YALE-PRINCETON | The tailgate that matters
Most Yalies still agree that “Harvard sucks.” But some may be casting aside the old adage “Princeton doesn’t matter” — at least as far as tailgating is concerned.
In light of stricter tailgating regulations at Harvard and the convenience of a home turf advantage this weekend, many Yale students say they are directing more attention toward Saturday’s game against Princeton than The Game next weekend. But it is not clear whether students at Princeton — which has already been statistically eliminated from contention for the Ivy League title — share in their enthusiasm.
The...
penn is NOT princeton's rival
saying that penn is princeton's rival just because of their location is like saying that Brown and Yale, or Brown and Harvard should be rivals--neither of which is the case.
ATTENDANCE: 5,711
"7 out of 9 students"
good job - you have a +/- 30% confidence interval.
Yale is Harvard's rival, but Harvard isn't Yale's.
#4: Pouring rain up to the start of the game tends to decrease attendance.
My understanding is that Penn and Princeton are traditional rivals in much the same way that Harvard and Yale are traditional rivals. I don't think the YDN made this assertion just because of their location.
#6: I think you meant to say Harvard is Yale's rival, but Yale isn't Harvard's. In any case, I think that both schools are each other's rivals; it's just that Yalies take the rivalry a bit more seriously.
Brown is The Game for Harvard alumni
By Julian Benbow
Globe Staff / September 28, 2008
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The night before the Harvard football team opened its season against Holy Cross, team captain Matt Curtis went with his coach, Tim Murphy, to a dinner with alumni at Dillon Fieldhouse.
They call it the huddle. They have one Thursday nights before every home game, and generally the room is flooded with Harvard grads.
"They were all class of 1960, 1965," said the Lynn English graduate. "And they're all coming up to me asking, 'What Ivy League team do you not like?' "
As captain of the Crimson, Curtis was tapped along with Yale captain Bobby Abare to throw out the first pitch at Fenway in honor of the storied rivalry, so that only makes sense.
But most of the alums he talked to had a different answer.
Brown.
And even though the Holy Cross game was the next day, everyone in the room wanted the captain of the Crimson to, "Make sure you beat Brown, make sure you beat Brown."
"This was my first time interacting with these alumni at one of these dinners," Curtis said. "And they were pumped up about [Brown] two weeks before we were playing them."
Harvard's rivalry with Yale stretches back 125 years, but the rivalry with Brown runs about 45 miles.
"The alumni," explained the 6-foot-2-inch, 295-pound defensive tackle. "A lot of them work in Boston, a lot of Brown alumni work in Boston."
When the two schools met yesterday, it was for regional bragging rights, and as the Crimson's first Ivy League game of the season, it's always the tone setter. Harvard came into the season as the Ivy League's top ranked team in the preseason poll. Brown was two spots behind.
"Since I've been here," Curtis said, "the Brown game has always been a huge game. Brown has always been a very tough, very physical team. It's the first Ivy League game for a lot of teams and it dictates how our season's going to go. It's tough having a game that early on that's so important to your season."
In Curtis's freshman season, Harvard beat Brown in double-overtime and Brown managed to bounce back and win the league. Last season, Harvard won by a touchdown late and went on to win the league.
"To win a game like that, it really helped us with the momentum and the ability to close games out," Curtis said. "Which I think we did better as the season went on."
Rivalry aside, just being at that alumni dinner was big for Curtis, who grew up in Lynn. It allowed him to see everything he's learned at Harvard through Lynn-colored lenses.
"It's really been truly a blessing to come from where I have, to be able to see things from an inner-city, working-class city point of view," he said.
"To come to a school like Harvard and be able to rub elbows with politician's sons and sons and daughters of CEOs and to be able to meet the CEOs of companies is amazing."
Princeton is Penn's arch-rival. The latter makes tht clear in many ways. Historically, Penn is not Princeton's top rival except in men's baskketball. The humor and friendly jabbing by YDN writers is fun to read, but the "unimportance" of the Princeton rivalry in football is contradicted by the obsessive pre-game coverage it carries on the contest.
The "crowd" at the Yale-Princeton game last week: 5,711.
THE GAME will always be Harvard-Yale, it's the oldest and best football rivalry in history and we should keep it that way even as Harvard becomes progressively wacker.