Three in a Row? Princeton is the Pick in the Ivy League

After having won Ivy League titles in each of the last two seasons, the Princeton women's soccer team is the pick to finish atop the league once again.

The Tigers received 10 of the 16 first-place votes from a pool that included each of the teams' athletic communications contacts and one media representative from each team. Penn received five first-place votes and Harvard received one.

Princeton's votes earned 120 poll points, ahead of Penn (112), Harvard (80), Dartmouth (76), Columbia (74), Brown (59), Yale (37) and Cornell (18).

Princeton returns six of its seven goal scorers from last season, with sophomore Gabi Juarez and seniors Tomi Kennedy and Courtney O'Brien coming back after multi-goal seasons in 2018.

Notes on the Tigers ahead of the 2019 season:

• Princeton made the NCAA quarterfinals in 2017, upsetting No. 2-ranked North Carolina in the round of 16 to earn a quarterfinal trip to UCLA.

Check out some awesome photos from Sunday's win over No. 2 North Carolina in the @NCAASoccer round of 16! (?? @theAndyMead)
More: https://t.co/3fhhaKcxcP pic.twitter.com/3imHV4XqZ6
— Princeton WSoccer (@PrincetonWSoc) November 20, 2017

• The Tigers won the last four games of the 2018 Ivy League season, all by shutout, to split the Ivy League title with Penn and gain the Ivy's automatic bid by virtue of the 1-0 win over Penn to end the regular season.

• Princeton returns seven All-Ivy League honorees, including first-team defender sophomore Lucy Rickerson, second-teamers in senior forward O'Brien, junior defender Eve Hewins and senior keeper Natalie Grossi, and honorable mentions in sophomore midfielder Emma Davis and senior midfielder Kennedy.

Congrats to Mimi Asom, coach Sean Driscoll, and all the Tigers who earned All-@IvyLeague honors!https://t.co/hncYK8SiVI pic.twitter.com/8Zgi3dfUCL
— Princeton WSoccer (@PrincetonWSoc) November 7, 2018

• Grossi enters the season with 25 career shutouts, four short of the Ivy League record of 29 held by Dartmouth alum Kristen Luckenbill.

• Head coach Sean Driscoll has 51 wins, just one behind the program's first coach, Bob Malekoff, for second with 52 wins. Predecessor Julie Shackford had 203 wins over a 20-season career, and Driscoll and Shackford will meet when William & Mary comes to Princeton on Sept. 22. Driscoll has the highest winning percentage of any coach in program history, at .747, and has won Ivy League Coach of the Year honors in three of his first four seasons including each of the last two years.

• No team has won three Ivy titles in a row since Princeton did that from 2000-02. The last time any Ivy team made three NCAA tournaments was when Princeton made it six years in a row from 1999 through 2004. Princeton would be the first Ivy team since those earlier Princeton teams to accomplish those feats if it won the Ivy title or made the NCAAs this year.

Calendar

Upcoming Events

Recent Results