RETURN ENGAGEMENT: Princeton University field hockey star Beth Yeager, center, bolts through two foes in a 2021 game. Yeager, who took a hiatus from Princeton for the 2023-24 school year to play for the U.S. national team at the Paris 2024 Olympics, is back with the Tigers for her junior campaign. Princeton starts its 2024 season by heading to Louisville, Ky.,this weekend to face Louisville on September 6 and North Carolina on September 8. (Photo by Frank Wojciechowski)

By Justin Feil

The Princeton University field hockey team has Beth Yeager back.

That fact alone gives the Tigers confidence that they can improve on last year, but Princeton has a lot more to be excited about than the return of Yeager, who played for the U.S. at the 2024 Paris Olympics.

“It’s very helpful to have her experience and her leadership,” said Princeton head coach Carla Tagliente. “She specifically has a specialty skill on penalty corners. That’s a lot of goals not in that lineup last year and a lot of playmaking missed. I don’t think we’re by any means a one-person show. We’re the probably the most balanced we’ve been in a long, long time, but having her back is definitely super helpful.”

Junior star Yeager was one of nine new faces when Princeton kicked off its preseason practices two weeks ago, though she and senior Grace Schulze, the Tigers’ leading returning scorer in 2023 (6 goals, 12 assists in 2022) who played only the opening weekend last year before going down with a season-ending injury, are hardly entirely new to the Tigers. There are also seven new freshmen, of which three could be starting and most of the class is expected to contribute and add much needed depth after an 8-9 season in 2023.

“We’re a lot deeper than we were last year and a lot more talented as well in terms of the depth through the line so it’s been fun,” said Tagliente. “Training has been super competitive, and it’s just been good to be back at it.”

Princeton jumps right into a schedule that matches up with anyone in the country for its difficulty. The Tigers will play at Louisville on September 6 and remain there to face North Carolina on September 8. The Tigers will play six of their first seven games on the road.

“Sometimes your team loves being on the road, sometimes they don’t,” said Tagliente. “We’ll find out real quick here, but I think we actually were a bit better on the road than we were at home last year. I love being on the road the opening weekend. You get off campus. It’s a long weekend together. I think there’s a bit of team bonding. I’d rather travel early than travel in October. If we’re traveling in October, it’s usually more stressful for the girls with midterms. So I don’t mind it too much.”

The first games will provide an early test of the retooled Tigers. Princeton was outscored by teams for the season last year. The Tigers didn’t have a player with more than four goals on the season. Yeager and Schulze provide a lot of firepower themselves, and there is now a group of Tiger players that are more experienced plus an influx of new talent.

“I think offensively we’re pretty good,” said Tagliente. “I think my concern is we’ve got to lock down defensively and be very stingy and defend very well. Attack is fun. It makes highlight reels, but we’re still growing into the defending part a little bit so that part is always a bit of a concern because for me that’s where it needs to be a strength because we’re so athletic and we can transition so quickly. We’ve got to be able to create pressure, win the ball and attack in that manner. How we grow into that is critical. We need kids coming in and contributing right away when they come into the game. I don’t think we ever got there last year.”

Tagliente is confident that the depth of this year’s team can make a big difference. Princeton could not go deep enough without falling off in ability last year. The Tigers want to sustain an up-tempo pace and level of play regardless of who is on the field, and to be at their best, they will have to give even their top players breaks.

“This isn’t like soccer where you’re going to play a full match,” explained Tagliente. “In order to play the tempo you want to play you have to rotate off. Forwards are rotating off in three- and four-minute bursts. Midfield, anywhere from six to seven to eight minutes. Backs, you’re probably rotating one back in for one to two minutes depending on how many you’re playing with. We finally have that. It’s just now making sure when we rotate there’s not a drop off, and the quality continues and the connections continue.”

Making those connections up the field will give the offense more scoring chances. And with Yeager’s return along with Schulze the Princeton offense is more capable of finishing those opportunities.

“Beth’s got a great flick, but we’ve got two other kids that have great corner skills,” said Tagliente of Yeager, who totaled 29 goals and 15 assists in her first two seasons with the Tigers. “So I think the balance there is great because teams can’t focus just on her. We can also set up stuff where there’s so much focus on her that it opens up opportunities for others with counters and we can make different calls. I think the best thing about this team is just the balance that we’re going to have across the board.”

The freshmen class bolsters the Tigers’ depth immediately. Three are from England and four from the United States.

“They will see a handful making a big impact right away and I think the sky’s the limit,” said Tagliente. “We could have potentially three starting out of that group, which is kind of crazy considering we are returning quite a bit. Probably the most ready to go right now are Anna Faulstich and Clem Houlden. They will definitely be locking in spots and then Lilly Wojcik probably as well.”

Pru Lindsey, Molly Nye, Izzy Morgan, and Libby Smith round out the first-year class. Lindsey is coming back from recent injuries that have kept her out of action, Morgan figures to play half the game and Nye has had days where she looks like a starter at times. Smith is a goalie, a tough spot to make an impact this year behind the established senior Robyn Thompson (1.78 goals against average, 89 saves in 2023), but the future is hers.

