Women's Water Polo: Tigers win Southerns in exciting finale

She saved just 2.4 seconds to score her final goal, a game-winning shot to give the women’s water polo team a 9-8 win over Brown and the Southern Division Title. It was the seventh Southerns victory in school history, as the Tigers took down George Washington, Bucknell and Brown in the process.

The championship game pitted Princeton against a Brown team that the Tigers had crushed by 10 goals earlier in the season. The Bears were much more ready this time around, however, as the game was tied with less than two minutes left. The game appeared to be heading to overtime when Zwirner fired the game-winner.

“I did not want to give Brown a lot of time to score,” she said. “During the last possession, I could not see the clock, and I knew I did not have enough time to get a foul, so I had to just step out and shoot it as hard as I could.”

“It was really exciting and definitely a relief to finally win,” added sophomore utility Katie Rigler. “The Southern Championship game last year left a very bitter taste in our mouths, so it was very satisfying to get our year on the banner at DeNunzio.”

The Tigers’ first game came against a George Washington team that had won only one out of five conference games in the regular season, including a 13-9 loss to Princeton. The result was not all that different this time around, as the Tigers came out strong and took an 8-2 lead that allowed them to cruise to an 11-8 victory despite a late George Washington rally.

Later that same day, the Tigers took on a bit of a tougher team in Bucknell, who had gone 2-3 in the conference and had lost to Princeton by a score of 12-6 earlier in the season. This time around was not any better for the Bison as the Tigers dominated all four quarters and cruised to an easy 14-6 win.

“Against Brown, our shooting percentage was way down, but we maintained our intensity until the end, where Brittany scored the winning goal with a few seconds left,” freshman utility Ashley Hatcher said.

“It was exciting to finally reach the championship part of our season and finish the weekend with three wins, especially after pulling through a challenging game against Brown in Sunday’s final,” freshman attack CeCe Coffey said. “In addition, it was great to be able to see the seniors win their first Southern Championship in four years of Princeton water polo.”

The team was seeded number one entering the tournament and can now expect another high seed going into the CWPA Eastern Championship tournament in a couple of weeks.

“These games gave us a preview of the intensity we need to bring to each game and also the fire other teams will be coming out with against us,” Rigler said. “Every team will come out with their best effort, and we need to exceed their efforts in order to win. Easterns is a single elimination tournament, so there is no room for mental mistakes or lack of intensity.”

“The games this weekend really helped us prepare mentally for Easterns,” Zwirner added. “We are in the part of the season where every game is do or die. There are no more second chances. This came out especially during our final game against Brown.”

The Tigers now wait to find out their seeding for Easterns on Tuesday and will start the tournament on Friday, April 27.