Anderson responded with his arm, hurling a perfect 52-yard bomb to sophomore wideout Trey Peacock that put the Tigers back on top for good.
“[Trey] has been unbelievable all year,” said Anderson, who was 14 for 19 for 237 yards and three touchdowns. “It did not look like he had the defender beat by that much, and I may have underthrown the ball. It is a testament to Trey that I can toss it up there and he can come down with it.”
The Lions scored on the game’s first possession, driving 67 yards on seven plays to take a 7-0 lead. The Tigers were not down long, however. Lucking into beautiful field position when the ensuing kickoff landed out of bounds, Princeton started with the ball on its own 40-yard line. Anderson and the offense started a methodical, 11-play, 60-yard drive to tie the score.
On third and four from the five-yard line, Anderson found junior running back Jordan Culbreath open in the flats, where Culbreath made a nice over-the-shoulder catch and barreled his way into the endzone.
After the defense stalled Columbia’s next possession at midfield, the Princeton offense went back to work. A 69-yard completion from Anderson to senior wideout Will Thanheiser set up Culbreath’s second touchdown of the game, a three-yard run to give the Tigers a 14-7 lead.
“We came out hot in the first quarter, and we needed to,” Anderson said. “That success goes back to the coaches looking at film during the week, getting us prepared to come out firing.”
On the second play of the second quarter, senior linebacker Collin McCarthy sacked Lions quarterback Shane Kelly for a loss of eight yards. The play set the tone for the entire quarter, 15 minutes of football that saw a total of just three points.
With five minutes, 49 seconds left in the second quarter, senior punter Ryan Coyle pinned the Lions inside their own two-yard line with a beautiful kick, but the Princeton defense was unable to keep Columbia at bay. The Lions closed the half with a 12-play scoring drive, culminating in a 25-yard field goal with less than 30 seconds to play.
After Anderson’s first incompletion of the game and a kneel-down, the half ended with the Tigers leading 14-10.
Princeton widened its lead on the first drive of the second half, scoring a touchdown on a 17-yard pass from Anderson to Thanheiser. Anderson, rolling to his left, saw a Columbia cornerback fall on the sidelines and found Thanheiser in the endzone for an easy score.
Once again, however, the Tigers couldn’t hold the lead. On the ensuing possession, the Lions drove 71 yards down the field for a touchdown of their own, cutting Princeton’s lead to 21-17.
After a Princeton three-and-out, it looked as though Columbia would pull within one with a 39-yard field goal, but on fourth and eight, the Lions faked the kick. The play fooled no one on the Princeton defense, and Kelly was brought down three yards short of a first down.
Princeton’s offense, however, continued to struggle, and Columbia opened the fourth quarter with a nine-play, 49-yard touchdown drive. The score, a one-yard run by Columbia running back Jordan Davis, gave the Lions a 24-21 lead.
Trailing for the first time since the opening quarter, the Tigers came back to life. After a big 18-yard completion to Thanheiser on third and 12, Anderson threw the bomb to Peacock to finish the scoring. Senior kicker Connor Louden’s extra point was blocked, though, leaving the Lions within a field goal of overtime.
The defense handled the rest, forcing a punt and a fumble on the Lions’ final two possessions. With less than a minute left in the game, Columbia drove inside the Princeton 30-yard line, but after a short completion over the middle, junior linebacker Scott Britton forced a fumble that was recovered by junior cornerback Cart Kelly, ending the Columbia threat and the game.
“I was thinking to myself, ‘I am going to hit this kid as hard as I can,’ ” Britton said. “I thought I had just tackled him, but then I heard our fans yelling, and I saw that he didn’t have the ball. Credit great hustle to Cart Kelly for diving on the ball.”
The victory, Princeton’s first conference win of the season and sixth straight against Columbia, puts the Tigers in a tie for first place in the Ivy League standings with Brown, Cornell and Penn.
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