Home of the Roundball Poets
Steve Silverman 
Dartmouth women’s basketball bested New Hampshire, 43-40, in a nail-biter at Leede Arena Sunday afternoon for the Big Green’s first win against a Division I opponent in nearly 12 months.
It was also the first Division I win for Linda Cimino as Dartmouth’s coach. Cimino took over the reins of the Dartmouth women’s hoops program in May after a successful five-year tenure at St. Francis Brooklyn.
The Princeton women’s basketball team split a pair of Thanksgiving weekend contests against two nationally ranked opponents from power conferences at the Fort Myers Tip-Off in Florida.
Playing on Thanksgiving Day for the first time in coach Carla Berube’s career, the Tigers dominated No. 22 Oklahoma, 77-63, at Suncoast Credit Union Arena. Then, on Saturday morning, the Tigers fell prey to a hot-shooting No. 19 Indiana Hoosiers squad, 72-63.
It’s Thanksgiving, and our cups runneth over with sumptuous Ivy hoops results.
Last Monday, the Penn men’s team gobbled up a nationally ranked Villanova team at the Palestra. A day earlier, the Princeton women’s team visited Middle Tennessee State, the defending Conference USA champions, and pulled the rug on the Blue Raiders’ 49-game home court winning streak. Five days later, the Tigers came within a whisker of upsetting No. 3 UCLA at Pauley Pavilion.
Last Saturday, the Columbia men, picked to finish last in the Ivy League, toppled Temple, 78-73, in an upset that virtually no one even seemed to notice.
But wait, there’s more. The Brown women’s team, picked to finish sixth in the Ivy League this season, lowered the boom on Providence and Georgetown in back-to-back games. The Bears may not win the Ivy crown, but apparently they are contenders in the Big East.
Princeton women’s basketball returned to its winning ways by knocking off the University of San Diego Toreros, 62-51, on Sunday afternoon at the Jenny Craig Pavilion in San Diego.
The matchup was the second of two weekend games the Tigers played on their Southern California road trip, which served as a homecoming for three Princeton standouts – Kaitlyn Chen and freshman Ashley Chea, both of whom played high school ball at Flintridge Prep, and Skye Belker, a Los Angeles native who played at the Windward School before coming to Princeton.
Coming off a nail-biting, near-miss against No. 2 UCLA on Friday, the Tigers made quick work of the Toreros. Madison St. Rose led the way early for the Tigers, notching eight points in each of the first two quarters. The story of the half, however, was Princeton’s stifling defense, which forced the Toreros into a horrid 5-31 shooting performance. The Tigers led 31-18 at the break.
The Princeton women’s basketball team nearly pulled off an upset for the ages as the Tigers fell on Friday afternoon, 77-74, to the No. 3 UCLA Bruins at Pauley Pavilion. It was Princeton’s first loss of the season.
Five days earlier, the Tigers had visited Middle Tennessee State and ended the Blue Raiders’ 49-game homecourt winning streak. On Friday afternoon, in the first game of a two-game West Coast swing, the Tigers entered the Bruins’ den at Pauley Pavilion in hunt of another statement win.
They almost got it.
Upset? https://t.co/LROKsY4X4E
— Tosan Evbuomwan (@Tosan_Evb) November 7, 2023
After defeating the Duquesne Dukes of the Atlantic 10 Conference, 70-67, Wednesday night at UPMC Cooper Fieldhouse in Pittsburgh, Princeton men’s basketball is off to a 3-0 start, its best beginning since the 2015-16 campaign, when the Tigers won their first four games.
Here are four reflections on the season so far for the two-time defending Ivy League champions:
Ivy Hoops Online contributor Steve Silverman caught up with first-year Dartmouth women’s basketball coach Linda Cimino Monday to discuss her key influences on the path to taking over in Hanover, plans to strengthen the program, takeaways from her team’s home loss to Siena Sunday, first-year guard Nina Minicozzi’s strong work ethic, how she’d define a successful first season as coach and much more:
In winning its season opener at home against Duquesne, Princeton women’s basketball witnessed the blossoming of Madison St. Rose as a new superstar for the Orange and Black.
It was time for another coming-out party Sunday, this time by rookies Skye Belker and Ashley Chea, in a 65-60 comeback win to remember at Middle Tennessee State.
Anyone thinking this might be the year to topple the Princeton women’s basketball team from its perch atop the Ivy League standings received a rude but familiar awakening on Monday night when yet another phenom took center stage in the Tigers’ season opener against the Duquesne Dukes. Princeton won a seesaw affair, 65-57, at Jadwin Gym, powered by sophomore sensation Madison St. Rose’s career-high 26 points on 9-for-18 shooting.
It was déjà vu all over again for Princeton. A year ago, the Tigers were coming off another successful campaign having won a second straight Ivy League title and toppled a power-five opponent – Kentucky – in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. Although the Tigers were considered a favorite to repeat, there were questions about who could fill the very large shoes of graduated senior Abby Meyers, who had led the team in scoring and was voted Ivy League Player of the Year.
The Princeton Tigers men’s basketball team opened the 2023-24 season with a statement win over the Rutgers Scarlet Knights, 68-61, in front of more than 6,000 fans at CURE Insurance Arena in Trenton in what was dubbed the “Jersey Jam.” Here are four observations about the Tigers’ triumph over their in-state rival: