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Princeton Football Falls Prey To Harvard Hex As Crimson Prevail In 43-40 Overtime Thriller
By Bill Alden
When the subject of sporting curses comes up in the Boston area, the talk generally centers on the Red Sox' sale of a certain young lefty pitcher/outfielder to the Yankees before the 1920 baseball season.
The Princeton University football team, however, is on the wrong side of another potential hex that appears to be sprouting on the Boston sporting scene.
Coming into last Saturday's game at undefeated Harvard, the Tigers had lost seven straight games to the Crimson with its last three losses in Cambridge having been by an average of three points a game.
Producing a wild and wacky classic that will take a place in the annals of great Ivy League encounters, Princeton gave more evidence of a possible curse as it fell 43-40 in overtime to Harvard before a crowd of 14,086 at Harvard Stadium.
In the afternoon, Princeton rolled up 594 yards of total offense with running back Jon Veach rushing for a career-high 205 yards and three touchdowns and quarterback Matt Verbit throwing for a career-best 354 yards.
The Tigers had a 20-18 lead at the half and then fought back from 30-23 and 37-30 deficits in the second half to knot the game at 37-37 with 3:24 left in regulation.
A J.J. Artis interception on Harvard's last drive of the fourth quarter gave Princeton a chance to win in regulation. The Tigers were unable to cash in as a 42-yard field goal attempt by Derek Javarone with 22 seconds left sailed wide left.
In overtime, Javarone quickly atoned for the miss as he hit a 36-yard field goal to give the Tigers a 40-37 lead. The Crimson, though, kept their hex over Princeton (1-5, 1-2 Ivy) intact as quarterback Garret Schires hit Rodney Byrnes with a four-yard touchdown pass to give Harvard (6-0, 3-0 Ivy) the win.
While Princeton head coach Roger Hughes was not willing to admit the existence of any curse, he did acknowledge that the Tigers' matchup with Harvard has been a little spooky in recent years.
"It's a weird situation, we haven't had a break against them," said Hughes, whose club dropped a heartbreaker in Cambridge in 2001 when Taylor Northrup barely missed a 47-yard field goal attempt at the final gun that would've given Princeton a win that day. "Things will even out. The teams that get the breaks are the teams that make their breaks."
Hughes knew that his team came heartbreakingly close to making enough plays to pull off the upset. "The hard part is that the players played their tails off," said Hughes. "I couldn't be more pleased with their intensity and effort. A lot of good things happened, they played a full 60 minutes."
The play of Verbit and Veach was at the top of Hughes' list of positives. "Matt had his best game, not just in terms of passing but in terms of making the right decisions on the field," said Hughes of his junior QB who hit on 18-of-34 passes and three touchdowns.
"Veach came on and did a great job. That was not unexpected but he had a career game. I think that the offensive line played its best game of the season overall."
Although Princeton's defense gave up a lot of points, Hughes saw progress on that side of the ball as well. "Early in the game, we shut them down," explained Hughes, who got 10-tackle performances from Alan Borelli, Justin Stull, and Blake Perry.
"We did have some trouble with their power running game. But when the game was on the line, they made plays. We had two blocked punts and Artis made that interception that gave us a chance to win the game."
As a result of Saturday's setback, the Tigers find themselves in a position where they are two plays away ‹ the Byrnes TD and Columbia's last-second, game-winning 49-yard bomb earlier this month ‹ from being 3-0 in league play.
"When you sit back and think about it, that's true," said Hughes. "But that's the difference between champions and other teams. The champions find a way to make those plays and win those games."
Now Hughes and his charges face the task of picking up the pieces from Saturday's disappointment and coming up with the plays in the last four games of the season.
"The pain has not dissipated but we have to turn the page and go on to Cornell," said Hughes, whose club hosts the Big Red (1-5, 0-3 Ivy) in an eminently winnable game for the Tigers.
"Historically we've had a bit of a letdown against Cornell, the game comes between our games against two big rivals, Harvard and Penn. The challenge as coaches and players is to make sure that doesn't happen this week."
Hughes is confident that his club can meet that challenge. "The neat thing about this team is that they've practiced as hard as they could every week," maintained Hughes, who now has a 13-22 mark in his Princeton tenure.
"I don't
expect that to change. We haven't won a game at home this year and
we have to make this a hard place to play for our opponents. If
we can continue to play with the intensity that we showed Saturday,
the wins will come."
