ALLSTON, Mass. — Princeton sophomore guard Ashley Chea smacked her hands together and glanced up at the ceiling after the whistle blew during the third quarter on Friday. It was the second time a Harvard defender had fouled her on a 3-pointer, and she wished she’d made the shot.
That was close to the only time Princeton was frustrated that night, as the Tigers played one of their best games of the season en route to a 70-58 win. They opened the game on a 13-4 run and shot 56.8% from the field overall against one of the nation’s stingiest defenses. Every Princeton starter scored in double figures, led by 17 points from senior forward Parker Hill and 14 each from sophomore guard/forward Fadima Tall and sophomore guard Skye Belker.
“We’re really happy,” Tall told The Next postgame. “I feel like we struggled with putting together 40 minutes of a game for, I think, almost the entire season, and this felt entirely complete.”
The Tigers delivered their best at a crucial time. Entering Friday, Harvard and Princeton were tied for second in the Ivy League at 9-2, one game behind Columbia. ESPN’s Charlie Creme had the Crimson and Tigers as the last two teams in his projected NCAA Tournament bracket.
With the win and other weekend results leaguewide, Princeton clinched the No. 2 seed in the Ivy League Tournament. It also boasts a 2-0 record over Harvard — the No. 34 team in the national NET rankings entering Friday — and a NET ranking of 49 for the selection committee’s consideration.
The fact that Princeton is now 20-6 overall and in such good position for the postseason is remarkable. The Tigers have won six straight Ivy League regular-season titles and five straight Ivy Tournament titles, but this looked like the year they might be vulnerable. They graduated three starters from last season, including a former Ivy League Player of the Year and a three-time Ivy League Defensive Player of the Year. And in their fourth game this season, they lost junior guard Madison St. Rose, herself a Player of the Year candidate, to a torn ACL.
As a result, the Tigers are starting four sophomores, including two who barely saw the court last season, alongside a senior in Hill who’d started just 10 games before this season. Belker is the only starter who also started full-time last season.
Yet head coach Carla Berube has Princeton playing elite basketball heading into March. The Tigers are again a strong contender to win the Ivy League Tournament. And if they don’t, they could become just the third Ivy League team ever to get an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.
“They have a swag to them under the bright lights that some players might just shy away from,” Berube told The Next after Friday’s game. “But I think they love it. It’s so much fun to coach them and see just how far they’ve come.”
The Tigers have grown up, and grown together, throughout the season. They’ve gritted out wins when they haven’t played their best, including at Cornell and Dartmouth, which are both bottom-three teams in the conference. Along the way, Princeton’s less experienced players got surer of themselves and of what they needed to do on the court.
“I feel like I’ve gotten that [stronger] relationship with everyone on the court and the coaches, because I didn’t have this experience last year,” said Tall, who played 88 total minutes last season but has played over 700 this season. “It took a little time to get used to even just being on the court for long periods of time. So I think just putting my trust in others and feeling like they trust me as well has been the greatest help.”
Defense, something Berube and Princeton have long been known for, was an adventure early on. The Tigers were allowing 99.4 points per 100 possessions through Nov. 22 and 94.0 through Dec. 27, both of which ranked among the bottom 40% of teams nationally. But in Ivy League play, the Tigers have clamped down defensively, and their season-long mark of 86.3 points allowed per 100 possessions now ranks in the 81st percentile nationally.
“[I’m] really proud of them,” Berube said. “We’ve put a lot on their shoulders as a young group … and they’ve made huge strides in so many ways, and especially our defense. It’s certainly coming along.”
The Tigers’ defense was tested again after a 64-60 loss to Columbia on Feb. 22. That loss knocked Princeton out of a first-place tie with the Lions. Columbia sophomore guard Riley Weiss scored 34 points, the most Princeton had allowed to a single player since Delaware forward Elena Delle Donne scored 35 in 2009.
Princeton responded on Friday by stifling Harvard senior guard Harmoni Turner, who is the conference’s leading scorer at 21.1 points per game. Turner had just 4 points through the first three quarters and finished with 15 on 6-for-20 shooting.
“That was tough the other day, the way [Weiss] was able to score at will,” Berube said. “Yeah, I think that was important to have just a great defensive effort across the board and not let [Harvard’s] best player, probably Ivy League Player of the Year, have a night.”
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Both Harvard and Columbia press full-court, and the Tigers have also gotten much better at handling that as the season has gone on. Their first experience with constant full-court pressure came at Portland on Dec. 6, and they turned the ball over 29 times in a 74-55 loss. “That was probably our worst game dealing with the press ever,” Tall said bluntly.
In Princeton’s first matchup against Harvard on Jan. 11, the Tigers turned the ball over 20 times. They also committed 24 turnovers in their first game against Columbia on Jan. 20.
But they had just 16 turnovers in the Feb. 22 rematch against Columbia, and through the first three quarters against Harvard on Friday, they had only 13. That prompted Harvard head coach Carrie Moore to say postgame that she needed to figure out how to press Princeton more effectively.
“I just found myself wanting more from what we were doing in the full court,” she told reporters, “and we couldn’t really get that, for whatever reason.”
“We took the time to work on it in practice,” Tall said about breaking presses. “We disciplined ourselves, made sure we had that spacing and … [knew] where we want the ball. Everyone’s confident dribbling. It’s really something that we’ve gotten better with over time.”
Beyond the high stakes of Friday’s game, it was also an important indicator of Princeton’s mentality after losing to Columbia for the second time this season. The Tigers have rarely not been in first place throughout Berube’s five seasons as head coach, and they could’ve crumbled. Instead, they regrouped against one of the toughest teams on their schedule — like a mature, experienced group would do.
“There’s a lot of season left,” Berube said, describing her message to the team after the second Columbia loss. “Maybe we don’t win the regular-season Ivy League championship, but there’s more to win here. There’s more to accomplish, and we needed to start playing our best basketball. And … they had a great week of practice and came in really focused.”
For Tall, Princeton’s championship standard hasn’t been a weight on her shoulders, even with the Tigers in second place. Instead, it’s given her confidence and direction.
“I had the luck of seeing [Princeton] win an Ivy championship and sweeping these teams last year,” Tall said. “So just being able to see off my own eyes and knowing almost what it takes to win that, that’s what we want to do. If we’re not winning, something is wrong. So I feel like realizing that and not taking a shame about it [and instead] knowing that we can get better is what keeps us on our toes.”
Princeton and Harvard will face off in the semifinals of the Ivy League Tournament on March 14. Harvard, the No. 3 seed, will try to redouble its pressure and upset the Tigers — just like it did two years ago against Columbia after losing to the Lions twice in the regular season. Moore also noted that her team needs to improve its ball screen defense after Princeton (and Brown the week before) “absolutely shredded” it.
And Princeton? It’ll look to play a complete 80 minutes in the tournament and, however improbable it seemed when St. Rose went down, extend its streak of seasons with at least one trophy to hoist.
“We know what we can achieve. We know we’re not done yet,” Tall said. “… We’re winners. … No matter where we start off [with our seed], we can still get to that championship.”
