Princeton women’s basketball has released its schedule for the upcoming 2026-27 season, and once again, the Tigers have chosen to run a daunting gauntlet.
Of Princeton’s 29 regular-season games, 16 will come against programs that earned bids to postseason tournaments last March, including the team that won it all at the Big Dance, the UCLA Bruins.
“Our 2026-27 schedule reflects the championship mentality of this program,” newly installed head coach Lauren Gosselin said in a statement released by Princeton Wednesday. “Our non-conference schedule will test us immediately against some of the most successful programs in the country and prepare us to defend our Ivy League Championship while building a resume worthy of postseason competition.”
Gosselin will make her debut as Princeton’s 11th head coach on Nov. 2 when the Tigers open the season against Belmont at Jadwin Gymnasium in a return matchup from a season ago. The Tigers prevailed over the Bruins last year in Nashville, 70-58, in the first ever meeting between the two programs.
After opening with Belmont at home, the Tigers will travel to Richmond, Va. for a pair of games to inaugurate a scheduling alliance between the Ivy League, the Atlantic 10 (A-10), the American, and the Missouri Valley Conference (MVC), which is designed to showcase top teams from several of the premier mid-major conferences. On Nov. 6, the Tigers will take on the Richmond Spiders of the A-10, a NCAA Tournament team last season, and on Nov. 8, Princeton will face the Murray State Racers, a MVC stalwart, for the first time in program history.
Then, for the third time in four years, the Tigers will fly to Los Angeles to play the defending national champion UCLA Bruins on Nov. 15 at Pauley Pavilion, the scene of last March’s season-ending loss to Oklahoma State in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.
“The UCLA matchup has been locked in for a while now, and we are very excited to head back to L.A.,” Gosselin told Ivy Hoops Online.
Tigers fans will recall that Princeton nearly upset UCLA in Westwood three years ago in a nonconference thriller. After leading by a point with a minute to go, the Tigers bowed to the No. 3 Bruins, 77-74.
Though Princeton will be underdogs when they return to Westwood on Nov. 15, Bruins coach Cori Close will have an entirely new lineup as all five of UCLA’s starters from last season’s national championship squad were taken in the 2026 WNBA Draft. In contrast, four of Princeton’s five All-Ivy starters from last season are returning to Old Nassau for the upcoming campaign.
While on the West Coast, the Tigers will motor up the Pacific Coast Highway to Malibu to take on the Pepperdine Waves of the West Coast Conference on Nov. 17 for the first time in program history. The Waves are coming off a 21-13 season that included an appearance in the WBIT Super 16.
Princeton’s seniors hope their third visit to Southern California will be a charm, especially L.A. natives Ashley Chea and Skye Belker. Three other SoCal natives wearing the Orange and Black, including junior Emily Eadie (Newport Beach), and incoming freshmen Sarah Aldeguer (Santa Ana) and Mei-Ling Perry (Irvine), will also look forward to playing in front of their hometown friends and family.
“We try our best to play games close to our players’ hometowns, so it made sense to plan a trip to L.A. since we have five players from Southern California on our roster,” Gosselin told Ivy Hoops Online. “We’re grateful that UCLA and Pepperdine were both open to hosting us and we’re looking forward to the challenge of a multigame business trip against top competition early in the season.”
After completing their West Coast swing, the Tigers will host three consecutive high-profile games at Jadwin against George Mason of the A-10 on Nov. 18, Georgia Tech of the ACC on Nov. 22, and Rutgers of the Big Ten on Nov. 25. The Tigers clawed past all three programs last season.
After the Thanksgiving break, the Tigers will drive up Route 206 to play in-state rival Seton Hall of the Big East on Dec. 2, before flying to Houston for a return matchup with Rice of Conference USA on Dec. 5. The Tigers clipped the Owls, 69-56, last season in the first meeting of the two programs. The Tigers will swing across town to play Houston Christian of the Southland Conference on Dec. 7 in yet another first-time meeting of programs.
The Tigers close their nonconference schedule with three intriguing matchups at home against A-10 power Rhode Island on Dec. 10, the Portland Pilots on Dec. 13, and the Oregon State Beavers on Jan. 1.
Portland embarrassed Princeton two seasons ago in the Rose City, 74-55, using a zone press to force the Tigers into 29 turnovers. Princeton’s talented backcourt tandem of Chea and Belker will undoubtedly be highly motivated to turn the tables on the Pilots in the rematch at Jadwin.
Another power from the Pacific Northwest invades central New Jersey when Oregon State, a founding member of the new Pac-12, takes to the hardwood at Jadwin on New Year’s Day. In the only previous meeting between the teams in 2000, the Beavers routed the Tigers in Corvallis, 69-33.
Four days later, the Tigers will open Ivy League play on Jan. 5 at Jadwin in a Tuesday evening tip-off against the Penn Quakers. The Tigers will cross the Delaware for a return matchup at the Palestra on February 6. Princeton owns a 16-game winning streak against Penn and leads the all-time series with the Quakers, 73-30.
Other notable conference matchups for the Orange and Black include a challenging, back-to-back road weekend that begins with a long drive to Ithaca to play Cornell on Fri., Jan. 28, and finishes with a much-anticipated clash at Columbia on Sat., Jan. 29.
The return matchup between the Lions and the Tigers will take place at Jadwin on Feb. 13 in a game that could play a pivotal role in determining the Ivy League regular-season champion. The season series between Columbia and Princeton should provide high drama once again as a veteran Tigers squad will be highly motivated to avenge a rare series sweep by the Lions last season.
Not to be overlooked are a pair of key contests against rival Harvard, including a Jan. 16 tilt at Harvard and a return matchup on Feb. 26 at Jadwin. The Tigers defeated Harvard three times last season, including a dramatic 63-53 triumph in the championship game of the 2026 Ivy League Tournament to earn an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.
Though this appears to be one of the toughest schedules Princeton has ever faced, a silver lining for Gosselin’s squad comes in the knowledge that the Tigers faced most of these same teams last season and came away with a 20-2 record against them, losing only to Columbia.
Does that record of recent success give the Tigers confidence heading into the new campaign or put a target on their backs?
“The familiarity of our opponents is certainly nice, but it’s a new season, so we can’t hang our hat on past results,” Gosselin told Ivy Hoops Online. “Each team will have new faces in addition to key returners, so we’ll need to prepare even better than we did last year with the added motivation of having a target on our back. We have to focus on one game, one opponent at a time, starting with Belmont on opening night.”
Another advantage compared to a year ago for Princeton is that the Tigers will play a total of 15 games at home in the coming campaign, compared with only 12 last season.
Still, the Tigers’ 2026-27 schedule may present the toughest slate the program has ever faced – precisely what Gosselin and crew were aiming for. As an assistant and associate head coach at Princeton during the Carla Berube era, Gosselin was responsible for putting together some of the toughest schedules in Princeton women’s basketball history, and she understands from that experience how important it is to use the nonconference schedule to prepare her team for the grind of Ivy League competition and the pressure of the postseason.
As Gosselin put it in Wednesday’s press release, ““If we want to reach our fullest potential, we have to compete against the best.”