“Of the six field players, they’re all impactful players,” said Tagliente. “Our upside really is dependent on how quickly they can be game-ready. But it’s exciting because I think where we were very thin in the midfield, even in the back where we need a bit more of a deeper rotation to play the pace we want to play — we didn’t have it last year — and do now, and now the hard part is just trying to figure out the best rotations.”

Thompson, Schulze, Gracie McGowan, Aimee Jungfer, Clare Brennan (1 assist in 2023), and Lily Webb (1 goal) are all seniors. The junior class features Yeager, but also has Helena Grosse (1 assist) and talented local product Talia Schenck (3 goals, 1 assist), who played for Lawrence High School, and a much improved Ava Dempsey (1 goal, 2 assists), who trained with the Wales national team.

“Talia really was peaking towards the end of last season and she’s kind of picked up where she left off,” said Tagliente. “Not that last year she didn’t have a good year, but I think it took her time to get going. I really think this is like a breakout year for her. She’s very dynamic player. She had a good summer training.”

Ottilie Sykes, who led Princeton in points last year with four goals and three assists, and Ella Cashman (3 goals) come off standout freshman years for the sophomore class. The returning players come back all understanding the system and style that Princeton wants to play, and that has helped them start ahead of prior years. The staff has been left with just sorting out how to combine their pieces for the best results.

“There’s a lot of talent there,” said Tagliente. “And then complementing it with the freshmen coming in, and adding their talents, it’s going to be fun.”

Princeton also has a new assistant on staff. Pat Harris is a former United States men’s national team coach and coach and player in Europe.

“He’s got great insight into the game,” said Tagliente. “I think right now one of his biggest impacts is just technically, him and his feedback to players and helping them develop little skills and honing and find certain skills. It’s been very, very helpful. He’s got a wealth of knowledge and experience. I think he’s going to be very helpful in the short term and the long run.”

Princeton got a sneak peek at some of its possible combinations in a scrimmage against Monmouth last week. The Tigers jumped out to a 3-0 lead and won 3-2, an encouraging sign against a team that had more practices in than them.

“They’re a good side. It was good for us to play against them because it’s not a team we can steamroll and get away with doing things that aren’t going to work,” said Tagliente. “We have to play good hockey. We were comfortably up 3-0 in that and then we let in two. I subbed pretty liberally so I’m not too concerned. If that was regular season, they also probably would make changes, but I think that’s a game that we would have comfortably won, which is I think a good marker. I think last year that game would have been a tight one-goal game for us, whereas this year games like that I think we’re three goals better. I just think our offensive firepower is way more beyond what it’s been.”

When the real games begin this weekend, the Tigers will get a tougher test against a pair of teams that already have played. Both Louisville (No. 7) and UNC (No. 2) were preseason top-seven picks by the National Field Hockey Coaches Association (NFHCA).

“The opening weekend, they’re two very different teams,” said Tagliente, whose team is ranked No. 15 in the NFHCA poll. “Louisville is a very defensive minded team. They have been the last few years, and watching them against Maryland they are again. They play for their limited opportunities and they try to be highly, highly efficient with those. UNC is more of an offensive powerhouse. They’ve got a lot of dynamic players. They play a very attacking style — I think there’s others that would rate higher for me, but they’re very seasoned. They’ve got a lot of experience returning.”

The two contrasting styles are important for the Tigers to see now. Princeton will run into a myriad of different strengths in the Ivy League season and their non-conference schedule.

“It’s two very different looks,” said Tagliente. “I think the Louisville game, we really need to break them early because they just bleed you dry in terms of how they just defend, defend, defend, and in some ways those games are harder for us compared to teams like UNC where we get to open things up with them and we both have great athletes and play with a lot of speed. So that game could be an offensive shootout.”

Princeton also has such powers as Northwestern, Maryland, Syracuse, Penn State, and Rutgers on the non-conference schedule.

“Our non-conference schedule is what we need it to be in order to prepare us to be where we want to be,” said Tagliente. “It sets us up for an at-large bid should we not win Ivy, so that we’re comfortably in either way.”

Princeton reached the Ivy League Tournament final last year before falling 2-1 to Harvard. Harvard again will be good, but Tagliente also sees Yale coming back with a lot of talent, Penn with the ability to compete with anyone, Dartmouth vastly improved, and Brown with some very new talent, Cornell is positioned to improve if they can replace their top scorer and Columbia could surprise. The net effect is a league that’s more competitive than ever, according to Tagliente.

“Across the league you’re just seeing an influx of better and better players, better international players, and it’s just getting more competitive,” said Tagliente. “I don’t think there’s really a game you can really overlook, whereas it used to be this will be a game but we’re going to get through it comfortably type of mentality.”

Princeton is looking forward to starting its season and seeing how its improved balance and depth help the Tigers match their high expectations.