Five consecutive graduating classes have left Princeton without having experienced a bonfire on Cannon Green, which signifies football victories over both Harvard and Yale in one season.
This year's senior class is hoping to avoid avoid another bad streak — becoming the fifth straight graduating class to have never beaten Harvard.
The first step towards ending both of those streaks will be getting a win tomorrow afternoon at Harvard Stadium in Cambridge, Mass.
Two years ago, Princeton (1-4 overall, 1-1 Ivy League) was within a 48-yard field goal attempt by Taylor Northrop '02 of beating Harvard, the eventual Ivy League champions. The Tigers went on to beat Yale later that year, 34-14.
The football team once again gets set to battle one of its oldest rivals. The teams first played in 1877, in a make-or-break game in the Princeton season. The same is true for this year's team.
A win means that Princeton improves to 2-4 on the year but, more importantly, to 2-1 in the Ivy League, which puts it right back in the title hunt. A loss drops the Tigers to 1-2 in the league and two games out of first place.
The biggest story in tomorrow's game is the absence of Harvard's star quarterback, Ryan Fitzpatrick. Fitzpatrick, or Fitzy as Harvard head coach Tim Murphy refers to him, broke his throwing hand in a 27-0 victory over Cornell two weeks ago.
He was replaced last week by Garret Schires, who made his first career start in Harvard's win over Lafayette. After starting slowly, the southpaw finished 12-for-20 with 201 yards and a touchdown.
Without Fitzpatrick, the Harvard offense became conservative, but that didn't mean they were ineffective.
Freshman tailback Clifton Dawson had a field day against the Leopards and finished with 218 yards.
The Tigers don't have a slouch at running back either as junior Branden Benson has come on strong in the team's two league games.
Benson rushed for 102 yards and two touchdowns two weeks ago against Columbia, and was dominant again last week against Brown, finishing with 128 yards and two more scores.
As is the case for many gridiron games, this contest will be decided in the trenches. Last week against Brown the offensive line missed a number of blocks that led to several blocked and tipped passes from junior quarterback Matt Verbit.
"We've reduced the number of checks at the line of scrimmage," head coach Roger Hughes said, "and we've tagged plays with an alert call."
This change is put in place to help simplify the blocking schemes for the offensive line.
Pass protection will be even more important this week. Harvard has two very talented corners in Ben Butler and Gary Sonkur. The Crimson are able to play man coverage with their corners which allows them to bring their safeties up to help stop the run. Harvard routinely puts eight to nine men in the box.
If the offensive line gives Verbit time to throw the ball, Princeton's talented wide receivers — junior B.J. Szymanski, senior Blair Morrison, and junior Clint Wu — have the ability to get open.
On defense, Princeton has to stop the Harvard running game and put pressure on Schires. That will be tough against a talented and experienced Crimson offensive line. In addition, Dawson and sophomore Ryan Taylor are a formidable duo in the backfield.
Controlling emotion will also be a difficult task for both teams.
"This is definitely one of our two biggest games," Harvard head coach Tim Murphy said, referring to the Yale game as the other. "Our players understand the rivalry, and they respect the tradition. They know how fortunate we've been the last couple of years."
Murphy is referring to the very close contests between the two teams in recent years. Harvard earned a 24-17 victory in Princeton last year and pulled out the game two years ago on the missed field goal.
Princeton fans are finally looking for a change in the misfortunes against Harvard. After all, it's cold in Princeton in November, and a bonfire would warm things up nicely.
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