Ivy Tournament Champions! Softball Earns NCAA Tournament Bid

Saturday, May 11

Princeton, N.J.

12:00 PM

Princeton University

28-16

Harvard

27-16

Harvard

Princeton

ivy softball tournament championship group photo

Photo by: Shelley M. Szwast

Ivy Tournament Champions! Softball Earns NCAA Tournament Bid

May 11, 2024 | Softball

Box Score 1 Box Score 2

With a combined shutout from Cassidy Shaw and Brielle Wright, the Princeton softball team defeated Harvard 1-0 in the if-necessary game of the Ivy League Tournament on Saturday at Princeton Softball Stadium at Strubing Field, earning the Ivy League's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.

The tournament draw will be announced on Sunday at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN2. The NCAA regional round will start on either Thursday or Friday.

Karis Ford, who went 5 for 10 in the Ivy tournament, won Most Outstanding Player honors with shortstop Grace Jackson, who hit .400, and pitchers Meghan Harrington and Shaw, each of whom threw six-plus shutout innings in an Ivy tournament win, joining Ford on the all-tournament team.

Princeton's run in Saturday's second game came in the second inning. Allison Ha led off with a walk, took second on a successful bunt single from Grace Jackson, took third on a Sophia Marsalo groundout, and came home on Cate Bade's groundout that was the second out of the inning.

That turned out to be enough for Shaw and Wright, with Shaw scattering four hits across six walk-free innings, striking out three, and a clean seventh inning for Wright, who drew three infield outs. Harvard had runners on second and third with one out in the third inning, getting a strikeout of Ivy Player and Rookie of the Year Sophie Sun for the second out and a foul pop-up to end the inning. A two-out double in the fifth put a runner in scoring position, but a groundout ended that threat.

FINAL | Princeton 1, Harvard 0

WE'RE COMIN' TO THE @NCAASoftball PARTY!

A shutout in the final game of the @IvyLeague Tournament wins us the bid!

Selection show tomorrow night at 7 ET on ESPN2! pic.twitter.com/4YvBTwaOMI
— Princeton Softball (@PUSoftball) May 11, 2024

Wright's save was her ninth of the season, extending her own Princeton and Ivy League records and giving her 10 saves for her career, breaking the Princeton record she had co-held with Riley Wilkinson '19 and tying the Ivy record co-held by Harvard alumnae Rachel Brown (2009-12) and Katie Duncan (2016-19).

Harvard forced Saturday's second game with a 6-1 win in the day's first game. The Crimson faced all four Tiger regular arms in the first game, breaking it open with two fourth-inning runs and three more in the fifth after Princeton had tied the game at 1-1 with Marsalo reaching on a leadoff error and scoring four batters later on a Julia Dumais single.

The NCAA tournament appearance is Princeton's 12th and first since 2022. Princeton and Harvard were the final two teams in contention for the Ivy's automatic bid each of the past three seasons, with Princeton winning the Ivy League Playoff Series on its home field in 2022 and Harvard winning the inaugural Ivy League Tournament last year after Princeton had forced the if-necessary game, also in Princeton.

Saturday's doubleheader were the last games at Princeton Softball Stadium at Strubing Field, where Princeton moved temporarily after playing its last season at the Class of 1895 Field in 2019, located where Princeton's New College West residential college now stands. Princeton will move to a new stadium in the university's Meadows Neighborhood for the 2025 season.