In the world of Ivy League football, Harvard can’t stand Yale, Yale despises Harvard, Penn hates Princeton, and Princeton abhors all of them.
The Tigers (2-6 overall, 1-4 Ivy League) lost big to league co-leaders Penn and Harvard this season, so it probably comes as little surprise to hear that they view Saturday’s game against Yale (4-4, 2-3) as particularly important.
The two teams have played one another since 1873, and Saturday’s meeting at Princeton will be the 132nd renewal of the game. Overall, Yale leads the series 72-49-10, and it has won four of the last five games, and two in a row. Last year, the Bulldogs shut the Tigers out at the Yale Bowl, 14-0.
This year, though, neither team can win the Ivy League title — that is a two-horse race between Penn and Harvard. Still, the history of the rivalry and the fact that it will be the seniors’ last home game will add to the excitement. And, in the words of sophomore quarterback Tommy Wornham, “We hate Yale more than anyone else.”
So far this year, the Bulldogs have fared better than the struggling Tigers. Yale is tied with Dartmouth for fourth in the league, while the Tigers are fighting to not finish in last for the first time in 36 years.
But with two games left in the season, Princeton still has an outside shot to climb back to 4-6 overall, which has been its final record two years running. While the Tigers beat Cornell this season, Yale fell to the Big Red by two. The Tigers also beat Lehigh, which beat Yale. On the other hand, the Bulldogs beat Columbia, and in October, the Tigers fell to the Lions, 38-0.
In other words, this weekend’s matchup could go either way, though Princeton enters as the underdog. To beat Yale, the Tiger offense will have to fire on all cylinders, which it certainly failed to do last weekend at Penn.
The Quakers stifled the Tigers’ running attack, holding junior running back Meko McCray to just one rushing yard on seven carries and freshman Akil Sharp to 13 yards on seven carries. Since All-Ivy senior running back Jordan Culbreath went down during the game against Lehigh in September, McCray and Sharp have struggled to hold up Princeton’s rushing offense.
Wornham said that to spark the running game, the Tigers would be implementing some Culbreath-era plays against Yale. In last year’s loss, Culbreath rushed for 69 yards, which was substantially lower than his average of 133.7 yards per game.
Without a running game in top form, Princeton has been relying on Wornham to throw the ball more this season. That resulted in seven touchdowns and eight interceptions so far, along with almost 160 passing yards per game for the sophomore.
Junior wide receivers Trey Peacock and Andrew Kerr lead the team in receiving, with 11.4 and 10.3 yards per catch, respectively. Peacock has scored three times this season, and Kerr has found the end zone twice. On Saturday, though, they will face a tough Yale secondary led by cornerback Adam Money, who has picked off three passes this season, including one he returned for a touchdown.
Yale’s offense this season has not been as powerful as it once was, as quarterback Patrick Witt, who transferred from Nebraska in the offseason, has not put up great numbers. The Bulldogs’ running backs have also struggled, while wide receiver John Sheffield has been a somewhat lonely bright spot for the team, averaging 61.9 yards per game.
Yale’s offensive woes are good news for the Princeton defense, which has recently been plagued with injuries, most notably to senior co-captain and inside linebacker Scott Britton. The defense is led by junior inside linebacker Steven Cody, who is first in the Ivy League and fourth in the nation with 12.29 tackles per game. He also has two interceptions on the season, but he has been forced to adapt to new schemes in recent weeks as the cast around him has shifted because of the injuries.
Despite the fact that the game promises to be a particularly difficult one for the Tigers, Wornham noted that his team was looking forward to the game. The focus is particularly keen on the seniors, as Saturday’s match will be the last at home of their Princeton careers.
Without classmates Culbreath and Britton, though, the bulk of the pressure for leadership will fall on the capable shoulders of senior co-captains defensive back Wilson Cates and defensive lineman Joel Karacozoff.
Though all the surrounding story lines — seniors and injuries included — might be distracting, Wornham said the team remains singularly focused on one goal: winning the last two games of its season.
“Morale’s actually pretty good,” he said. “As we’ve said in the last few weeks, we don’t want to be that team to end the season with two wins.”
After last week’s potentially demoralizing loss to Penn, the fact that the team has such a positive sentiment may be a good sign. “The team’s excited, ready to go and ready to get that Penn taste out of our mouths,” Wornham added.
But perhaps the most important thing to remember about Saturday’s matchup is even more visceral than that.
Let’s not forget, after all, that, in Wornham’s words, “We hate Yale more than anyone else.”
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