Each week, Sports writers analyze recent athletic competitions to provide analysis and insight on the happenings of Princeton athletics and individual players across the 38 intercollegiate teams at Princeton. Whether they are record-breaking or day-to-day, statistics deliver information in concise ways and help inform fans who might have missed the action. Read past By the Numbers coverage here.
Princeton Tigers: Oct. 11–Oct. 24
Fifty-three games and matches were played across 12 sports and nine U.S. states over the past two weeks. Of the 25 games where only one team came out on top, the Tigers won 68 percent of matches — more than the 58 percent in last week’s games.
Multiple day meets and tournaments are counted individually for each day of the competition. Competitions with more than one event or individual results such as golf and cross country are not included in our win percentage analysis.
This week, the Tigers won more than two-thirds of their games. They greatly benefited from home field advantage this past week, taking six of eight back home in New Jersey. They persevered through travel to succeed on the road, winning 11 of their 17 games away from Old Nassau.
King is the queen of wins
Women’s volleyball head coach Sabrina King ’01 clinched her 200th career victory in a 3–0 win at Columbia last Friday. King brought the Tigers three Ivy League titles as a player before starting as an assistant coach in 2002. Now in their 12th season under King’s tutelage, the Tigers have taken home five Ivy titles, including three in a row from 2015 to 2017.
Phirst-year Phenom
First-year linebacker AJ Pigford has burst onto the Ivy League football scene, receiving the Ivy League Rookie of the Week award in two back-to-back weeks. Pigford recorded three tackles, one pass breakup, and a sack in Friday’s 29–17 home win over Brown after wreaking havoc on Mercer with three tackles for loss and a sack two weeks ago.
Californication
No. 6 men’s water polo defeated the defending champion No. 7 University of California Berkeley Bears this Sunday 11–9, for their first ever program victory over Cal, a perennial water polo powerhouse. Sophomore goalie Kristóf Kovács anchored the Tiger defense with a season-high-tying 16 saves to drown the Golden Bears.
Scarano Scaries
Junior linebacker Marco Scarano brought Halloween early to the Brown Bears last Friday night at Powers Field. The third-year backer swarmed the Bears the whole night, making 14 total tackles and one tackle for loss.
Scarano attributed the defense’s success on Friday to preparation. He wrote to The Daily Princetonian, “On defense, we like to say, ‘it’s about us,’ meaning that we control the yards an offense gains on us. After Sunday’s film breakdown of Mercer, our focus flipped to Brown and it was all about coming out with energy and focus at practice every day.”
On his own individual numbers, Scarano was the quintessential teammate. “The inside and back end guys did a great job, which pushed the ball outside on the perimeter to me,” he wrote to the ‘Prince.’
0 to 100, real quick
Junior midfielder Beth Yeager reached 100 career points this past week with an overtime assist in field hockey’s 2–1 win over Harvard. Yeager, who represented the United States in Paris at the 2024 Summer Olympics, became the twelfth Tiger ever to accomplish this feat and will have the opportunity to break into the all-time top five for points in her senior season.
Lord of the goals
Senior utility Roko Pozaric swam his place into the Tiger water polo record books this past week, breaking the all-time goal record in a 12–11 win over Pepperdine this past week. Pozaric, hailing from Croatia, scored his 255th goal, surpassing the 19-year-old mark of 254 held by John Stover ’06. Pozaric is now sitting at 262 goals with five regular season games and the postseason left to continue his historic success.
Where there’s a will, there’s a way
Senior Will Huang led men’s golf to a tournament victory in the Georgetown Invitational this past week, overcoming an impressive first round team performance from Campbell University. Huang opened the tournament with a scorching six under par score of 65 — tied for the lowest round score in modern Tiger history — before overcoming bad weather to shoot back-to-back one-under 70s for an eight-under overall score.
“I actually got off to a pretty slow start in the first round. I missed my first four fairways and greens in a row and relied on my short game to get up and down for par,” Huang wrote to the ‘Prince.’ “It wasn’t until later in the round where I started to heat up and make some birdies.”
The blustering wind during the second and third rounds of the tournament threw off many golfers, but Huang adapted.
“The greens were really fast and pure so I knew if I just kept giving myself opportunities some putts would end up dropping,” he added.
All in all, the Tigers had a winning week, overcoming their victory percentage from last week. From women’s soccer to field hockey, the Tigers notched many successes on the field and look set to have a strong rest of the season in these sports. Check back next week to learn about all things Princeton Athletics — By The Numbers.
Harrison Blank is an assistant Sports editor at the ‘Prince.’
Please send any corrections to corrections[at]dailyprincetonian.com.
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