Men's Soccer: Strong finish highlights season

It says a lot about the men’s soccer team that, despite reaching its first NCAA tournament since 2001, it wasn’t satisfied with how the season went.

A 1-0 loss to Bucknell brought Princeton’s year to a close in the first round, but the Tigers had been expecting more of themselves going into the game.

“We thought we were playing well enough to make a run deep into the playoffs,” head coach Jim Barlow ’91 said. “We had been playing our best soccer in the last month of the season, and we were all frustrated that we weren’t quite as sharp in the Bucknell game as we had been in the games leading up to the NCAAs.”

Though the season did end on this bitter note, it had seemed unlikely that the Tigers would make the NCAA tournament at all at the midpoint of the season.

After a 4-0 start, capped off by a thrilling last-second, double-overtime victory against Fairleigh Dickinson, Princeton lost its way over the next month.

Close losses against ranked Monmouth and UC-Irvine teams were followed by disappointing defeats to Ivy League rivals Dartmouth and Brown, and the Tigers found themselves with a 4-5-1 overall record with only seven regular-season games remaining. With a 0-2 record in Ivy League competition, it seemed certain that the Tigers would not see postseason play.

The turning point came in the next match, against St. John’s. Having conceded the first goal only minutes into the first half, the Tigers battled back against the Red Storm and forced the game to a 1-1 double-overtime tie in front of a national television audience.

This result brought an end to a run of disheartening performances, and it seemed to invigorate the Princeton squad, which really began to come together over its last six games.

Consecutive 3-0 victories against Columbia and Colgate at Roberts Stadium restored the Tigers’ confidence, and they began to produce their best soccer of the season by far. With the midfield dominated by senior captain Devin Muntz and the defense solid under the pairing of junior Benjamin Burton and freshman Mark Linnville, Princeton began to look toward the possibility of a tournament berth.

Standing in the way was the prospect of a trip to Cambridge, Mass., to face then-No. 9 Harvard. The Crimson was, up to that point, unbeaten at home, and Princeton hadn’t defeated Harvard since 2002. Yet, in their most impressive victory of the year, the Tigers won a tight game, 2-1, in double overtime.

With this marquee victory, and having improved its Ivy League record to 3-2-0, Princeton now knew the tournament was in reach. Still, three more games had to be negotiated.

A 1-1 tie at home with Cornell temporarily derailed Princeton’s momentum, but a 3-1 defeat of Penn put the Tigers back on track. Then, in their most complete performance of the season, they dismantled Yale, 4-0, in front of another national television audience over Homecoming weekend.

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This victory, and a final regular-season record of 9-6-3, allowed the team to receive an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament. Though the contest with Cornell didn’t go quite as the Tigers would have liked, there is still much to be proud of and much to build on.

In one of the strongest Ivy League fields in years, Princeton finished third and showed that it deserved a place on the national stage. The Tigers also contributed eight players to this year’s All-Ivy League teams, more than any other school, and the most the team has provided in five years.

As thoughts turn to next year, there is nothing but optimism as to how successful Princeton can be.

“I am happy with and proud of how the team performed this year,” outgoing captain Muntz said. “But they should have high expectations next year, looking for the league title as well as another NCAA tournament bid. I see good things coming for the team and hope that they continue the upward trend.”

Despite losing three important seniors, including Muntz, the Tigers return a strong and experienced nucleus of players, and they all will want to improve on their progress this season.

“We are already looking forward to 2010, and we want to build on the success of this fall and become an even better team,” Barlow said. “This will not be easy, and we know we have a lot of work to do in the offseason, but we are looking forward to it.”