Princeton

Megan Griffith hired as Columbia basketball coach

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Columbia Athletics announced Monday that Megan Griffith has been hired as Columbia’s next women’s basketball coach.

Griffith was an assistant at Princeton for the past four seasons and also served as Princeton’s director of basketball operations from 2010-12. The Tigers went 54-7 in that span.

Griffith succeeds Sheila Roux, who coached the 2015-16 season as an interim coach after Stephanie Glance stepped down in September 2015 to become the Executive Director of the Kay Yow Cancer Fund.

Griffith was captain of the Lions for three seasons and earned All-Ivy League honors in both 2006 and 2007.

No. 6 West Virginia defeats No. 11 Princeton, 74-65

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The No. 11 Princeton women’s basketball team fell to No. 6 West Virginia in the first round of the NCAA Tournament in Columbus, Ohio Friday, surrendering an eight-point first-half lead in the Tigers’ sixth tournament appearance.

The Mountaineers shot north of 50 percent in the second half, led by Bria Holmes’ 26 points. Annie Tarakchian and Alex Wheatley scored 20 and 18 points for the Tigers respectively.

Princeton had returned three starters from last year’s squad that went undefeated during the regular season, nabbing the first at-large bid in Ivy history with its 22-6 regular season overall record, including a 12-2 mark in league play.

Two-bid Ivy: No. 10 Penn vs. No. 7 Washington, No. 11 Princeton vs. No. 6 West Virginia

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#2bidivy got in just under the wire.

For the first time ever, the Ivy League got two NCAA Tournament bids, league champion Penn and at-large Princeton, in the final season without a conference tournament to determine the league’s NCAA Tournament representative.

Penn received the automatic bid after defeating Princeton at Jadwin Gym, 62-60, completing a season sweep of the Tigers. The Quakers were rewarded with their highest seed in school history, a No. 10 seed pitting them against No. 7 Washington. The Quakers (24-4) and Huskies (22-10) will square off on Saturday at 4 p.m. at the Xfinity Center in College Park, Md. A first-round Penn win would set the Quakers up with No. 2 Maryland on the Terrapins’ home court. Then-No. 1 Maryland ousted Princeton from the tournament in the second round of last season’s tournament, ending the Tigers’ undefeated season.

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No. 6 Princeton to play at No. 3 Virginia Tech in NIT first round

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Princeton (22-6, 12-2 Ivy) was projected by Big Apple Buckets analyst John Templon to get a No. 4 seed in the National Invitational Tournament, but the Tigers got a No. 6 seed instead, setting them up to travel to No. 3 Virginia Tech (19-14, 10-8 ACC) for a matchup with the Hokies Wednesday at 8 p.m. on ESPNU.

Princeton enters as the road team despite having a RPI of 39 and Virginia Tech having a RPI of 90, and both teams having virtually identical KenPom rankings (66 for Princeton, 63 for Virginia Tech).

The Tigers turned down a CBI bid after finishing 16-14 last season, and the women Tigers got a No. 9 seed in the NCAA Tournament after going undefeated in the regular season a year ago.

 

The monkey on Mitch Henderson’s back

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With its season-ending defeat of the Penn Quakers last night, the Tigers ran their record to a gaudy 22-6 (12-2 Ivy), their best 28-game record in this century (when you are as old as Toothless you think of these things in terms of centuries). On only two occasions, 2004 (13-1) and 2011 (12-2) did a Tiger team win at least 12 Ivy League games, and both of those squads won Ivy titles.

It took Yale’s historic run, in which the Bulldogs suffered but one loss, to deny the Tigers another Ivy crown. (That one defeat came at the hands of Princeton.)

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Penn-Princeton Tuesday roundup

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Penn 62, Princeton 60 (Women)

Where to begin? With another storybook ending for the Quakers on Princeton’s home floor, and some delightful deja vu for coach Mike McLaughlin’s Red and Blue.

Two years after upsetting Princeton in stunning fashion with an outright Ivy League championship on the line at Jadwin Gym, 80-64, the Quakers toppled the Tigers again in the same scenario, clinching their second Ivy title in three seasons as Jadwin guests. Penn’s win followed another two-point victory over Princeton this season, a 50-48 overtime triumph at the Palestra.

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Ivy 60 for 60: Frank Sowinski

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Frank Sowinski Princeton Varsity Club
Frank Sowinski helped lead the Tigers to back-to-back Ivy League championships in 1975-76 and 1976-77. The “Polish Rifle” was the 1976-77 Ivy Player of the Year. (Princeton Varsity Club)

Frank Sowinski was one of the more productive Tigers over his stellar three-year career in the orange and black.

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A substantial sweep for Princeton

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The Tigers’ weekend sweep of Yale and Brown at Jadwin gave them control of their destiny in the hectic Ivy race and tied them with the Bulldogs in the all-important loss column.

The largest Jadwin crowd in the Mitch Henderson era, bolstered by a beer-soaked cadre of undergraduates and Garden State chief executive Chris Christie, Delaware ’84, was on hand for Friday’s matchup with Justin Sears and company. Yale controlled the backboards and the game in the early going, taking an 11-6 lead after six minutes. Two Sam Downey free throws gave the Bulldogs their largest lead of the game, 19-13, with nine minutes to go in the first period. The key statistic was Yale’s six offensive rebounds while shutting the Tigers out in that category. At the five-minute mark the margin remained six, 27-21.

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Princeton’s midseason report card

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Saturday’s heart-stopping overtime victory at Columbia gave the Tigers at least temporary control of their destiny for the balance of the Ivy League campaign. Princeton’s 6-1 first half record puts the denizens of Old Nassau firmly in second place, trailing only the unbeaten Yale Bulldogs. This week’s Game Of The Year is set for Friday night when the Tigers seek to avenge their only loss, a four-point nailbiter at Yale three weeks ago. IHO presents a midseason report card on the Tigers, a fascinating story of a team very deliberately assembled by Mitch Henderson to withstand and even flourish in the nightmare of Ivy League back-to-backs.

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