The Bulldogs return to the Yale Bowl this Saturday for their final home game of the season against the Princeton Tigers in the 148th meeting of the second-oldest rivalry in college football. Kickoff is set for noon, and the game will air on ESPN+.
Princeton enters with a 6-2 (4-1 Ivy) record, a No. 23 national ranking, and a share of first place with Harvard after being picked to finish in the bottom half of the league in the preseason. The Tigers dropped their opener at Bryant, ripped off four straight wins, were hammered 35-7 at Harvard, and have since survived Cornell 21-20 and Dartmouth 21-14 at home, with the latter making Bob Surace the winningest coach in program history. Yale has won four straight in this series, including last year’s 13-10 slugfest in New Jersey, but at 2-3 in the league the Elis are reduced to playing spoiler while clinging to the faintest of mathematical hopes. Expect a low-scoring, field-position battle against a team that has made a habit of winning ugly.
Princeton has rotated two young quarterbacks all season in freshman QB Wyatt Becker (6’2”, 200 lbs.) and sophomore QB Ty Ciongoli (6’0”, 190 lbs.). The freshman has completed 56.8% of his passes for 815 yards with 5 touchdowns and 2 interceptions while adding 148 yards on the ground, and the sophomore is the more accurate thrower at 61.3% for 763 yards and 5 touchdowns but has tossed 4 picks. Sophomore QB Eli Friend (6’1”, 200 lbs.) enters as a short-yardage option and has 2 rushing touchdowns on just 9 carries. Junior RB Kai Honda (5’10”, 210 lbs.) has been the breakout star with 554 yards (5.3 ypc) and 8 touchdowns, highlighted by an absurd 219 yards and 4 scores on 14 carries at Columbia, but he left the Cornell game early and has just 3 carries over the last two weeks. Senior RB Ethan Clark (6’1”, 210 lbs.) was a second-team All-Ivy selection in 2025 and returned last week after missing a month and a half, with 130 yards on 40 carries in his four appearances. Freshman RB Kaio Agudinho de Oliveira (5’11”, 205 lbs.) led the Tigers with 61 rushing yards against Dartmouth. Sophomore WR Josh Robinson (5’7”, 170 lbs.) was the 2025 Ivy League Rookie of the Year, an Honorable Mention All-Ivy pick, and a Phil Steele FCS second-team All-American, and he leads the team with 33 catches for 392 yards. Sophomore WR Josh Smith (6’0”, 185 lbs.) is the big-play threat at 18.5 yards per catch with 5 touchdowns, three of which came in the Cornell comeback. Senior WR Aidan Besselman (6’1”, 185 lbs.) has 17 grabs and 2 scores, while senior WR Jackson Green (6’3”, 200 lbs.) averages 17.1 yards per reception. Senior TE Joey Wassler (6’4”, 240 lbs.) is a captain who is used primarily as a blocker with 9 catches. The Tigers’ offensive line averages 297.0 lbs. across the board and is the strength of the unit, anchored by a pair of 2025 second-team All-Ivy guards in senior OL Barrett Eddlemon (6’3”, 285 lbs.) and senior OL Justin Selbert (6’5”, 320 lbs.) along with senior OL Oyintare Porbeni (6’7”, 300 lbs.), a captain who has had NFL scouts at practice. The line has allowed only 6 sacks all season while the team averages 3.9 yards per carry. Princeton has scored touchdowns on just 12 of 25 red-zone trips, so keeping them to field goals is vital, and they are aggressive on fourth down at 11 of 19. The Tigers have outscored opponents 45-9 in the first quarter but have been outscored 60-58 after halftime, so we cannot afford another slow start. Shutting down the run game is the first priority, as Cornell held Princeton to 14 rushing yards and the Tigers needed a comeback to escape. From there, our front has to put real pressure on two inexperienced signal callers who have combined for 6 interceptions, even against a line that rarely lets anyone get home. Defenders have to wrap up on first contact after the missed tackles that turned short catches into long scores against Brown, and we can’t allow a team to march down the field on penalties again.
