Men's soccer takes down Harvard 3-2 in Cambridge

On paper, the odds were against them. The men’s soccer team, winless in league play, battling on the road against Harvard, one of two teams still perfect against their Ivy League foes.

The Tigers, however, are not ones to back down from a challenge.

The Princeton men’s soccer team (7-4-2 overall, 1-2-1 Ivy League) picked up their first win in league play this year, upsetting the Crimson (6-5-2, 3-1-0) 3-2 this pastSaturday. With the victory, the Tigers have won back-to-back games for the first time since late September.

An emphasis for the game, and indeed, throughout the season, has been exhibiting 90 minutes of intensity. In the games against Dartmouth and Brown, the Tigers had one small defensive lapse that allowed a go-ahead goal in the opening minutes (Dartmouth) and a game-tying goal in the final minutes (Brown).

The Tigers were the ones to come out strong, as freshman forward Jeremy Colvin made a strong run past multiple Tigers’ defenders for the first score of the game, picking up the second goal of his career.

“It was a great goal. The most telling and revealing part of that goal, and [that] was indicative of the entire game, was that it was an opportunity that we got on a counter. We knew what their game plan was,” senior goalie Ben Hummel explained. “They commit numbers forward. [We thought] if we could counter them and get off that, then we [could] break them and down that attack.”

The Harvard squad, however, did not stay lying down. With continued aggressive play, they forced a penalty kick in the 18th minute, which the Crimson’s Jake Freeman converted into their first score of the game.

Princeton would respond come the 40th minute, as junior midfielder Vikram Pothuri hit sophomore midfielder Daniel Bowkett on the cross for the score, Bowkett’s second on the season. The Tigers could walk off the field proud after the first half, having secured a 2-1 edge.

They would come right out of the gate just as strong. Just over a minute into the second half, senior forward Tom Sanner took the pass from Colvin and found the back of the net for the 10th time this season.

While Harvard was ultimately unable to make a comeback — scoring just once more, in the 89th minute — one certainly can’t fault them for lack of trying. The Crimson were keeping the defense and Hummel honest, forcing 19 shots total on the day compared to Princeton’s seven.

“I think one of the most important things that I was able to bring to the game was taking away the aerial threat. In the first and second half, they were serving in so many balls, and I felt comfortable coming off my line, and snagging some balls out of the air. That sort of sets the tone,” Hummel said. “They have to think twice about every ball they serve in, and that leads to errors … I think [that] me establishing and maintaining control of my box and making sure I was aggressive and strong off my line helped to give the defense a little bit of confidence and sort of took away a big part of their game.”

With the win, Princeton moves to fifth place in the league, as three games remain in the season. With league leaders Dartmouth standing at 4-0 in Ivy League play, multiple events would have to go the Tigers’ way for them to earn a share of the league title, as they did in 2014 season.

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While the odds of earning an automatic NCAA bid are slim (and chances of an at-large bid unsure), the Tigers continue to build off their success in hopes of finishing off the season as strongly as possible.

“If everybody goes 4-2-1, we have a share of the league [title], but that’s so unlikely to happen. You have to have a serious conversation with yourself about what … it means to be a team, what does it mean to be successful team,” Hummel said. “We all kind of came together and said 'We have a chance of getting to 11 wins and winning out the last six games.' That would be considered a successful team.”

“You have to look around, and play for the people around you.” Hummel explained. “[The game showed] what moral character the team has here … As a senior, it made me feel so awesome to have those guys step up and play for me, and me playing for my brothers.”