So far, the Princeton women’s basketball team’s dream season has unfolded, well, like a dream.
The Tigers have opened up the 2025-26 campaign with two big road wins over power-conference opponents, both in exhilarating fashion. In each game, the Tigers trailed for a majority of the contest only to have the lights suddenly come on in the final stanza.
In the team’s season opener Sunday at Georgia Tech, Carla Berube’s squad overcame a sluggish first quarter and an eight-point deficit in the fourth quarter to win, 67-61.
Three days later at Villanova, the Tigers rallied in carbon-copy fashion from a 10-point deficit in the fourth to win again, 73-68.
Here are three takeaways from the Tigers’ promising start to the season and a preview of this weekend’s epic matchup with Maryland:
1. These Tigers are gritty.
The magic ingredient in both of Princeton’s quality road wins to open the season was grit.
The Tigers used tough defense against both the Yellow Jackets and the Wildcats to force turnovers and get stops.
One key indicator of a team’s tenacity is its ability to get steals. In Princeton’s first two games of the season, the Tigers took the ball away an average of 15 times per game, which ranks 26th-best in the nation.
The ringleader of this gritty gang so far has been Fadima Tall. The junior forward leads the team in points (18.5 per game), rebounds (11.5) and steals (3.5). Tall has already won recognition as the U.S. Basketball Writers Asociation’s Player of the Week.
In both of Princeton’s comeback victories, it was Tall who sparked the team’s turnaround.
At Georgia Tech, Tall hit back-to-back triples in the fourth quarter to dissolve the Yellow Jackets’ lead. And at Villanova, Tall tallied a career-high 21 points, 14 in the second half, to lead the Tigers’ comeback.
Berube has also gotten clutch playmaking from senior co-captain Madison St. Rose.
Though Rose is still rounding into form after missing nearly all of last season due to injury, she nevertheless turned in steady performances in her first two games back on the court, averaging 15 points, 3.5 rebounds and 2.5 assists per game.
Most notably, the senior guard from Old Bridge, N.J. has come up big when the Tigers have most needed a play.
Against Georgia Tech, St. Rose nailed a cold-blooded trey with just over a minute to play to seal a comeback win against an ACC opponent and NCAA Tournament team last season.
Three days later, the former Ivy League Rookie of the Year stroked an open three to knot the contest with Villanova at 63 with just over five minutes to play.
The fact that these tenacious Tigers have not once but twice already clawed their way back from late-game deficits on the road and played their best with the game on the line against top competition speaks to an incredible winning team culture that coaches Carla Berube, Lauren (Battista) Gosselin, Lauren Dillon, and the rest of the staff have instilled at Old Nassau.
2. The Tigers haven’t found their shooting range. Yet.
One of the most impressive aspects of Princeton’s hot start to the season is that it has occurred in spite of cold shooting by just about everyone on the team.
After two games, the Tigers have converted only 37% of their shots, which ranks 275th in the nation, and only 22% from distance, which ranks 317th.
Is this typical for Berube’s Tigers? No. And yes.
Last season, Berube’s squad shot 46% for the season with nearly the same roster. The season before, the Tigers shot 45.5% from the field. So, no, Berube’s Princeton teams do not normally shoot anything like 37%.
But games early in the season can later prove to be outliers.
For example, a year ago, Princeton dropped its first game of the season at Duquesne, 76-66. In that contest, the Tigers shot only 33.8% and ended up blowing a fourth-quarter lead.
The following game, however, the Tigers refocused at DePaul and shot over 50% en route to a 79-58 rout. From there, the Tigers went on to win 20 more games and earn a bid to the NCAA Tournament.
The point is, Princeton’s problematic shooting so far is likely due to the fact that the team is still rounding into form after playing only two games on the road against top competition.
Once the Tigers kick off their home season next Wednesday night against Rice, don’t be surprised if suddenly the shots begin to fall like rain in the Amazon.
3. The subs have been subpar so far.
With only 11 players on the team’s roster, Princeton’s coaching staff knows it has to get contributions from everyone in order to avoid wearing down the starting rotation.
Unfortunately, Tiger subs were able to contribute only six points against Tech and only seven points against Villanova.
So far, only four bench players have scored at all for Berube’s club, including freshman Grace O’Sullivan (three points), sophomore Toby Nweke (three points), sophomore Emily Eadie (three points), and senior Taylor Charles (four points).
Overall, Princeton ranks 351st in the nation in bench points.
The Tigers’ thin bench has gotten thinner due to a lingering injury to sharpshooting guard Cristina Parrella, who hasn’t seen action yet in her sophomore campaign.
Although Princeton has managed to scrape by without much contribution from its bench, that dynamic will surely have to change if the Tigers hope to survive the remaining gauntlet of games in their non-conference schedule.
Look for Toby Nweke to shake off an early season slump and start hitting big corner threes for the Tigers, perhaps as early as this Sunday in a homecoming matchup at Maryland.
Will there be magic in College Park?
Speaking of Maryland, the Tigers will get a heat check this Sunday when they take on the No. 9 Terrapins at the XFINITY Center in College Park. The game tips at 1 p.m. on Big Ten Plus.
The Tigers have never beaten Maryland in three previous tries, the last two of which took place in the NCAA Tournament. In fact, it was a No. 1-seeded Maryland team that put an end to Princeton’s perfect 30-0 season in the second round of the NCAA tournament at XFINITY in March 2015.
Tall has had the Maryland matchup circled on her calendar since before the season began.
In an engaging interview on the Get Stops Podcast, Tall, who hails from Silver Spring, Md., pulled the curtain back on what the game means to her.
“It’s one of the most important games of my life,” Tall said. “That’s a huge underdog game. There’s no better feeling than knowing that people think you’re going to lose, but you’re probably going to win. It’s easy to rise to the occasion when the odds are against you.”
That quote sounds like a line from a speech Hannibal might have given to his Carthaginian troops as they crossed the Alps to confront (and defeat) the Roman legions.
But for Tall’s tale to come true, the Tigers will have to execute their offense better than they have so far in either of their two previous contests.
That starts with the star shooters, like Ashley Chea, finding more accuracy from distance.
Chea, a unanimous First-Team All-Ivy guard who led the Tigers in scoring last season, reached double-figures in each of her first two outings of the season. However, the junior sharpshooter has hit only 27.3% of her three-pointers so far, down from 36.2% last season and 37.9% as a freshman.
For Princeton to pull the upset on Sunday, Chea will have to find her range and have a big day.
Ditto for Skye Belker, who struggled in the first seven quarters of the season before igniting in the fourth quarter at Villanova. Belker tallied nine of her 13 points in the final stanza to help lift the Tigers past the Wildcats.
Like Chea, Belker has struggled from distance, making only one of seven shots from behind the arc.
Princeton’s other sharpshooter, St. Rose, likewise has canned only two of eight from three so far.
For Princeton to prevail against a loaded Maryland squad, all three guards–Chea, Belker and St. Rose –will have to step up and hit more shots, especially from behind the arc.
Tall, for one, isn’t worried about her teammates getting on track, especially Chea.
“She’s magic.” Tall told the Get Stops Podcast. “Everything she does is so instinctive. Give her a good ball screen, and you’ll see some magic will happen.”