Defense is what has carried the Tigers, as they have surrendered just 15.0 points per game and forced 13 turnovers. It is a bend-but-don’t-break outfit that gives up more yardage (363.8 per game) than its own offense gains (325.8) yet stiffens in the red zone, where opponents have reached the end zone on only 12 of 27 trips. Senior LB Chase Christopher (6’1”, 220 lbs.) was Honorable Mention All-Ivy in both 2024 and 2025 and leads the team with 80 tackles, including a career-high 16 last week. Junior LB Connor Cronin (6’3”, 200 lbs.) is second with 52 tackles to go with a sack and an interception. Junior LB Jake Moore (6’4”, 240 lbs.) has 5.5 sacks and 6.5 tackles for loss, and junior LB AJ Pigford (6’3”, 255 lbs.) has 4.5 sacks and a team-high 8 tackles for loss after dropping the Dartmouth quarterback twice; the pair ranks among the top three sack artists in the league. Sophomore DL Nate Stohl (6’4”, 280 lbs.) is extremely active for an interior lineman with 43 tackles and a blocked kick. Sophomore LB Dylan Torrico (5’11”, 220 lbs.) has 42 tackles and a 70-yard fumble return. Senior DB Torian Roberts (5’11”, 185 lbs.) was second-team All-Ivy in 2025 and has 5 pass breakups and an interception, while fellow captain senior DB Evan Haynie (5’11”, 180 lbs.) was Honorable Mention All-Ivy last year. Senior DB Kavon Miller (5’10”, 180 lbs.) is third on the team with 44 tackles, and senior DB Kyler Ronquillo (5’9”, 185 lbs.) and junior DB Casey Etienne Jr. (6’1”, 185 lbs.) each have 2 interceptions. Princeton allows 68.3% completions and 242.4 passing yards per game but only 5 passing touchdowns all year, and opponents average just 3.4 yards per carry. Expect Princeton to blitz heavily after Brown destroyed us with pressure to the tune of 6 sacks, especially with two of the league’s top three sack leaders leading the charge. The answer is quick, short plays that get the ball out of Reno’s hands before the rush arrives. Getting HDK rolling early in the run game will make them pay for sending extra bodies, and the tight ends should have openings underneath with the linebackers rushing the passer. Once the blitz is slowed, we have to find deep opportunities for Santiago and Anderson against a secondary left on an island. Yardage has been there all season, but the Elis must finally turn long drives into touchdowns and stop trading sevens for threes.
Senior P Brady Clark (6’2”, 200 lbs.) is a top punter in the league as a unanimous first-team All-Ivy selection in 2025, Honorable Mention All-Ivy in 2023 and 2024, an FCS Punter of the Year semifinalist, and the reigning Ivy League Special Teams Player of the Week. He averages 45.3 yards per punt with a long of 66 and 12 punts inside the 20, and opponents have totaled minus-2 punt return yards on the year. Senior K Esteban Nunez Perez (6’1”, 185 lbs.) is 4 of 7 on field goal attempts with a long of 38 and has not connected from beyond 40 yards, though he is a perfect 20-for-20 on extra points. Sophomore K Vaughn Lennon (6’2”, 180 lbs.) handles kickoffs with 15 touchbacks on 34 attempts. Junior RB Kenny Jordan (6’0”, 170 lbs.), a Phil Steele third-team All-Ivy pick in 2024, averages 19.0 yards per kickoff return, and sophomore WR Josh Robinson (5’7”, 170 lbs.) handles punt returns at 8.0 yards per return. Piper gives us a clear edge in the kicking game, and in a contest that figures to come down to a possession, that advantage has to show up on the scoreboard.
Go Bulldogs! Beat the Tigers!
27 replies on “Princeton Preview”
The Yale-Princeton rivalry is not the second-oldest, irrespective of some media reports. Lafayettte and Lehigh have played each other more times but only by virtue of their playing multiple times in the same season back in the 19th Century.
The Yale-Princeton game began in 1873, well before Lehigh and Lafayette ever met. And the more telling factor is that no other two teams have faced off in more different seasons —in more years — than the Bulldogs and the Tigers. Since U.S. Grant was in the White House, Y and P have played each other each year, save for three years when wars interrupted (1917, 1918 and 1944) or COVID (2020).
By
“Oldest” is an ambiguous term, anyway. In reality, Princeton-Rutgers is the “oldest” rivalry (first game ever played), but obviously has far fewer games played than Y-P or Lehigh-Lafayette. (Second “oldest” is Columbia-Rutgers, for what it’s worth.)
More accurately-stated, Y-P is the second-most *frequently-played* rivalry.
Voy Vey, Neither Columbia nor Princeton has played Rutgers in more than 45 years. I wouldn’t call Rutgers a football “rival” of either Ivy school today.
I agree that “oldest” is ambiguous, and our series with the Tigers is clearly the second “most-played.” My point here is this: If we’re going to talk about what’s the “oldest rivalry,” the Yale-Princeton game fits that description better than the Lafayette-Lehigh game.
Hard to believe most betting sites have Yale favored in this game.
Good start, but it was also a good start last week.
Somebody needs to tell the camera operators that they don’t need to be in satellite view mode.
Play calling sucks
Execution sucks
13/18 3tds far from sucks.
Could be another game where Yale will dominate the statistics, but doesn’t score many points.
Maybe not the passing yards
Brown 2.0
Would it kill is to give Hewitt a series?
Not going to need him. Game in control.
Remember the offense style called the “run and shoot”?
I think our offense approach is called the “three and out.”
Run and spike?
I’ve been calling for TE pop pass up the seam since week 3!
Wouldn’t it have been a perfect time just before halftime to try one long pass?
Caught a view of the near-empty Yale Bowl at halftime.
20 years ago Princeton vs Yale drew 43k to the Bowl. Now, it draws the same as Merrimack.
Faith guys. This game is over.
Good to see some downfield passes on the last drive.
I was just thinking that in previous years Kamara came up with big INT’s in just such situations.
Nice win despite lack of creativity from OC!
Great win! Beat Harvard!
Harvard clinched the Ivy’s automatic playoff bid today with a win over Penn, coupled with losses by Dartmouth and Princeton. Too much to hope that the Cantabs will look past Yale to the FCS playoffs.
They won’t look past Yale, but that doesn’t mean they will win.