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Princeton Travels to Eastern Championship With Hopes of League Title and NCAA Tourney
PRINCETON, N.J. -- The Princeton men's water polo team travels to Boston this weekend for the 2009 CWPA Eastern Championship this weekend at MIT. The Tigers are the second seed on the Southern side and will take on the host Engineers in the opening game on Friday.
Princeton has won two Eastern Championships, but has not held the trophy since the 2004 season when the Tiger edged St. Francis 3-2 in quadruple overtime. The Tigers were Eastern runners-up in both 2006 and 2008, falling to Navy in both championship games by identical 9-6 scores. In both season, Princeton faced Navy in both the Southern and Eastern Championship games.
Princeton was the Southern regular season champion by virtue of winning a tiebreaker with both Navy and Bucknell after the three all finished with identical 6-2 records in the regular season standings with wins over each other at home. Navy was awarded the top-seed at the Southern Championships two weekends ago at Bucknell and topped the Tigers in the championship game to earn the top seed for Easterns.
The Tigers clinched their Eastern berth by winning their opening round game at Southerns over Gannon. Princeton then came from behind to defeat host-Bucknell in the semifinals; scoring two goals late to tie the game and force overtime in the 10-9 Tiger win. In the championship games, Princeton fell behind early and stayed within a goal or two of Navy until the Midshipmen extended the lead late in the 10-5 win.
As the second seed on the Southern side, the Tigers will meet MIT, the third-seed on the Northern side. Brown won the Northern Championship and is the first-seed on its side. Friday first round games feature South No. 1 Navy vs. North No. 4 Iona, North No. 2 Fordham vs. South No. 3 Johns Hopkins, North No. 1 Brown vs. South Nov. 4 Bucknell and North No. 3 MIT vs. South No. 2 Princeton. Should Princeton advance into the semifinals, the Tigers would play the winner of the Brown-Bucknell game on Saturday. A complete Eastern Championship schedule can be found at this link.
The winner of the Eastern Championship will gain the CWPA's automatic bid to the 2009 National Collegiate Water Polo Championships, held the first weekend in December at Princeton's DeNunzio Pool.
