PREVIEW: Women’s basketball prepares for rematches with Cornell, Columbia

In their last meet-up, Princeton beat Columbia 79–64. The Tigers shot .453 from the field, had 47 rebounds, and racked up nine steals. This was also the game that junior Bella Alarie set two Ivy League records. The story of her record-breaking performance, and a recap of the game, can be found here. Sophomore Carlie Littlefield also contributed 18 points.

Princeton beat Cornell – on Feb. 2 – 75–46, with a field goal percentage of .410, a three-point percentage of .375, and a free-throw percentage of .842, all of which were higher than Cornell’s corresponding percentages throughout the game. Alarie secured a double-double and first-year Lexi Weger had a season-best 13 points.

As the Tigers prepare for their second meeting with these teams, there are two things that they need to be prepared for. The Big Red are one of the best teams in the country in defending the three-point line, ranking 19th in the nation. Though this wasn’t a problem the last time that the Tigers played the Big Red, they need to go into the game prepared to face this defense. Second, the Tigers need to continue to get rebounds. Having high rebounds this season has allowed the Tigers to continue to put up a fight against their Ivy League competitors.

“We’re on the journey and we learned a lot after the Penn loss that we can’t just look past any games. We are going to just keep learning and take one game at a time and hopefully it takes care of itself,” head coach Courtney Banghart explained in her podcast, “The Court Report with Courtney Banghart,” on Feb. 20.

Coach Banghart also explained that last year, the team went into every game with the goal to win in a landslide, whereas this year, they move into their second matchups with the idea of who the other teams are and what they need to look out for.

On Friday, before the matchup against Cornell, the Tigers will honor Alarie for scoring 1,000 career points before tip-off, and on Saturday, the team will honor senior Sydney Jordan for winning the Pyne Honor Prize. The Pyne Honor Prize is awarded annually to a member of the senior class who has “most clearly manifested excellent scholarship and effective support of the best interests of the University.” It is the highest general distinction conferred upon an undergraduate.

Both games will begin at 5:30 p.m. in Jadwin Gymnasium, with Cornell on Friday and Columbia on Saturday. The game against Cornell will be featured on ESPN+ and the Columbia game will be on ESPN3.