Princeton Hoops: I Was 1 of the 665 in Attendance

I didn't know whether to go to the opening round of the College Basketball Invitational last night. Princeton was hosting Duquesne (rumor has it that the Tigers paid roughly $60,000 for the privilege of hosting the game and having it televised on HDNet), the Princeton students were on spring break, and the two people whom I thought might be interested in going were out of down. "Don't worry," I told my wife, "there are some die-hard alums there whom I know, I probably just end up sitting with one of them." And so I did. The conversation was probably better than the game, or, more fairly, the first 10 minutes, when both teams played as though they had molasses on their sneakers and butter on their fingers. But the Tigers snapped out of it with about 9 minutes to go into the first half, took the lead going into the locker room and didn't look back.

Click here for the link to the Princeton Basketball website for the full report. Princeton won, 65-51, thanks to solid play from guard Douglas Davis, heady inside play by frosh forward Ian Hummer and great passing from senior center Zach Finley. Best moment of the night was when seldom-used senior Nick Lake dunked with less than a minute to go in what might have been his final game in Jadwin Gym. If so, it's a nice way to go out. Princeton will take on the winner of IUPUI-Hofstra, site, I think, to be determined.

It seemed like there were more than 665 people there. It didn't seem like there were any Duquesne fans in attendance, and you'd have to think that each Tiger player (say there were 15 dressed) didn't bring 42 fans apiece. So, actually, there were some students, some older alums and some administrators and professors in attendance.

But not that many. Good win for the Tigers, and it's good to keep playing basketball for as long as you can, I suppose. The beginning of the game left a lot to be desired, but the last 28 minutes or so were worth watching.