Exhausted after a week of midterms, the Princeton football team stumbled onto buses Friday morning in New Jersey and fell asleep for the long ride to Cambridge and a showdown with the Harvard Crimson.
But the bus driver got lost, and when the Tigers woke up Saturday afternoon they found themselves in Never-Never Land, winners over the Crimson in a bizarre 11-6 contest before 18,000 incredulous fans.
The Crimson (now 4-2, 3-1 Ivy) had a commanding 6-3 lead over Princeton (now 3-3, 3-1 Ivy) with less than five minutes to play when Harvard lined up in punt formation at its own 37.
Kevin Dulsky's snap flew high over the head of punter Rob Steinberg and began rolling toward the Crimson endzone. Steinberg, who despite a missed field goal had had a marvelous day kicking the ball, turned and gave chase with a bevy of Tigers on his tail.
By the time the punter caught up with the ball it was on the goalline. The senior slid and kicked the ball over the endline and out of the playing field as a host of visitors lept to cover it for a would-be touchdown.
Steinberg's play gave Princeton a two-point safety, but Harvard still had an unusual 6-5 lead. If the Tigers had fallen on the ball, they would have gotten at least three points, and the game would have been tied. The safety didn't really hurt Harvard, and Steinberg's heads-up play was the difference.
"He [Steinberg] made a big play on the safety," Crimson Coach Joe Restic said afterwards. "I mean that's a pro kind of a play. He's thinking, he's in the ballgame. He knows we can't give up the seven points, he's got to get it [the ball] in the endzone. That play could have been the ballgame and should have been the ballgame."
But it wasn't the ballgame.
After a safety, the team that surrenders the two points must take a free kick from its own 20, and may either punt or kick off. The Crimson elected to have Steinberg, who is a better placekicker than punter, tee the ball up and kick away.
Restic said he had no doubts that Steinberg should kick off, although many other coaches choose to punt.
"We worked on that during the week, and we just didn't do a good job on that part, punting the ball, free kick," Restic said. "Robert kicked the ball off very well. What you're trying to do is get maximum distance there. On a punt...in that situation he's not the best kicker. He kicks well for us when we're in the snap but it's a different kick, it's a different kick altogether."
"I was very surprised," Princeton return man Tom Urquhart said of the decision to kick off. "You can get the hang time on a punt so you can't get a return."
But the Crimson opted not to punt, and Steinberg smacked a solid boot to the Tiger 30, where the ball took a crazy bounce. Urquhart lunged at the ball and made a wonderful pickup on the pigskin.
The senior pulled the ball in, broke a single tackle and headed upfield. Seventy-five yards later, the ballgame was Princeton's.
"Honest to goodness, when he broke that first tackle, it was almost like I was looking right into his eyes," Rogerson said. "I said to myself he's gone, because there was just like a fire, a determination and it was just an acceleration and I just figured, boy, I don't know that anybody--unless they get a clean one on him--I'm not sure anyone's gonna stop him."
Only one Harvard player ever had a play on the speedy Urquhart, but a good move left safety man Lee Oldenburg on the ground at the Harvard 15 and Urquhart was the new hero.
"You can see it as soon as you catch it," Urquhart said amongst the shouts of his jubilant teammates after the game. "There was a 20-yard gap and then all you've got to do is beat the safeties."
"They took the kick off right up the gut and knocked out the four and five men [the two middle men]," Harvard Captain Brent Wilkinson said.
Back in the Beginning
The game had started on solid footing, a Steinberg kick deep in the end zone, but gradually wound its way toward its exotic and frenetic conclusion. All along, the emphasis was on the kicking game, but the finale was an ending no one could have forseen.
For the first 55 minutes the two teams could manage very little sustained offense. Neither squad penetrated the opposition 13.
"We had bad field position so many times," Rogerson said. "When you're going against a really outstanding defense like that, they have you backed up, they force mistakes and all of a sudden you're in third-and-long, and they're dictating to you what you can and cannot do."
The defenses shut the offenses down on downs time after time, so the punters went to work. And for the most part, Steinberg and Tiger Rob DiGiacomo were nailing the ball despite an unpredictable swirling wind in the Stadium.
Air Traffic Controllers
The Crimson secondary shut down highly-touted Tiger quarterback Doug Butler, who had trouble connecting with his receivers. The defensive backs and strong pressure from the front five held Butler to a 13-for-36 outing for just 161 yards.
On the ground, Princeton was equally ineffective, as its run-oriented Wing-T offense could manage only 118 yards.
The Princeton defense, meanwhile, also enjoyed an outstanding afternoon and a particularly fine second half. The Tigers held the Crimson to minus 20 yards rushing after intermission, and All-Ivy fullback Robert Santiago (68 yards for the day) to zero yards in the second half.
Crimson quarterback Brian White picked up almost as many yards as Butler (158) on a seven-for-18 Saturday, but the senior signalcaller was under constant pressure from a fearsome Princeton rush all day. The Tiger line sacked White eight times and stalled countless Crimson drives with its relentless pressure.
Few points were surrendered as the defenses dominated and the punters battled for field position. After an early Steinberg miss, the Crimson senior and Princeton's Goodwin traded second-quarter field goals. Steinberg added another at 12:36 to give the hosts a 6-3 advantage.
Wilkinson Edge
Harvard had its best touchdown chance of the day two plays later, when Wilkinson forced a Craig Fitchett fumble at the Tiger 30.
With a 1:39 remaining in the half, the Crimson had a golden opportunity to surge ahead. On the first play, White went back to pass, felt some pressure, ignored a wide-open field ahead of him and threw into a crowd at the goal line.
Princeton defensive back Jim Anderson, who was having an outstanding game, came up with the ball, and the Crimson push was foiled.
"I thought that was going to be the play that was going to be the big play in the ball game," Restic said. "Because if he doesn't get it up in the air, I think he's gonna run, maybe down inside the 10, 'cause there was no one in the middle of the field."
In the second half, the two defenses dominated, and both coaches waited for the inevitable break to come. The Crimson blitzed Butler incessantly, but the Tiger line did a heroic job giving him protection and preventing the Harvard defense from picking up the edge.
The Good Book
"I put together the plan for our offensive linemen, I had like a book I gave them," Rogerson said. "This was our midterm week. I said, 'Unfortunately, guys, you've got another midterm.' And they responded well."
So with the defenses shutting down the offenses, the special teams--and a little well-placed fortune--gave the game to Princeton.
THE NOTEBOOK: Brian White had the wind knocked out of him and was replaced by junior Dave Landau for two plays...Junior linebacker Scott Collins broke his nose...White, who now has 1828 career passing yards, moved into fifth on the all-time Harvard list.
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