Princeton University Athletics
Tuesday TigerBlog - Nobody Ever Does Anything About It
February 24, 2026 | Tiger Blog
The women's tennis team played two matches in South Florida this weekend, defeating Florida International and Florida Atlantic. The Tigers, by the way, were ranked 34th in last week's ITA poll (the men were 19th).
Look at the picture. Palm trees swaying gently in the warm tropical breeze. The clear blue-green of the ocean beckoning beyond. The cloudless sky of blue sending its own personal greeting.
Now, if you were in the path of the storm that pushed through, look out the window. It's quite the contrast.
TigerBlog was outside Saturday at the men's lacrosse game at Maryland on a beautiful late February day. The snows of the previous six weeks had almost vanished completely. Grass was actually visible.
And now? Bang. There's more snow than there was before. And it's the heavy, hard-to-shovel kind.
If you were affected by this storm, hopefully you're okay and you still have power — or if not that you get it back soon. This storm was a wild one, with nearly two feet of snow and then crazy winds.
Also, if you're wondering, the women's tennis team was supposed to be back Sunday night but now can't get back until today at the earliest. What has the team been doing there? "Training and studying," Johnson said.
That's a good use of time.
The storm was so intense that in-person classes were cancelled, something that has happened because of weather less than five times probably in all the decades TB has been at Princeton.
Oh well. As Mark Twain once said: "Everybody talks about the weather, but nobody ever does anything about it." Or was that Charles Dudley Warner?
The timing of the storm wasn't horrible as far as the athletic schedule was. Had it come through 24-48 hours earlier, it would have been a logistical nightmare for sports at Princeton and everywhere else in the Northeast.
The week coming up is a huge one, with major events up and down the schedule. The weather app on TB's phone, by the way, still has a few too many snowflakes for his liking.
Before any of that becomes an issue, there are two more mentions from this past weekend.
The first is for the baseball team, which opened its season with three games at North Carolina State, who was ranked 17th in the country. The Wolfpack won the first two games, which, as an aside, improved them to 5-0 on the year. They also outscored Princeton 22-5 in those two games, including 16-1 in Game 2.
So what happened in the third game? Princeton 1, NC State 0.
The run came via an Isaac Lamson home run in the sixth. It was the first career home run for the sophomore.
The pitching came from Brady Kaufman, who went the first five innings, allowing one hit while striking out three, and then Ryan Penney, who went the last four, allowing two hits and striking out four, including two to end it after allowing a lead-off double in the bottom of the ninth.
Those are two big-time performances right there. Oh, and both of them are freshmen.
The Tigers head back to North Carolina for four with Duke this weekend.
TB also wants to talk about the men's hockey team, who lost in a shootout to Colgate Friday night and then turned around 24 hours later to beat No. 10 Cornell 4-2 on senior night.
As a result, Princeton heads into the final weekend of the regular season alone in fourth place in the ECAC standings. Fourth is a really good place to be, since the top four teams will receive a first-round playoff bye and home ice in the quarterfinals, while 5-8 will host the opening round next weekend.
Princeton is three points ahead of fifth-place Harvard, a team whom they play Friday night (in Cambridge), followed Saturday by a stop in Hanover to take on Dartmouth. The standings right now have Quinnipiac with 47 points, Dartmouth with 43, Cornell with 41 and then Princeton with 35.
No matter what happens, Princeton can finish no lower than sixth, which means there will be postseason hockey at Hobey Baker Rink for both the women and the men. The women will host Harvard in their quarterfinal series, which is best-of-three. Those games will be Friday, Saturday and if necessary Sunday, with a 3 pm start time each day.
