Princeton University Athletics
Prager Leads Princeton Past Rutgers
March 27, 2001 | Men's Lacrosse
March 27, 2001
Piscataway, N.J. - B.J. Prager scored four goals to lead Princeton to a 14-5 win over Rutgers in front of 1,014 frozen fans at Yurcak Field Tuesday night.
The victory gave Princeton the Harland (Tots) Meistrell Cup, awarded annually to the winner of the Princeton-Rutgers game, for the 12th straight year. The teams have met every year since 1926, with the exception of the World War II seasons of 1944 and 1945.
The win also came three days after Princeton lost at Syracuse to fall out of the No. 1 spot in the national rankings. Princeton is now ranked fourth.
"It was good and bad to play them so soon after Syracuse," Princeton coach Bill Tierney said. "It was good because we didn't have to live with the loss for an entire week. It was bad because the hangover from losing that game could still have been with us." Any thoughts of a hangover were erased when Princeton (4-1) took a 5-0 lead after the first quarter. Prager scored two of his four goals in the quarter, including the first of the night at the 3:18 mark.
Prager, who returned from a torn ACL last year and a shoulder separation this year, has scored at least one goal in 24 straight games. The junior had scored one goal in each of his first two career games against Rutgers (2-3).
"It was a good game for us," Prager said. "I thought we controlled the tempo pretty well. We wanted to come back and play right away after losing to Syracuse. I know it was better to play than to be practicing."
Princeton led 6-1 after the teams traded second quarter goals, but Rutgers scored the first two of the third quarter to cut it to 6-3. All-America attackman Keith Cromwell scored the first of the Rutgers goals in the quarter at the 5:33 mark, and Michael Buck scored off an assist from Cromwell 34 seconds later.
"I thought we came out well," Tierney said. "We played a lot of players, and we started to have trouble scoring. Their goalie [Dan Shavitz] played very well, and they played hard the whole game. All of the sudden, it's 6-3 and we're having trouble scoring."
Prager answered that threat with his third goal 57 seconds after Buck's goal, and that started Princeton on a 5-0 run that built the lead to 11-3 early in the fourth quarter.
In addition to Prager's four goals, Princeton picked up two each from Jason Doneger and Rob Torti and three assists each from Ryan Boyle and Chris Harrington.
Trevor Tierney made 13 saves in goal for the Tigers.
Cromwell led Rutgers with three goals and one assist.
Princeton opens its Ivy League season at Yale Saturday.
Princeton (4-1) 5-1-4-4--14
Rutgers (2-3) 0-1-2-2--5
Princeton scoring -- B.J. Prager 4-0, Ryan Boyle 0-3, Rob Torti 2-1, Jason Doneger 2-0, Owen Daly 1-0, Will MacColl 1-0, Matt Striebel 1-1, Chris Harrington 0-3, Brian Lieberman 0-1, Brendan Tierney 1-0, Sean Hartofilis 1-0, Dan Clark 1-1.
Rutgers scoring -- Keith Cromwell 3-2, Michael Buck 1-1, Ken Springer 1-0, Nick Schmidt 0-1.