Princeton Hosts Harvard As Ivy Race Heats Up

Saturday, October 14

Princeton, N.J.

12:00 PM

Princeton University

Harvard

October 12, 2023 | Field Hockey

PRINCETON (5-7, 3-1 Ivy) vs. HARVARD (9-3, 4-0)
Bedford Field • Princeton, N.J.
Oct. 14, 2023 • noon

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The best word to describe the Ivy League field hockey standings just past the halfway point is probably "symmetrical."

There are two 4-0 teams. There are two 3-1 teams. There are two 1-3 teams. There are two 0-4 teams.

In the coming three weekends, the word will go from "symmetrical" to "final." After that will be the first four-team Ivy League tournament to determine the automatic bid to the NCAA tournament. There are only 12 Ivy League games left to be played. This weekend will really begin to define things.

Princeton vs. Harvard
Five Storylines

The Ivy race
The two 4-0 teams are Harvard and Penn, followed by 3-1 Princeton and Cornell. Dartmouth and Yale are both 1-3, with Columbia and Brown 0-4.

This weekend's matchups have the two 0-4s and the two 1-3s playing each other. At the top of the standings, it's Harvard at Princeton Saturday, after Penn at Cornell Friday. By Saturday night, you could have anywhere from two 5-0 teams to four 4-1 teams, though you will definitely have one 0-5 team, two 1-4 teams and one 2-3 team.

The Ivy League champion will be decided by the final regular season standings, regardless of what happens in the tournament.

The tournament race
The top four teams will advance to the Ivy League tournament, which will be at the home of the No. 1 seed. Harvard and Penn have already clinched their spots, and Cornell would do so as well with a win. Princeton, even with a win, cannot mathematically clinch its spot this weekend.

Harvard finishes the season with games against Princeton, Cornell and Penn. Cornell and Penn still have to play each other. Princeton finishes the season with games at Dartmouth and Yale.

Any of the top four teams could mathematically be the host for the tournament.

Princeton vs. Harvard
Princeton and Harvard are a combined 63-1 against the rest of the league since the start of the 2017 season. That one loss was Princeton's double overtime loss to Penn earlier this season.

The last time that neither Princeton nor Harvard won at least a share of the Ivy League title was back in 1993. Since then, only three times has another team even won a piece of the championship: Brown and Princeton in 1999, Penn and Harvard in 2004 and Princeton and Yale in 2011.

Princeton leads the all-time series 43-8-2.

A year ago
Princeton defeated Harvard 4-2 after scoring three times in the first eight minutes and then sealing it on a goal with 12 minutes left after the Crimson had cut it to 3-2 in the second half.

Of the 11 players who started for Princeton in that game, only two are still active: goalie Robyn Thompson and midfielder Ella Hampson. Princeton also started seven seniors, Beth Yeager (who is off this year to play for the U.S. national team in Olympic qualifying) and Grace Schulze (who is out for the year after breaking her collarbone in the first minute of second game of the season).

RPI
Harvard is ranked ninth in RPI this week. Princeton has already played seven teams in the top 13 of this week's RPI, with a win over No. 12 Maryland and one-goal losses to No. 3 North Carolina, No. 4 Louisville and No. 6 Rutgers.

Princeton is currently No. 7 in RPI, while Cornell is 24^th and Penn is 25^th.