigers could enjoy for years to come.