Game, bonfire slips from Tigers' grasp

The football team's dreams of an Ivy League title and a bonfire went up in smoke Saturday afternoon, leaving the Tigers shaking their heads and wondering what might have been.

"We had our chances to get the W, and we didn't pull it out," senior cornerback Jay McCareins said as he slowly trudged away from the locker room, eyes bleary. "There's nothing you can say."

Princeton (6-3 overall, 4-2 Ivy League) let a win slip away with sloppy offensive execution, falling to Yale (4-5, 4-2), 21-14, amid the roars of a packed Princeton Stadium full of the hopes and dreams of fans young and old.

After Tigers grabbed a commanding 14-0 lead midway through the second quarter behind a dominating defense and two touchdown tosses by junior quarterback Jeff Terrell, the wheels came off Princeton's offense.

Beginning with the Tigers' final drive of the first half, their last nine drives of the game all ended in some level of disaster: five interceptions, two fumbles and two three-and-outs.

Princeton's defense would do its best to make an early lead hold up — as it had successfully done so many times this season — but on this day, the offensive miscues would simply prove to be too much to overcome. On Yale's three touchdown drives, the Bulldogs had to move a total of just 62 yards to score 21 points.

Their first score of the day came late in the third quarter after Terrell's third interception of the day, an ill-advised throw into heavy coverage intercepted by Yale safety Nick Solakian and returned to the Princeton 25.

After the Bulldogs advanced the ball to the Tigers' six-yard-line, Princeton made a valiant goal line stand, keeping the Bulldogs out of the end zone on five straight plays. But, finally, and fourth-and-goal from the one, Mike McLeod broke through the wall, putting Yale on the scoreboard and cutting the Tigers' lead in half.

The Tigers held that 14-7 lead for a time, aided by a blocked field goal attempt by junior defensive end Jake Marshall. But, ironically, things began to go seriously wrong on an interception by McCareins with three minutes, 29 seconds left to play in the fourth quarter.

On the previous drive, sophomore fullback Rob Toresco fumbled the ball on Princeton's own six-yard line. Princeton got lucky, though, when Yale was penalized for a personal foul and two consecutive false starts that combined to push the Bulldogs back to the Princeton 36.

Finally, on fourth-and-25, Yale quarterback Jeff Mroz lobbed a pass into coverage that McCareins was able to leap for and pull down on the three-yard line.

It was a mixed blessing, though, because had McCareins simply batted down the pass, the Tigers could have gained far better field position. But as he explained, it wasn't quite so simple a decision.

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"For sure, [it] would have been [better] to knock it down, but then if I put one hand up, he can put two hands up and take it away from me," McCareins said, noting that the intended receiver, Ashley Wright, had done exactly that last weekend against Brown. "Unfortunately I was at the three yard line and not in the end zone — which I kind of thought I was — to get a touchback."

The consequences of the play, though, were clear. To avoid a safety, Princeton's offense found itself forced into protect mode and was hardly able to gain any yardage. The Tigers punted after three plays, and Yale took over at the Princeton 36.

After the Bulldogs moved the ball to the Tigers' 10-yard-line, the Princeton defense made another fierce stand, forcing three straight in incompletions. But on fourth down, Jeff Mroz connected with a diving Todd Feiereisen in the right corner of the end zone, tying the game.

Still, with the score tied and about 75 seconds left to play, the Tigers had a chance to capture the victory. At worst, it seemed, the game would head into overtime.

But disaster struck once more. On first down from the 20-yard-line, Terrell connected with junior wide receiver Brian Shields on a short slant over the middle, but Shield was immediately drilled by Brendan Sponheimer. The ball popped out of his Shields' grasp and into the waiting arms of linebacker Bobby Abare, who rumbled down the field to the Bulldogs' one-yard-line.

Once more, the Tigers' defense did its best to stand tall, stopping Yale's first two plunges toward the goal line. But on third down, Mroz stretched into the end zone, nailing the coffin shut on Princeton's hopes for a bonfire and, more than likely, for an Ivy League championship.

With a win in their season finale against Dartmouth next week and a Brown loss, the Orange and Black could still land in a three-way tie for the Ivy title with Brown and the winner of next week's Harvard-Yale game. But with the Bears playing Ivy cellar-dweller Columbia, losers of seven straight games, Princeton appears destined for second place.

"What we're playing for [next week] is pride," head coach Roger Hughes said, "for sending these seniors out with a 7-3 record, which is a vastly improved record."

But playing for pride is far from what the Tigers' had in mind. After the game, they struggled to explain how and why their magical run toward an Ivy title had been derailed. Both McCareins and Hughes said neither nerves nor the enormous pressure the team was under to win the game played a role in the loss.

"I didn't see any jitters," Hughes said.

Princeton's fast start supported Hughes words, as the Tigers dominated the first 25 minutes of play. Terrell played nearly flawlessly before his first interception late in the half, twice finding men wide open in the end zone after what appeared to be breakdowns in Yale's secondary.

But though Princeton capitalized on Yale's mistakes early on, they made more than enough of their own for the Bulldogs to win the game in the second half. Between seven turnovers and nine penalties, the Tigers inflicted far too much damage on themselves to walk away winners.

"We did things today that we hadn't done all year," Hughes said. "Every time we got something going, the other thing that killed us were penalties ... You can't do that and win games against good teams."