Tigers lose Anderson in loss to front-running Brown
By Justin Feil, Assistant Sports Editor
Ben Bologna converted his first career field goal attempt for a 3-0 Princeton lead over Brown on Saturday.
It was downhill from there for the Tigers in a 31-10 loss in a battle of two of the Ivy League’s final three unbeaten teams. Brown moved to 3-2 overall, 2-0 in the Ivies, tied with Penn, which beat Columbia, 15-10. The Tigers slipped to 2-3 overall, 1-1 in Ivy play and lost more than the game. Quarterback Brian Anderson left the game in the third quarter with a bruised right (his non-throwing) shoulder.
“The beautiful thing about football is you get 24 hour to mourn this and then we have to come back with a big game against Harvard,” said Princeton head coach Roger Hughes. “Clearly it wasn’t our day today, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be our day the next five weeks we play. All we can do is play one at a time.”
The Tigers didn’t like the way they started even though they got Bologna’s kick. That’s because his field goal was from just 18 yards, the result of the offense stalling again after it reached the Brown 1. Twice, Jordan Culbreath tried to rush it in, the second time he was nearly tackled in the backfield, before Anderson fired incomplete under heavy pressure on a roll-out on third down.
“There’s no excuse,” Hughes said of the series. “I’m anxious to see the film to see what happened down there. Clearly that started things. Things kind of snowballed from there.”
In all five of Princeton’s games this season, the team that scored first has lost. Brown seized control with touchdowns on its first two possessions Saturday. Twice the Bears converted five-play drives into seven points apiece for a 14-3 lead. Scoring on its first drive was a big goal for the Bears, who won for the first time in five meetings at Princeton Stadium.
“Any time you can score on the first drive, it’s great momentum,” Hughes explained. “It gets the other team back on their heels, or other teams have to answer. Instead of looking to see what went wrong, you’re more talking about what’s going right and what’s going to work and the kids come off with a sense of accomplishment.”
Princeton cut into the lead on a big-play drive. It took just four plays with a 33-yard pass to Will Thanheiser and 20-yard completion to Trey Peacock setting up Meko McCray’s 12-yard touchdown run. The receiver came all the way across the formation on a sweep to the right side for his first career score to cut the deficit to 14-10 with 9:28 left in the first half.
“Even as bad as we were playing in the first half, and the miscues we had, it was still a 10-14 game,” Hughes said. “It felt like we could come back and take charge of it. We just couldn’t get anything going offensively.”
The Bears opened the second half with a field goal and then got a pair of touchdowns – one receiving and one rushing – from Buddy Farnham, who finished with 285 all-purpose yards, to seal the victory.
“You need to come out and get something going in the third quarter,” Hughes said. “And we just weren’t able to do that today.”
Princeton managed just 18 yards of offense in the second half. Anderson left the game for good midway through the third quarter after being hounded by the Bears defense. His shoulder was injured in the first quarter.
“We tried to see if he could go on it,” Hughes said, “and it became apparent – especially in the third quarter – that he just couldn’t. The ball just wasn’t coming out. As tough a kid as he is, he just couldn’t play with it. That’s why we came in with Dan (Kopolovich) and with Tommy Wornham at those situations because Brian just wasn’t being effective.”
Wornham, a freshman from San Diego, saw some action in the final possession of the first half. He was 1-for-3 for 2 yards. Kopolovich, who made six tackles as starting cornerback, relieved Anderson in the second half.
“In that situation, you’re supposed to come in and make plays, not necessarily the big plays, but the just do what Coach tells you to do,” said Kopolovich, who was 1-for-2 for 10 yards and was sacked twice. “I just wasn’t able to do that.”
The Tigers have this week to figure out who will take snaps if Anderson cannot play when they welcome Harvard to Princeton Stadium on Saturday. The Crimson lost to Brown in their Ivy opener.
“The trouble is when you take Dan off the defensive side, you rob Peter to pay Paul,” Hughes said. “Some of it will get down to the development of Tommy Wornham. What we’re going to try to do is look at the film, see where we’re at on both sides of the ball and see what fits our team best. If Dan playing defensive fits us best and gives us the best chance to win the game, that’s what we’ll do, and if playing on the offensive side does the same thing, clearly that’s what we’ll do.”
Culbreath lead the Tigers with 67 yards rushing. Will Thanheiser was their top receiver again with 82 yards on 5 catches. Ryan Coyle blasted a 76-yard punt, a career long for the senior from Lawrenceville School.
Carlos Roque recorded his first career interception and Mark Ethridge had his first fumble recovery as the Tiger defense forced two turnovers.
“We did create a couple turnovers today,” Hughes said, “but they weren’t in situations where we had a short field to go on.”
Little went Princeton’s way after its opening score. The Tigers lost the game and control of their Ivy destiny Saturday, but their season is only half finished and there are five Ivy games to play, including three more at home.
“Together we have a chance,” Hughes said. “If we start to fray a little bit, then we have no chance. The character of the team is going to show through at this point.”