If there's anything the football team has learned over the past few seasons, head coach Roger Hughes joked Wednesday afternoon, it's how to react to a tough loss.
The lesson will undoubtedly come in handy as Princeton (4-2 overall, 2-1 Ivy League) prepares to travel to Ithaca, N.Y., to face Cornell (1-5, 1-2) on Saturday.
"I told the team you can't do anything about that loss," Hughes said, referring to the 39-14 drubbing the Tigers received from Harvard last weekend. "All we can do is win the games left on our schedule and elevate our execution level."
On paper, at least, Princeton should be able to win the next game on its schedule. Prior to the Harvard game, the Tigers had played some of their best football in recent memory. Meanwhile, the Big Red have struggled to close out games so far this season — they've held second-half leads in five of six games this season, only to see the contests slip away in four of the cases.
Still, in just coming close, Cornell has proven to be a better team than many observers predicted at the start of the season. The Big Red defense has been a surprising bright spot for first-year head coach Jim Knowles. They have proved particularly stingy against the run, not allowing a single 100-yard rushing game so far this season.
Knowles makes no secret that stopping the run is "priority" for the Big Red, and his game plan reflects that mentality. Cornell plays an eight-man front on defense, consistently bringing at least one safety into the box to stuff up the middle. Meanwhile, their agile defensive line strives to create confusion by constantly moving and stunting.
"We'll have to do things formationally to get their safeties out of there," Hughes said. "Secondly, we have to be ready for all the movement."
As a result of the emphasis on stopping the run, the Big Red are vulnerable to the passing game. But if the Tigers hope to take advantage of this opportunity, they'll have to get much better execution from their aerial attack than they did last week. Senior quarterback Matt Verbit frequently looked flustered in turning in his worst performance of the season, and several receivers dropped catchable balls.
A large part of the problem has come in reacting to opponents' blitzing. Hughes said this week's practices have emphasized passing under pressure and the related protection schemes.
Additionally, Hughes said the coaches have been "shuffling" players at the wide receiver position this week in search of more consistency. They're hoping to get sophomore Brian Brigham back on the field. After sitting out the Harvard game with an ankle injury, he practiced in full pads for the first time Wednesday.
Meanwhile, senior Clint Wu, who made seven catches in the first half of Princeton's season opener before going down with a torn ACL, has made significant progress over the past few weeks. While Wu still has a long way to go, Hughes said he is now running and hopes to return before the end of the season.
But no matter who's catching the passes, Hughes was quick to note, it's important that the entire team improve its execution.
"We have got to improve our third-down percentages," he said. "We had a lot of third-and-11, third-and-12, so its crucial that, on first and second down, we set up manageable third downs."
Like Princeton, Cornell's offense has struggled to produce at times this year. In an effort to mix things up, Knowles gave junior quarterback Ryan Kuhn his first career start last week. He rushed for 48 yards and two touchdowns. Overall, however, Kuhn is "not up there with the topnotch quarterbacks in the league," defensive coordinator Steve Verbit said, though he is "very consistent."
Kuhn's biggest advantage might be his large, physical offensive line, that boasts several 300-pound starters. They could cause trouble for Princeton's undersized, 3-4 defensive scheme — which has had trouble stopping runs up the middle all season.
"Last week was not indicative of the way we've been playing for the first four weeks. We took a step back," Hughes said. "We're looking forward to getting back on the field and playing at the level we expect to play at."
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