Since 1994, the field hockey team has dominated the Ivy League.
This year was no exception.
Under the guidance of head coach Beth Bozman, and with the help of a strong core of senior standouts, the Tigers went undefeated in Ivy League play for the third consecutive season.
While Princeton easily took home its ninth-straight Ivy League title, the story of the season as a whole was one of feast and famine.
While the Tigers were a perfect 7-0 in Ivy League play, they went only 5-7 in their other contests. While the Tigers scored 43 goals in their seven League contests, they managed only 34 goals in their 12 contests outside of the Ivy League. Take away a 10-0 demolition of a weak Rutgers team, and the Tigers only scored 24 goals in 11 games.
Granted, part of the reason for this discrepancy was that their matchups outside of the Ivy League were much tougher. The Tigers, however, usually played well against their ranked non-league opponents.
A standard benchmark of a team's performance is to compare the number of shots and penalty corners that each team earns against their opponent.
The Tigers often took more shots and had more penalty corner opportunities than their opponents. They controlled the ball well, and usually kept it on the offensive side of the field.
Though its offense generated ample scoring opportunities, Princeton was haunted by the inability to put the ball into the back of the net against good teams.
The Tigers opened up the season losing, 3-2, to Ohio State, but followed this up with three solid victories over Yale, Columbia, and Dartmouth the next week.
In those three Ivy League games, the Tigers outscored their opponents 22-2, making an early statement to the Ivy League that they were the team to beat.
As the Tigers continued their season, they hit what would be the beginning of their scoring slump against non-league opponents.
In the last weekend of September, Princeton fell, 2-1, to both No. 1 Maryland and No. 5 Michigan State. The Tigers outshot Maryland 8-5, and outcornered them 6-3, but lost the game on a penalty stroke.
Mid-season downer
The Tigers also took more shots than Michigan State, but only one of Princeton's 16 shots managed to find the back of the net that game, while the Spartans scored on two of their 11 chances.
After a 10-goal scoring binge in their next game against Rutgers, the Tigers went back to their old ways against No. 4 Old Dominion, falling 4-1 despite a well-played game in which they once again outshot and outcornered their opponent.
Princeton's offense finally seemed to come around in the Tigers' next match against No. 17 Delaware.
After being tied 1-1 at the break, the Tiger offense surged in the second half, scoring four goals against the Blue Hens.
Princeton seemed to sit on this momentum for its next game, posting a 4-3 overtime win over UConn.
The next day against Boston University, however, the Tiger offense again had difficulty finishing.
The Tigers outshot (22-6), and outcornered (14-4) the Terriers, yet still lost, 2-0.
Princeton continued on with its Ivy League schedule, and once again showed its dominance, beating Brown, 9-1. The Tigers took a 4-1 victory from Harvard, undefeated in the Ivy League at that point in the year. Easy wins against Cornell and Penn capped off the Tigers' ninth-consecutive Ivy League title.
Due to their non-league performance, nobody expected the Tigers to do well in the NCAA tournament.
Princeton managed one win against Michigan, which had knocked the Tigers out in the previous year. Princeton then fell to Penn State in the second round.
Seven Tigers were named as All Americans this season, including senior attack Ilvy Friebe, junior midfielders Claire Miller and Cory Picketts, sophomore midfielder Natalie Martirosian, senior goalie Kelly Baril, senior defender Emily Townsend, and sophomore attack Lizzie Black.
Head coach Beth Bozman resigned this season to take the head coaching position at Duke. Bozman built the Princeton team into the dynasty that it is today and leaves having lost only one Ivy League game in her last nine seasons. She will be replaced by Kristen Holmes-Winn, coach of the Under-16 National Team.
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