Carla Berube

Princeton women come out on top in roller-coaster overtime win over Buffalo

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Princeton coach Carla Berube set up a challenging out-of-conference schedule for her club, to say the least. She is focusing on preparation for running the Ivy League gauntlet. The Buffalo Bulls, a top-50 team and an NCAA Tournament team three times in five years, came into Jadwin Gym Tuesday night at 6-2 and riding a five-game winning streak.
The Tigers, on the other hand, were heading in the opposite direction, having lost two straight on the road at Fordham and Seton Hall.
The Bulls, coached by Felisha Legette-Jack, who has more than 300 wins in her 19-year career, are led by Dyaisha Fair, one of the best scorers in the nation.

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Princeton women triumph at No. 22 Florida Gulf Coast for first win over ranked opponent in 43 years

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The Princeton women made history Wednesday evening at Alico Arena, home of the Florida Gulf Coast Eagles. The Tigers shot down the high-flying No. 22 Eagles, 58-55. It was the first win for a Tiger team against a ranked opponent since 1978.

The Eagles entered the game with a record of 63-6 since the start of the 2019-20 season, coming in at 7-0 on the year:

If you follow Ivy Hoops Online’s coverage of the Tigers, you know that we concentrate on coach Carla Berube’s commitment to defense, particularly the single-digit quarters the defense yields.

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Princeton women maul Maine, 82-43

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The Tiger women opened the lone doubleheader on the schedule Sunday with a mashing of the Maine Black Bears, 82-43.

Princeton games usually feature a fast start defensively. Today’s effort fits nicely into that pattern, as the Tigers once again held an opponent to single digits over the span of an entire quarter of play.

At the end of the first quarter, the Tigers had sprinted to a 17-4 lead. For all intents, this one was over. For the season, the Tigers have outscored the opposition by 42 points in the opening period.

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Princeton women bounce back to stymie Temple, 59-41

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The big question for Tiger fans as their team took the court to face the Temple Owls in Philadelphia Tuesday night was the status of captain and team leader Abby Meyers. A leg injury kept Meyers on the bench in the final period of Saturday’s nine-point loss at Rhode Island, after a career-best 23 points. Thankfully, Abby was in the starting lineup against the Owls, suffering no ill effects.

Carla Berube’s quintet exploded out of the blocks, racing to a 15-0 advantage before the Owls could get their gun out of its holster. The first quarter ended with the Tigers up 17-4. Princeton’s fresh legs on defense gave the Tigers another trademark single-digit yield.

Temple found itself in the second stanza, holding the Tigers to 10 points while closing to within 11 at the half, 27-16.

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Princeton women suffer first loss in exactly two years in rock fight at Rhode Island

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The Princeton Tigers took their NCAA-best 25-game winning streak on the road to Rhode Island Saturday.

The result was a disappointing 61-53 loss at the hands of the unbeaten Rams.

The last defeat suffered by the Tigers occurred, ironically, two years ago to the day in overtime at Iowa.

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Carla Berube: A name to remember

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Carla Berube is a remarkable 29-1 (.967) in her first 30 games as the Tigers’ head coach. (Princeton Athletics)

You know all the top coaches in the women’s game. Actually, you know them all by their first names.

Geno. Kim. Tara. Dawn. Brenda. And the list goes on. Every fan of the game would come up with those names quickly.

But most would struggle to come up with another. And it belongs. Maybe not in November 2021. But it will by March 2022.

The name is Carla. Yes, Princeton’s Carla Berube.

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Ivy League women’s basketball Media Day roundup

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One day after releasing the conference’s preseason poll, the Ivy League moved one step closer to normal by hosting the 2021-22 Media Day for women’s basketball Tuesday.  For the first time, the league used a Zoom format to create a stronger connection between the coaches, players and the media.

In Monday’s poll, three-time defending champion Princeton was again picked as the top team with 122 total points and 12 first-place votes.  Penn, the 2019 co-champion, was selected No. 2 with three first-place votes and 108 points. The next three teams were close, with only six points separating Columbia, Yale and Harvard.

The Lions, which earned their first Ivy League Tournament berth in 2020 before the tourney was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, moved up to third with 87 points. The Bulldogs, a third-place team in 2020, dropped to fourth at 82 points.  The Crimson, which finished fifth in 2020, received one first-place vote but missed the upper division by one point.

Cornell, the 2020 seventh-place squad, moved up to sixth for 2022 with 41 points.  Dartmouth and Brown, two teams with new coaching staffs, ended up with the last two spots, with the Big Green’s 29 points two ahead of the Bears.

Tuesday’s Media Day revealed the four tiers apparent in the preseason poll. But there could be a slight reordering near the top.

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Q&A with Princeton women’s coach Carla Berube

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Carla Berube is looking forward to finally finishing a full season at Princeton’s helm. (Princeton Athletics)

Editor’s note: Our George Clark (Toothless Tiger) recently caught up with Princeton women’s coach Carla Berube, who reflected on the “tough pill to swallow” of her debut 26-1 2019-20 campaign with the Tigers cut short by COVID-19, how her program got through the 2020-21 season that wasn’t, the blow of again losing Kira Emsbo to injury, the new Ivy schedule format and much more:

Ivy hoops roundup – Olympic exploits, incoming classes and coaching moves

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Former Ivy standouts’ Olympic exploits

Olympic action in Tokyo featured an Ivy-on-Ivy matchup Wednesday when Maodo Lo helped lead Germany to a 99-92 victory over Miye Oni’s Nigerian squad in Group B play at Saitama Super Arena. The 2016 Columbia graduate and the Lions men’s third-all-time leading scorer led the Germans with nine assists and added 13 points in 28 minutes.

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Dartmouth names Adrienne Shibles new women’s basketball coach

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Adrienne Shibles takes over at Dartmouth after winning more than 80% of her games over a 13-year span at Bowdoin. (Bowdoin Athletics)

Well, Ivy Hoops Online asked and Dartmouth answered.

After a nearly 10-week search, interim Director of Athletics Peter Roby hired Adrienne Shibles away from Bowdoin to become the fifth head coach in Dartmouth women’s basketball history. Shibles’s hiring makes her the second “Little Ivies” head coach to make the jump to the “Big Ivies” in the last three years.

(Shibles also becomes the second important Ivy League hire from Bowdoin in the last three months, after Penn selected Whitney Soule as its new Vice Provost and Dean of Admissions.)

“I’m excited to welcome Adrienne and her family to our Dartmouth community,” Roby said in a Dartmouth Athletics press release. “She is a proven winner with a commitment to empowering young women to reach their full potential in every way. She is well respected throughout college basketball and will provide our women’s basketball program with dynamic leadership for many years to come.”

Shibles leaves the Polar Bears after a highly successful 13-year tenure (2008-2021) with a record of 281-67 (80.7%) and 11 NCAA Tournament appearances.  Her teams made it to the Sweet Sixteen eight times, including five of the last six competitive seasons, and the Final Four twice.  The 2019-20 team looked primed for a run to its third straight Final Four, entering the NCAA Tournament with a 27-2 mark, but the tournament was cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.

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