Football hopes to bounce

After what head coach Roger Hughes called "probably the most disappointing, emotionally draining loss that I've ever been associated with in all of sports," the football team will try to bounce back against Dartmouth in frozen Hanover, N.H.

The Tigers hope that the bounce will be a springboard into next season. They will lose only seven starters to graduation — four on defense, two on offense and one on special teams — though all but left tackle Kevin Manning and defensive ends Joe Weiss and Tim Kirby shared significant time with younger players.

"We're not losing that many guys, to be honest with you," Hughes said. "We're losing Tim and Joe, and those are going to be tremendous losses. We feel we've got some kids in the program who've stepped up."

First comes first, though, and Dartmouth occupies the front burner for the team right now.

Before taking over the top job at Princeton, Hughes was the offensive coordinator at Dartmouth, as was much of his offensive coaching staff.

"It's always special to go back to Dartmouth, since I was up there for eight years," Hughes said.

"Dartmouth's defense stunts a lot," Hughes said. "They're presenting us with a lot of slants, a lot of different movement. So that has taken a little longer to adjust to, and it will take some time adjust to their speed on Saturday."

The Big Green has made changes since Hughes left, though, especially on offense.

"They are certainly throwing the ball a lot more than when I was there," he said. "This year they've progressed to more two-back sets. But certainly they have taken the approach that they are going to throw the ball a bunch."

Having been an offensive coach himself, though, Hughes leaves most of the defensive coaching duties to the rest of his staff.

"This team uses a lot of '21' personnel — one tight end, two backs, two wide receivers," defensive backs coach Eric Jackson said. "They're the first team we've seen this year that's done that. From a defensive perspective it's always difficult to say, 'All right, we're going to send out our regular personnel; we're going to send our nickel,' because they line up in a one-back set with it."

What makes Dartmouth's offense most dangerous, though, is its tight end, Casey Cramer. The Princeton defense has had major problems this year covering big tight ends who can catch the ball. That is a perfect description of the six-foot, two-inch, 235-pound tight end, who has 53 catches for 648 yards and six touchdowns this year.

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"We think he's one of the best receiving tight ends we've faced the entire year," Jackson said.

That's saying a lot after being touched up for 173 yards by Lehigh's tight end Adam Bergen, 99 yards by Columbia's Wade Fletcher and 65 yards by Yale's Nate Lawrie.

Because Dartmouth does such a good job setting up with motion and formation, though, the Tigers will have trouble getting a favorable match-up on Cramer.

"Whoever is matched up against that kid has got to do a tremendous job," Jackson said. "He's relentless. He does not stop, whether it's blocking or going out for a pass. The guys on the outside are going to have to make some big plays for us."

The Tiger defense, which relies almost exclusively on zones, utilizes rotating coverages, which means that no one person will be able to shadow Cramer all game, though Princeton has no one player to look to who would be able to neutralize him.

"I don't think there's one [player]," Jackson said. "I think all the guys can do a good job. Everybody wants their shot at that guy."

Throughout this season of heartbreaking losses, Hughes has reiterated his team's positive outlook on each game. Since this is the last game for the graduating seniors, it takes on a special meaning.

"We'd love to send our seniors out with a great win," Hughes said.

In the three losses that were decided on the last play of the game, there was a conspicuous lack of a player who would come through in the clutch to secure the win for those seniors, though.

"At the end of the game, somebody didn't step up to make the big play," junior free safety Nick Brown said. "A lot of us feel like we could have been the man. I think we're going to go into the off-season — after getting a big win up at Dartmouth — we're going to work extra hard to make sure that we can be the man at the end of the game."