A collective exhale and shout could be simultaneously heard around New England on Nov. 6.

For on this day, the Harvard field hockey team defeated Columbia, 2-0, and grabbed a share of the Ivy League title, ending Princeton’s 10-year chokehold on the crown.

By all accounts, this was a strange thing to have happened. An odd time, an unlikely place, an improbable team.

The Crimson had graduated its top scorer (Kate McDavitt ’04) and assists leader (Mina Pell ’04), its all-time record-holder for shutouts (Katie Zacarian ’04), and Harvard’s first-ever first team All-American, the best defensive player in school history (Jen Ahn ’04).

But the Crimson, led by its senior class—including captain Kate Gannon, midfielder Shelley Maasdorp, forward Tiffany Egnaczyk, netminder Aliaa Remtilla, and backup goalie Anne Haig—would show that it had more than adequate replacements.

Harvard reeled off four straight wins to open the year, outscoring its opponents 16-3. Included was a 3-1 victory over Ivy foe Penn, a win that would prove eminently important later in the year.

The Crimson rose to a No.16 ranking, only to fall to Maine and then-No. 6 Connecticut.

A win over Brown preceded a trip to Ann Arbor, Mich., where Harvard topped Northwestern but stumbled against then-No. 8 Michigan.

The Crimson returned to Jordan Field and was again felled by a ranked opponent, losing 3-0 to then-No. 10 Northeastern.

Ivy dominance continued with a pair of victories over Cornell and Yale, but yet another ranked team—this time then-No. 12 Boston College—bested Harvard.

With its immaculate 4-0 Ivy record, the Crimson traveled down the familiar road to Princeton, N.J. The Tigers, sporting a 4-1 league record, were in a position to take the helm of the Ivy standings with a win over Harvard.

But Crimson midfielder Jane Sackovich scored a goal with 18:55 remaining in the game, and Harvard held the same 1-0 lead with only three minutes left on the clock. Just when it seemed the Crimson would finally topple the mighty Princeton, however, the Tigers reeled off two quick scores and took the contest 2-1.

“This was the most confident we’ve been going into the Princeton game,” Maasdorp said at the time. “We felt it was our game and our time.”

The Tigers still had one Ivy game left though, and the possibility of Princeton loss gave the Crimson a glimmer of hope.

Meanwhile, Harvard found itself up against a tough opponent in then-No. 17 Boston University.