Princeton Travels To Rutgers For 97th Meeting For The Meistrell Cup

PRINCETON (2-2) at RUTGERS (3-2)

High Point Solutions Stadium • Piscataway, N.J.
Saturday, March 9, 2019 • 1 pm
Series history Princeton leads 63-30-3
Last meeting Princeton defeated Rutgers 15-14 • March 10, 2018

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The Princeton men's lacrosse team has won 29 of the last 31 meetings in its series with Rutgers. On the other hand, the teams have split the last two, and Princeton lost in its last trip to High Point Solutions Stadium before winning last year at home in overtime.

Princeton and Rutgers meet for the 97^th time when they get together Saturday afternoon in Piscataway, and all of that history will not matter until after the game is over, when the winning team is handed the Meistrell Cup. Before that, it's a matchup of two teams who are both hoping that this game turns into a win in March that will look really good come NCAA tournament selection time.

As for those last two games in the series, Rutgers defeated Princeton 16-11 two years ago on a frozen night at home while Princeton rallied from four back in the fourth quarter to win it 15-14 in overtime, with a late goal from Austin Sims to tie it and then another by Sims 1:28 into the extra session to win it. Sims, who is now with the Archers of the Premiere Lacrosse League, led Princeton with five goals in that game.

Princeton vs. Rutgers
Five Storylines

The Meistrell Cup
The first men's lacrosse game in Princeton history was played in 1881. Rutgers would play its first game six years later. Both schools decided to discontinue the sport several years after that and in fact both did, as Rutgers dropped its team in 1889 and Princeton gave up on lacrosse a little after that, in 1893.

Harland (Tots) Meistrell, meanwhile, went from Erasmus Hall High School in Brooklyn to Rutgers in 1920, where he played varsity football as a freshman and also restarted the lacrosse team. A year later, in 1921, he did the same at Princeton.

Today, he represents both schools in the U.S. Lacrosse Hall of Fame, and the winner of the Princeton-Rutgers game each year wins the Meistrell Cup.

The teams have met every year since, except for the World War II seasons of 1944 and 1945. Princeton leads the all-time series 63-30-3.

The only team Princeton has played more than Rutgers is Yale, whom Princeton will play for the 104th time later this month.

The Sowers Factor
Michael Sowers has 14 points in two career games against Rutgers, with three goals and two assists in the loss two years ago and then three goals and six assists in the win last year.

Sowers comes into the Rutgers game off a two-goal, seven-assist performance against Navy in Princeton's 19-11 win Tuesday in Annapolis. It was the sixth time in his career he's had at least nine points in a game (including last year's Rutgers game); every other player in Princeton men's lacrosse history combined has had 17 such games.

Sowers, in 32 career games, is tied for seventh all-time at Princeton in points scored for a career with the great Chris Massey with 192. He is currently second in Division I in assists per game and third in points per game; he led the nation in both a year ago.

At his current scoring pace, he'll break Kevin Lowe's school career record of 247 in the second-to-last game of the regular season – of his junior year. Lowe is in the US Lacrosse Hall of Fame.

The Robertson factor
Phillip Robertson missed the first two games of the year due to an injury, and he played only extra man against Johns Hopkins. He made his first start of the season in the game Tuesday at Navy.

Robertson started out 0 for 5 against Navy. From there he went 5 for 7, which was more like what he did last year, when he led Division I in shooting percentage.

Robertson had three of his goals off of assists by Michael Sowers in the Navy game. For his career, Robertson now has 41 goals, and 21 of them have been assisted by Sowers. In fact, Sowers now has more assists to Robertson than to any other player, after Robertson moved past Gavin McBride, who had 20 goals assisted by Sowers.

With Robertson back on attack, Emmet Cordrey moved to midfield against Navy and responded with five goals and three assists, tying his career high of eight points that he set against Monmouth on opening day.

Save percentage
Rutgers goalie Max Edelmann is second in Division I in save percentage at .630. He's also eighth in Division I in goals-against average at 9.00.

With Edelmann in the cage, Rutgers is one of the top defensive teams in the country. Navy came into the game against Princeton allowing just nine goals per game, and Princeton more than doubled that, putting up 19, the most the Mids had allowed since 1998.

Princeton is averaging 16.25 goals per game, fourth best in Division I. Opposing goalies have made 67 saves while Princeton has scored 65 times, but that number is a bit distorted by the 24 saves Virginia goalie Patrick Burkinshaw made in a 12-11 win on Feb. 23. Minus that, Princeton has scored 54 times while opposing goalies have made 43 saves (.443).

On the ground
Princeton has done a great job on ground balls, with 39.75 per game, which is third in Division I. Princeton has really excelled on ground balls off the face-off wings, and it's been a pair of freshmen and a sophomore who have really led the way.

Jake Stevens, a freshman, has a team-best 26 ground balls, of which 19 have come on face-offs. His classmate Luc Anderson has nine ground balls on face-offs, and Andrew Song, a sophomore longstick midfielder, has seven ground balls on face-off wins.

With those three on the wings, Princeton has won 52.9 percent of its face-offs, up from 48 percent a year ago.

Other notes

* Jack-Henry Vara won 43.4 percent of his face-offs a year ago. Philip Thompson won 31.2 percent of his. This year Vara is at 60.4 percent, while Thompson is up to 52.9.

* Princeton has four players with at least one goal in each of the first four games and two others who have at least one point in every game. Emmet Cordrey, Michael Sowers, Chris Brown and Charlie Durbin have all scored at least one in every game, and Connor McCarthy and freshman Alexander Vardaro has at least one point in each game.

* Emmet Cordrey has scored six goals and five goals in Princeton's two wins and one goal in each of Princeton's two losses. He also leads the Ivy League and is fifth in the country in shooting percentage at .565.

* Chris Brown has at least one goal in all 17 games of his career. It's the longest streak of consecutive games with at least one goal to start a career by any player at Princeton since freshman eligibility in the 1970s.

* George Baughan leads Princeton and is second in the Ivy League in caused turnovers per game after leading the league a year ago. Baughan also has a goal – which he scored on a give-and-go against Navy – and an assist this season.

* Princeton has led in the fourth quarter in both of its losses. Princeton has led at the half in its two wins by a combined 23-6.

* Will Kusnierek scored his first two career goals in the win over Navy. Princeton now has three freshmen offensive midfielders – Kusnierek, Alexander Vardaro and Beau Pederson – who have combined for 10 goals and one assist and two other freshmen shortstick defensive midfielders – Luc Anderson, Jake Stevens - who have one assist each, as well as a combined 37 ground balls.

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