TIGHT BATTLE: Princeton University women’s basketball player Chet Nweke guards a foe in a game earlier this season. Last Saturday, senior forward Nweke scored 17 points in a losing cause as Princeton fell 67-65 at Columbia. The Tigers, now 20-4 overall and 10-1 Ivy League, host Harvard on March 1 and Dartmouth on March 2. (Photo by Frank Wojciechowski)

By Justin Feil

Chet Nweke had the rebound in her hands for a split second under the basket with just a couple seconds left in regulation, and then it was gone along with a long winning streak.

The ball was dislodged from the senior forward for the Princeton University women’s basketball team and the Tigers suffered a 67-65 loss at Columbia before a sold-out crowd of 2,698 at Levien Gymnasium on Saturday, their first Ivy League loss of the year, and first in 25 straight Ivy games overall spanning back two seasons. Their 24-game conference winning streak was fourth best in the country.

“That last possession was definitely very, very hard for us to finish the game like that,” said Nweke. “I got stripped and Ellie [Mitchell] got the ball then that they called a jump ball and then didn’t call a jump ball. It was a sequence of unfortunate events. When that buzzer sounds, that one hurt the most.”

Princeton and Columbia are now tied for first place in the Ivy League standings at 10-1 overall. Princeton, which came into the game ranked in the AP Top 25, fell to 20-4 overall as it saw a 15-game winning streak snapped. There are three games remaining in the Ivy regular season. Both Princeton and Columbia have secured spots in the Ivy March Madness postseason tournament that determines the league’s automatic bid to the NCAA tournament with both teams winning at home. Columbia is 14-1 at home after responding to their big crowd.

“I think we’re kind of used to it, playing at such a high level we get a good amount of people at our games and also in the past years, going to the tournament, being in that environment, it’s definitely not something we’re not used to,” said Nweke. “It was really cool to see, but obviously it worked out for them. They got the win. It was a pretty tough environment to be in.”

If both teams win out and remain tied, the tiebreaker to determine the Ivy tournament top seed would be their NCAA NET rankings. The Tigers would be the front-runner for the No. 1 seed. Princeton currently sits at 29 in the NET — one spot ahead of former Princeton coach Courtney Banghart’s North Carolina team — while Columbia is at 60.

“It’s really hard to beat a team more than once,” said Nweke. “If we had to split, we have to work hard in the Ivy League tournament and hope that goes well.”

Princeton had defeated Columbia, 80-65, on January 20 at Jadwin Gym in their first meeting of the conference season. The ups and downs of the second meeting kept the sold-out crowd in a frenzy. The Lions jumped out to a first quarter lead that Nweke closed to 19-13 just before the period ended with a 3-point play. Perhaps galvanized by the momentum, Princeton took a 30-29 lead into halftime.

Then came a tough third quarter that put Princeton behind 53-45 entering the final stanza. Columbia led by 11 with 5:00 left before the Tigers chipped away. Nweke’s layup with 52 seconds left brought Princeton within 66-65 before a free throw by Fliss Henderson of Columbia gave the Lions the 67-65 edge. On the final play after a timeout, Princeton gave the ball to Kaitlyn Chen who drove, spun and left her pull-up jumper short of the rim with three seconds left before a scramble to control it ended with officials ruling the clock ran out without anyone possessing the ball.

“We’ve seen Kaitlyn make that shot so many times I can’t even tell you — that’s a money shot for Kaitlyn — and when it didn’t hit the rim, I was positioning myself to rebound, maybe a long rebound, but when it didn’t hit the rim, I got the ball,” said Nweke. “I don’t know if the ref didn’t see a foul, or she might have gotten a clean strip of the ball.”

Nweke led the Tigers with 17 points, one off her career-high. Chen tallied 14 points and Madison St. Rose scored 10 points. Princeton, though, finished shooting just 37.1 percent from the floor, including 3-for-13 from 3-point range. The Lions shot 47.2 percent overall and 42.9 percent from 3 which was the most disappointing aspect of the loss for Princeton.

“Definitely and most obviously our defense,” said Nweke, a  6’0 native of Woodbine, Md., who is now averaging 5.8 points and 4.5 rebounds a game. “That’s something we always hang our hats on. It just wasn’t up to par this game. Columbia played a great 40 minutes of basketball and we just had these defensive slip-ups and mishaps all throughout the game. I think when a mishap would happen, they could counter back and get something out of it on the offensive end. And we just weren’t able to make shots.”

