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Princeton University Athletics
Football Falls To Dartmouth, 42-37
November 18, 2000 | Football
Nov. 18, 2000
Box Score
PRINCETON, N.J. (AP) -Princeton head coach Roger Hughes and offensive coordinator Dave Rackovan did their best to recruit Greg Smith to Dartmouth, and Saturday Smith made them sorry they succeeded.
The junior quarterback threw for 308 yards and four touchdowns as Dartmouth defeated Princeton, 42-37, to avoid its first winless Ivy League season.
"He played the best football I've ever seen him play," said Hughes, who was Dartmouth's offensive coordinator the previous eight seasons and watched his old offense amass a season-high 477 yards against the Tigers. "I always thought he had that ability, but that's the first time I saw him really put it all together."
Rackovan, a Dartmouth assistant for eight years before joining Hughes at Princeton, was primarily responsible for recruiting Smith. The Big Green (2-8, 1-6), which has won at least one league game every year since the official start of Ivy play in 1956, had a season-high in points and came from behind five times to defeat Princeton (3-7, 3-4) for the ninth time in the last 12 meetings.
"We knew we could move the ball," said Smith. "We finally came together as an offense today and scored touchdowns."
There were seven lead changes in the shootout, which resulted in the most combined points in 80 meetings between Princeton and Dartmouth. The previous high was 66 in 1973.
Dartmouth entered the final quarter trailing 31-28. But Smith, who was 20-for-27 with two interceptions, found Casey Cramer with a 12-yard touchdown pass to put the Big Green ahead with 10:04 left. On Dartmouth's next series, Jay Barnard caught a 26-yard flea-flicker pass from Smith to make it 42-31.
Princeton came back with a 1-yard touchdown run by quarterback Jon Blevins with 3:19 remaining, but the two-point conversion pass was broken up by Brad Eissler. The Big Green then ran out the clock to stave off a winless Ivy season.
"You really don't want to dwell on that," Smith said. "In a way it's like playing offense. You can't dwell on a bad pass, you have to look ahead to the next play.
"It's the same thing with the season. You have to look toward the next game, you can't look back at the past."
Dartmouth's Matt DeLellis caught eight passes for 164 yards, while Michael Gratch rushed for 97 yards. Blevins was 21 of 31 for 288 yards, while Chisom Opara caught 10 passes for 134 yards and fullback Marty Cheatham had eight catches for 98 yards. Princeton had 375 yards on offense.
In the third quarter, Smith threw a 14-yard touchdown pass to DeLellis for a 28-24 Dartmouth lead, only to have Princeton's Ismael El-Amin score on a 3-yard run to give the Tigers their final advantage.
The first half featured four lead changes, with Princeton getting a 5-yard touchdown run from Opara with 32 seconds left for a 24-21 lead. The touchdown, which came on a direct snap to Opara, was set up when Paul Simbi blocked Alex Ware's punt and Princeton's Cheatham recovered at the eight-yard line.
After Taylor Northrop's 42-yard field goal gave Princeton a 3-0 lead, DeLellis and Opara exchanged touchdown catches to make it 10-7 after one quarter. Dartmouth got 1-yard touchdown runs from Reggie Belhomme and Smith for a 21-10 lead before scoring runs by Cameron Atkinson and Opara restored Princeton's advantage.