This weekend, Princeton women’s water polo will travel to Cambridge to play its first Ivy League opponent, Harvard, as well as Marist College and Iona College. After suffering its first loss of the season at the hands of No. 20 Wagner this past weekend during an otherwise successful trip to the Bucknell Invitational, the No. 15 Tigers (6-1) face one of their largest tests of the young season, as all three of their upcoming opponents are ranked in the top 30 in the country. On Saturday morning, Princeton takes on No. 27 Marist (3-9). Despite its below .500 record, Marist is not a team the Tigers will take lightly. Most of its losses have gone to ranked opponents, including a narrow 8-9 defeat to Harvard and a 6-10 setback at the hands of No. 6 Hawaii. Furthermore, one of the Foxes’ three wins came against Bucknell, the only team Princeton has lost to this season. In last season’s contest, Princeton prevailed 10-5 in Cambridge, largely behind the strength of then-goalie Ashleigh Johnson’s 16 saves. With Johnson no longer in net and Marist coming in with much more experience in close games against strong opponents, Princeton will have to play a great game to repeat last year’s convincing victory.
After taking on Marist, the Tigers play the hosts, No. 16 Harvard (8-1), in a game not only for rivalry bragging rights but also seeding in the end of year CWPA championships. Like Marist, Harvard has also fallen to Hawaii this season, but apart from that lone blemish has seemed dominant, convincingly disposing of a talented California Baptist University squad at the Princeton Invitational and scoring a tight victory against No. 13 Indiana, another contender for the CWPA crown. Last year Princeton won both matchups by a combined score of 27-13, but Harvard’s improvement and performances so far this season suggest that this weekend’s matchup will not be so one-sided. If the Tigers are to prevail, they will need to slow down Kristen Hong, who has 32 points through the Crimson’s first nine games.
Princeton closes out the weekend on Sunday against No. 26 Iona (2-4), a team it has already beat 15-8 once this season. In that previous meeting at the Princeton Invitational, sophomore utility and leading scorer Haley Wan had a huge game, scoring four goals and assisting four more on the way to being named National Player of the Week. Junior centerMorgan Hallock also a had good day, scoring three goals in addition to tallying three steals and drawing four ejections. A similar performance from those two offensive standouts would go a long way toward Princeton’s overcoming the Gaels and ending the weekend on a strong note.
In one of its biggest weekends of the young season, Princeton will learn a lot about itself as a team and go a long way toward determining how the rest of its season unfolds. The games will be available to stream on the Ivy League Digital Network.
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