Men's Soccer: Princeton closes tough year at Roberts Stadium

The men’s soccer team will host Yale in the final game of the season at Roberts Stadium this Saturday. The Tigers will seek a strong finish to the campaign after a disappointing season that currently places them at a lowly seventh in the conference, a major drop from their title-winning efforts last fall.

Princeton (5-9-2 overall, 1-4-1 Ivy League) has started to find some form in its recent fixtures after a poor first half of the season. Although they have only won five games thus far, the Tigers swept aside Harvard for their sole Ivy League victory and held Cornell, then the league leader, to a 1-1 draw at home.

They also coasted to a 2-0 victory over Lehigh before succumbing to Penn last weekend, conceding two goals after having taken an early lead on freshman forward Julian Griggs’ scorcher into the top corner.

Despite the final score, the Tigers created enough chances to have put the game away before Penn had a chance to respond to the opening goal.

“There was a stretch in the first 20 to 25 minutes of the game where we thought we could have had two more goals and gotten out to a 3-0 lead,” junior defender Mark Linville said, “so, before they even get the equalizer, we could have killed the game off.”

Regardless, Princeton has struggled this season both defensively and on attack. The Tigers’ back-four has already conceded 30 goals this season in only 16 games, while last year’s team allowed only 19 in 18 matches. The current Tigers have suffered a drop in their goal-scoring output as well, scoring only 26 times compared to last year’s 37. While acknowledging the impact of losing 10 seniors, Linville attributed the disparity to sharpness in the penalty area on both ends of the pitch.

“We just haven’t been as strong inside the box as we were last year. Last year we had a lot of set-piece goals, a lot of goals off throw-ins, a lot of chaos we just created inside the other team’s 18 [yard box],” Linville said. “We haven’t been strong enough inside our own 18, really defending hard, just going all out to make sure the ball gets out, and no goal gets conceded.”

The Bulldogs (7-7-2, 3-3) come into the game with a .500 win percentage both in and out of conference. This statistical quirk is accompanied by another: Only Ivy League co-leader Brown has conceded as few goals (five) as Yale in league fixtures, while only bottom-placed Harvard has scored as few (also five).

Although Yale started the Ivy League season positively with wins over Harvard and Dartmouth (which shares the top spot with Brown), it lost its previous two games to Columbia and Brown. Last weekend, the Bulldogs matched up against a strong Bears team that controlled proceedings from the moment the referee blew the whistle at the beginning of the match.

Wave after wave of attack could not produce a breakthrough, but Brown secured the win in overtime via a controversial penalty. Nevertheless, Brown undeniably earned the three points awarded for victory, taking 17 shots while holding Yale to none.

Yale’s faltering attack appears to provide a distinctly easier time for the Tigers’ defense, while the visitors’ defenders will challenge the Tigers’ midfielders and strikers.

According to Linville, the team lacks no motivation for the encounter, as it looks to send off a senior class that has contributed immensely to the men’s soccer program, which now expects to be winning or competing strongly for the Ivy League title each season.