Two down, one to go.
Princeton women’s basketball added an exclamation point to its already triumphant Ivy League season Saturday by soundly defeating the Columbia Lions, 75-58, for its fifth consecutive Ivy League Tournament championship.
Princeton punched its ticket to the NCAA Tournament, which kicks off next weekend.
For Princeton, cutting down the nets at Ivy Madness was the second item on a three-item “to do” list. The first item was scratched off last weekend when Princeton defeated Penn to clinch a share of its sixth consecutive regular season Ivy League title. The second item was to win the Ivy League Tournament at Levien Gymnasium in New York City.
The Tigers can now scratch that item off the list thanks in part to an all-around outstanding performance by senior co-captain Kaitlyn Chen, who tallied 17 points on 7-for-12 shooting and dished a game-high six assists. For her efforts, Chen was named the MVP of the Ivy League Tournament for the third consecutive year, a feat never before accomplished in the history of the conference.
Princeton jumped out to an early lead behind the shooting of super sophomore Madison St. Rose, who was named to the All-Tournament Team. The Second-Team All-Ivy guard scored from the baseline on the opening possession of the game to give the Tigers a 2-0 lead.
It must have felt good for St. Rose and her coaches and teammates to see that first shot go down, because when St. Rose gets in a groove, it’s usually going to be a long night for the opposing team. Indeed, it did turn out to be one of those nights for Columbia, as St. Rose hit big shots throughout the game and turned in a team-high 18 points on 6-for-12 shooting.
But Columbia created some problems for themselves early on by turning the ball over 4 times before the game hit the first media timeout. Princeton led at the end of the first quarter 19-14.
In the second quarter, Columbia managed to stay in the game with a barrage of three pointers. The stanza opened with Abbey Hsu escaping from Chen to hit a trey, one of six on the night for the Ivy Player of the Year. Hsu finished with a game-high 20 points on 6-for-14 shooting.
Although Columbia got hot from long distance in the first half, Princeton continued to execute with precision on offense and never allowed Columbia to pull even. The Tigers went to the locker room with a 34-27 lead.
In the third quarter, the Tigers pulled away from the host team. Ashley Chea, a freshman guard from Flint Ridge Prep in southern California, came off the bench to score eight points, including two bombs from the corner, to extend Princeton’s lead to 55-39 by the end of the stanza. It felt like the game was over.
In the fourth quarter, Columbia fought valiantly but couldn’t get enough stops to ignite a run. A layup by Reilly Weiss with just under six minutes to play cut Princeton’s lead to twelve, 60-48. But Chen responded with a jumper in the paint and after Princeton got a stop, St. Rose drained a three to put the game away.
- The Tigers led by as many as 19 down the stretch before settling for a very business-like victory, 75-58.
After surviving a scare from Penn in Friday’s sometimes ragged semifinal, Princeton operated with poise and precision for a full forty minutes against Columbia with a championship on the line. The Tigers executed a game plan based on exploiting their size advantage in the paint, where they outscored the Lions 40-19.
For Princeton, winning in such a convincing fashion on Columbia’s home court would seem like vindication. After all, just three weeks ago, this same Columbia squad humbled the Tigers at Levien, handing Carla Berube’s club their only loss since early December.
But when asked in the postgame press conference whether the Tigers had something to prove in the rubber match of the three-game season series with Columbia, neither Berube nor her players took the bait.
“Today, was just business as usual as far as what we did as a coaching staff,” Berube said. “This was just the next game on our schedule.”
Speaking of the next game on the schedule, the Tigers will wait until Sunday evening to find out where the NCAA selection committee will send them for their first-round game in March Madness. There should be 63 other teams in the bracket not wanting to hear Princeton’s name announced next to theirs.
The Tigers have victimized two first-round opponents from power conferences in their previous two NCAA Tournament appearances. This year, they are looking to make an even deeper run and in the process cross that third item off their “to do” list for this already memorable 2023-24 campaign.
