Princeton University

Happy Day-After Mothers’ Day to all the moms out there. 

There’s nothing quite like the mom of a college athlete. Those four years in college are the culmination of a lifetime of organizing carpools, spending hours watching club tournaments or swim meets or any other sport and keeping their growing athletes fed and hydrated. 

They’ve taken a backseat during birthdays and anniversaries — and loved every minute of it. When it’s over, they miss it terribly.

And nobody cheers like the college sports moms. They high-five and hug and wear their collective hearts on their sleeves. There’s a reason the TV cameras find them after a goal is scored.

Hopefully, for everything they’ve done, they were showered yesterday with gifts and flowers and whatever they might have wanted. 

The Princeton Department of Athletics is loaded with moms as well. Hopefully they received the same treatment. 

Not all moms had the day off. There were plenty of track and field moms who were in New Haven for the Ivy League Heptagonal outdoor track and field championships.

Those whose offspring compete for Princeton went home very happy .

The Princeton men and women swept the team championships on a history-making day. For one thing, both teams completed the “Triple Crown” of having won Heps titles in cross country, indoor track and field and outdoor track and field. That makes an extraordinary 12 times that the men have done so and three times that the women have. 

This academic year joins 2010-11 as years where both teams won Triple Crowns. 

Also, the two Ivy championships brought the year’s total to 16, eclipsing the old league record of 15 that Princeton had done on two other occasions. That’s 16 Ivy League championships with three still on the table this coming weekend in women’s open rowing and men’s heavyweight and lightweight rowing. 

TigerBlog went to the Ivy website yesterday to see what the updated team scores were. To get there, he clicked on a story that read “Harvard Men, Princeton Women Lead After Day 1 Of Heps.” 

By the time he had clicked on the “live results” link, the Princeton men were way ahead. 

The women built their Day 1 lead with help from Georgina Scoot in the long jump and Shea Greene in the javelin, both of whom 1) won their event and 2) set a Heps record while doing so. For Greene, a junior, that’s three straight Heps javelin titles. 

Princeton went 1-2-4 in the javelin, with Greene, Niki Woods and Kameil Crane. Princeton went 1-2 in the long jump, as Scoot was followed by teammate Alexandra Kelly. 

Greg Foster won yet another Ivy League high jump championship of his own, by nearly a foot, for the first points of the meet Saturday. That’s six between indoor and outdoor, if you’re keeping score. 

As yesterday afternoon went along, Princeton added points without many first place finishes but with seconds and thirds, and sometimes both in the same event (like Marcelo Parra Ramon and Franco Parra Ramon in the men’s steeplechase and Joe Licata and Casey Helm in the men’s shot put). 

There was even a 2-3-4, with Layla Giordano, Makenna Marshall and Siniru Iheoma. Each time TB checked the team standings, Princeton was further ahead, especially after Mena Scatchard and Harrison Witt did what they do, which was to sweep the 1,500. 

And then there was Foster again, with a win in the 110 hurdles, followed in third by teammate Easton Tan and fourth by teammate Yuki Hojo. There was another 2-3-4 in the men’s 100 meters, with Jadon Spain, Jackson Clarke and Paul Kuhner. 

By mid-afternoon, the team titles were pretty much locked up. There would still be more highlights. 

Scoot would win the triple jump. Iheoma won the shot put. Helm and Avery Shunneson went 1-2 in the discus. Clarke and Gant went 1-2 in the 200. 

The women put up 202.5 points, followed by runner-up Harvard with 178.5, with nobody else over 100. The men won by a larger margin, with 212.5 points to 128 for Harvard, who was also in second-place here. 

Dominance? Yes, having the men and women win a Triple Crown in the same year fits that description. 

So does winning 16 of the first 30 Ivy titles awarded in an academic year. 

That’s a lot of high fives from the Tiger moms.