Princeton University Athletics
Beth Bozman
February 10, 2000 | Field Hockey
She stood at the podium, looked out the window at the hallowed grounds that would play host to the Final Four, and smiled. For once, Beth Bozman didn't mind making the trip to Franklin Field.
It wasn't always that way. When she started her tenure at Princeton as head coach of the field hockey team, Penn was the team to beat in the league. The trip to Franklin Field for a battle with the Quakers was the make-or-break game.
And break was too often in the cards for Bozman and her players.
"Franklin Field is always a tough place to play," Bozman says, recalling a time when Princeton lost overtime game after overtime game to its Ivy nemesis. "Penn had a high-quality team with some good Philly kids. Plus, Val [Cloud] is a very good coach."
From 1991 until 1994, Princeton lost to Penn by one goal. In three of those years it took the extra session to decide. It would have been understandable for Bozman to get frustrated and start questioning her strategies, both on the field and in recruiting. She didn't. She believed her methods and the kids she wanted could take Old Nassau to the top of the league. She even thought they could give her kids a chance to dance with some of the nation's elite. Maybe, just maybe, they would be able to pull out a surprise here and there.
Little did she know just how big the surprise would be for everybody, including herself. Since the last overtime defeat at Franklin Field, a 2-1 loss in 1993, Princeton has won 32 consecutive league games, made the NCAA tournament five times, played in three Final Fours and battled for the national crown twice.
And she does it without a single scholarship and some of the toughest admission standards in America.
"I always thought we could be good, but not in the league as some of these other teams," Bozman says. "For most schools there were field hockey scholarships before there were basketball ones. Other schools don't believe that we don't give scholarships because, if you think about, this shouldn't be happening. We start later, we play fewer games and every non-Ivy game is against a Top 10 team."
Bozman, who is one win away from No. 150 in her career (she has 130 wins at Princeton) was able to get the Tigers to this level by recruiting tough kids-from Kim Simons '94 to the brilliant class that will enter this year-who could compete with the best of the best.
No wonder she could smile at the podium at last year's NCAA championships. The cycle that brought her back to Franklin Field was a wondrous ride, and one that she completed against the odds.
Not that she's ready to get off though. The rest of the ride could prove even more amazing.