Princeton University Athletics
Thursday TigerBlog - Thanks For Nothing
November 20, 2025 | Tiger Blog
So TigerBlog has told you this story from his days as a vendor at the old Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia before:
Mario Soto was the Cincinnati Reds' ace and the favorite player of Evan Weiss, then a vendor who used to drive TigerBlog from West Philadelphia to the stadium every day in his VW and today a doctor in Philadelphia. All season, Weiss waited for the Reds — the last team to come into Philly — to arrive so he could get Soto's autograph, and then finally the day was there. Weiss waited for Soto to get off the bus and went up to him and asked for his autograph, only to have Soto walk by without stopping. Talk about being crushed.
And now, a mere 42 years later, TigerBlog got to experience those same emotions all over again.
It happened yesterday in the late afternoon. The Princeton field hockey team had just wrapped up practice at the University of North Carolina, in advance of the NCAA Final Four at Duke.
Princeton will play tomorrow at noon against Harvard in the first national semifinal (ESPN/ESPN+), followed by North Carolina and Northwestern. The championship game will be Sunday at 1 (same broadcast outlets). It will be an intense weekend.
Yesterday, though, was merely a practice after a long trip down for the Tigers, who left Caldwell Field House Tuesday afternoon, stopped for the night in Richmond and finally rolled into North Carolina in the middle of the afternoon. After checking into the hotel, it was off to work out at UNC's field.
Princeton Associate Head Coach Dina Rizzo is a native of Walpole, Mass., which is pretty much walkable to Gillette Stadium, home of the Patriots. Like most of that area, Rizzo is a big Patriots fan, especially during the glory years of Bill Belichick and Tom Brady.
And where is Belichick these days? He's the head coach at North Carolina. And where was he specifically yesterday when Princeton was wrapping up practice? Inside the building adjacent to the field hockey team, giving a pep talk to the Tar Heels.
While this was going on, Princeton was milling around outside the very same building, waiting for its post-practice food to be delivered to the bus. The entire Princeton group knew who was inside the building.
And there was Rizzo, all excited about the idea of getting a photo with Belichik when he came outside and sending it her family of fellow Patriots fans.
TigerBlog could see it coming from a mile away. It was going to be, sigh, Evan Weiss and Mario Soto all over again.
With that, 1) Belichick eventually walked out of the building, 2) Rizzo went up and asked if she could get a picture, 3) Belichick said no and got into a golf cart to be driven away (though he sat in the cart for two minutes or so) and 4) it was very, very weak of him. Oh, and 5) Rizzo and her whole family — after she texted them — are no longer fans of said coach.
C'mon now. How hard would it have been to take one picture? Yes, he probably gets that all the time, but still, this was right after he had just talked to one field hockey team and when another was just sitting there waiting to get on its bus. There wasn't a crush of fans. And besides, Rizzo announced herself by giving her hometown.
It was just like Mario Soto all those years ago. Soto now works in the Reds' front office; hopefully he's a changed man.
At the other side of the likeability scale sits Jim Barlow, the head coach of the Princeton men's soccer team. His team will be playing its NCAA opener Sunday against the winner of tonight's first round game between FDU and Duke.
That game will be played at Duke, coincidentally.
Just before TB got on the bus yesterday, he ran into Barlow, on his way to practice. TB told Barlow that he would be happy to scout the FDU-Duke game.
Now forget for a minute that TB wasn't really serious. After all, there's an NCAA Final Four banquet for field hockey tonight as well.
You can also forget that TB's scouting report would have gone something like this: "They each had 11 guys, and both teams tried to kick the ball into the other team's goal."
What did Barlow say? He reminded TB that NCAA rules prohibit any representative from an opponent to see the game in person.
Barlow never met an NCAA rule he didn't know and follow to the letter.
Anyway, it's about to get really serious for the field hockey and men's soccer teams. For yesterday?
It was Mario Soto all over again.
