Ivy League Sports

In the 1990s, coeducation and women’s athletics had come to be taken for granted by Princeton students, and the school’s always-strong athletic programs continued to be successful — winning a total of 31 Ivy League women’s titles in 11 different sports.

In 1992, Princeton field hockey shared the Ivy championship and won its first title in the ECAC tournament, receiving its fifth straight bid to those playoffs. The team again earned the Ivy League championship from 1994 through 1998, winning each and every one of its 32 Ivy League games without a blemish. The Tigers reached the NCAA tournament in all five of these years, and its 13 postseason games during the period tell the story of the program’s evolution. In 1994, Princeton lost, 5-0, to Penn State, and head coach Beth Bozman and her players returned hungry the following year. Princeton took one more step up the ladder by winning its first NCAA tournament game in school history in 1995 — 3-0 against Syracuse — but a 6-0 loss to North Carolina in the second round ended the Tigers’ dreams of the national semifinals. The ladder exploded in 1996 when Princeton traveled to Iowa City, Iowa. After a 5-4 opening round win against Boston University, the Tigers outlasted the host Hawkeyes — ranked number two in the country — by a 5-4 score in overtime to advance. One week later, Princeton pinched itself and kept dreaming with a 4-3 overtime victory in the national semifinals against powerhouse Old Dominion. Again, the Tigers’ season would end against North Carolina, but the appearance in the national championship game set the stage for the next two years; Princeton advanced to the national semifinals in both 1997 and 1998, and added another visit to the championship game in 1998, falling to Old Dominion, 3-2.

Princeton lacrosse also was dominant in this decade, sharing the Ivy League title in 1993 and going on to the NCAA tournament, in which Princeton won the first and second rounds but lost to the University of Virginia in the championship game. With the lacrosse team’s first sole possession of the Ivy title in 1994, the Tigers won the national championship contest, 10-7, against the University of Maryland on the Terrapins’ home field. It was Princeton’s first women’s national lacrosse title and the school’s first NCAA women’s team championship. When the men’s lacrosse team also won the NCAA championship game that year, Princeton became the first and only school to win women’s and men’s NCAA Division I titles in the same team sport in the same year, and women’s coach Chris Sailer was named the Division I Coach of the Year for an unparalleled second straight year. Women’s lacrosse took second place in both the Ivy League and the national championship in 1995 and, in 1997, won the Ivy title and reached the NCAA semifinals.

Princeton regained the Ivy softball championship in 1991 and advanced through the Ivy League schedule undefeated to successfully defend its title in 1992. That team was the first Ivy squad since 1985 to complete the League season undefeated and only the second League team to appear in the National Invitational Championship, where it finished in second place and ended the season as the second-winningest team in Princeton softball history. After winning its tenth title in school history in 1994, Princeton advanced even further onto the national scene in 1995, capturing the Ivy and NCAA regional titles and earning the League’s first berth in the NCAA College Softball World Series as one of the final eight teams in the nation. Again, in 1996, the team won the Ivy League title, reached the NCAA Northeast Regional qualifier tournament, and played in the College Softball World Series.

Guided by coach Lisa Brown, the 1992 ice hockey team claimed an Ivy League title and placed fourth in the ECAC tournament; in 1995, skaters shared the League title with Dartmouth. Prior to the 1996-97 season, Brown stepped down from her post to train for the U.S. national team; she made the squad and represented the United States in the 1998 Olympic Winter Games as a member of the gold medal-winning team.

Squash began the decade ranked second nationally in 1990, but lost the Ivy championship that year to Harvard. The following year, however, playing under coach Betty Constable in her final season before retirement, the team had an undefeated 7-0 dual-match season, took first place in the Ivy League, and won the Howe Cup. After some years of rebuilding, senior Katherine Johnson won the 1997 individual national squash title, and in 1998 the team won its first Howe Cup and Ivy League title since 1991. The following winter, Julia Beaver won the individual title, and Princeton won its second straight Ivy championship.

Numerous accomplishments by Princeton’s swimmers and divers occurred during the 1990s. Under head swimming coach Susan Teeter and diving coach Greg Gunn, the team won the Ivy League titles in 1990, 1991, and 1994 and shared the honor with Harvard and Yale in both 1992 and 1995. The team also participated in several EWSL championships, taking fifth place in 1990, third place in 1991, and first place in 1993, 1994, and 1995.

Princeton’s crews often dominated their competition in the 1990s, winning the Eastern Sprints in 1990, 1993, 1995, 1996, and 1997. The rowers also took first place in the national competition in 1990, 1992, and 1995 and won the Charles G. Willing Cup, signifying the top-point program, in 1991, 1992, and 1993. In 1997, the inaugural year of the NCAA championships in women’s rowing, the Tigers placed second in the team totals. That same year, Princeton expanded its program to include a lightweight rowing team.

Among individual accomplishments of the decade was Kristen Beaney’s victory in the 5,000-meter run and being named the outstanding performer at the 1993 Heptagonal indoor track and field championships. Beaney matched her performance the following year, adding a victory in the 3,000-meter run, and became the first two-time winner of the outstanding performer award.

Princeton’s Olympians of the period included track and field athlete Lynn Jennings, rower Anne Marden, and Swiss swimmer Nathalie Wunderlich, all of whom competed in the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, with Jennings taking the bronze medal in the 10,000-meter run. Jennings also competed in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, as did Daphne Hernandez who was on Costa Rica’s diving team.

Princeton also experienced success in the Ivy League’s newest women’s sport of golf. The Tigers took the Northeast championships in 1995, and Mary Moan won the first Ivy League individual championship in 1997. (Story, page 125) After losing the team competition to Yale by a single stroke in 1998, Princeton roared back from a first-day deficit in 1999 to notch its first League title in the three-year history of the sport. The Tigers were led by Julia Allison, who became the second Princeton golfer in three years to take medalist honors at the crowning Ivy League event with a two-day total score of 160.