With victory over Lions, men's soccer could place third

The league title may be out of reach, but third place is nothing to sneeze at — even though the men's soccer team managed to come in second last season. A win against Columbia tonight, a team that Princeton has only beaten once in the last 15 years, would place the Tigers on firm footing for a respectable end to the season.

After a frustrating start to the league schedule, going winless in its first three games, Princeton (2-2-1 league, 5-7-3 overall) rallied hard to extend its 20-year unbeaten stretch against Penn on Saturday, recording a 2-1 win and back-to-back league victories. The Tigers are now tied for fourth in the league standings with a game in hand and just two games left in the season.

The first of these comes Tuesday as Princeton hosts the Lions (0-5-0, 3-11-1). Regardless of the outcome, the Lions can hope for no higher than a tie for sixth place, though a loss against the Tigers will condemn them to ending the season in the Ivy League cellar — a first for Columbia in 32 years. The Lions, therefore, though demoralized by their eighth-straight winless match — they lost to Harvard over the weekend — can be expected to fight tooth and nail to prevent such an end.

Princeton, on the other hand, is buoyed by its recent successes on the road against Cornell and Penn and will be looking to make full use of home advantage to extend the current run. With the entire team healthy again, riding on momentum and hungry for results, the Tigers have a good chance of seeing off the Columbia challenge.

Senior forward Darren Spicer is back to his goalscoring form, notching another goal over the weekend to bring his total this season to a team-high six, while senior forward Adrian Melville, sorely missed during the beginning of league play, tallied three assists and a goal of his own. The Princeton offense was able to outshoot its opponents over the break by a comfortable 10-shot margin.

The Lions, who have been unable to score in five games, will also have a tough time against the Tigers' defense, backed by senior keeper Bobby Guelich, who still maintains his position at the top of the league in goals saved.

Dartmouth's win over Cornell on Sunday saw the Big Green pull into first place alongside Brown and ended Princeton's chances of repeating last year's second-place finish.

The Tigers now trail third-place Yale (4-1-1, 9-3-4) in the standings by six points but have yet to play the Elis. If Princeton can win both games, the Orange and Black will tie with Yale to end the season jointly in third; losing both will probably push the Tigers down one position to fifth. Any other combination of results will probably see Princeton end the season right where it is now, at fourth — and that, for the team, simply won't do it.