Princeton has three games left before the Ivy tournament to iron out the mistakes it made. Nweke is confident that the Tigers can use the loss the right way. She is looking at the loss as an important lesson.

“I definitely think that this needed to happen in order for us to grow as a team and be dialed in on the growth we need to have come from this loss,” said Nweke. “We scout their sets a lot and we spend a lot of time on that, but at the end of the day the mishaps came down to our principles on defense that we know how to do and do all the time in practice. For some reason, they just weren’t there in the game.”

Princeton has now faced some significant challenges in two of their last three Ivy contests. A week before, they trailed Brown by seven midway through the third quarter before rallying to win, 74-62, in Providence, R.I. Nweke missed the next night’s game due to sickness, but the Tigers responded to any idea that they might be vulnerable with a 70-25 rout of Yale.

“After that Brown game, it really put things in perspective for us,” said Nweke. “Obviously we’re Princeton. We get everybody’s actual best game every time because everybody wants to beat us so badly. After we trailed a little bit in the Brown third quarter, we came together and were like, ‘OK, now it’s time to play some Princeton basketball and we need to do that and excel at that for a whole game.’ We can’t just be playing really hard for half of the game because that’s not going to result in a W. That’s what showed — I obviously didn’t play in the Yale game — that was a full team effort there.”

Princeton is trying to learn from each game — wins or losses — to put themselves in the best position to win the Ivy tournament. Nweke has been a big help after moving into the starting lineup for the first time in her career in the first meeting with Columbia. She has continued to solidify her spot with solid contributions. After scoring in double figures once in the first 16 games, she has reached double digits in each of the last five games, something she credits to watching film after each game with Princeton assistant coach Lauren Battista.

“After that last Columbia game she showed me I can sprint in transition and get the ball, I can go back straight up, and she showed me there are so many opportunities for me to score that I had been missing out on,” said Nweke. “And then she put those ideas in my head so I felt like, maybe I can do this, I don’t have to pass it up when I get an offensive rebound, I can just go back up and put it up. Film has been really helpful for me. I’m just really eager to learn and grow as a player.”

Each game that Nweke performs well in only helps her play better the next game. Princeton is looking for her to continue her strong second half of the season.

“Obviously the first half of the season, I didn’t really show what I was capable of to the highest potential,” said Nweke. “Now that I’m doing that, it helps me with my confidence each game when I see the little things that I do I can actually be rewarded for them.”

Nweke has three games remaining at Jadwin Gym in her Princeton career. The Tigers host Harvard on Friday, Dartmouth on Saturday, and then finish the regular season on Senior Night against Penn on March 9. Princeton is 8-0 at home this year.

“These next three games, they’re going to be tough games but I think being at home will work to our advantage,” said Nweke. “People say everyone shoots better at home, and sometimes we don’t but I just think being at home gives us that extra edge. It’s an advantage for us. I’m really excited for these next three games and hoping to finish out Ivy League play strong so we can stay on top. I’m excited.”

Nweke is motivated to end her Princeton career on a high note. She still has one year of NCAA eligibility left and entered the transfer portal before the season started because the Ivies do not allow graduate students. Nweke is balancing preparing for the Princeton games with eyeing her future options.

“I’m looking to get my Masters of Public Health,” said Nweke. “So I’m pretty much primarily focused on schools that have an MPH program. Some of the schools don’t. That is what I want to do, but I’m trying to decide if I could go another direction and do something else and then go back to school and get my MPH. It would be nice to get that over with and get that paid for by a school.”

Nweke would love to add another Ivy championship to her resume before she graduates. Doing so will require another trip to Columbia, which hosts this year’s March Madness on March 15-16. Any potential grudge match between the two will mean even more with an Ivy title on the line.

“That would be another good test for us, see how we respond to the adversity that we faced (Saturday) and how we’ve changed things up and being able to see the difference through another game,” said Nweke. “I would love to play them again and put together a full 40-minute effort. So if that’s what happens, that happens. We’re just more focused on finishing up league play the way we want it to end. Whatever happens after that will happen.”