Harvard Men’s Lacrosse Falls to Princeton 13-11, Drops to 1-1 in Ancient Eight Play

The No. 13 Harvard men’s lacrosse (5-2, 1-1 Ivy) team fell on the road this past weekend to No. 4 Princeton in a tightly-contested 13-11 battle that came down to a solid fourth quarter of lacrosse for both programs.

The Crimson was coming off a hot and much-needed victory that might have put the nail in the coffin early for a once-superior Yale men’s lacrosse team that now sits at an abysmal 1-5, including 0-2 in the Ivy League. With UPenn falling to in-state rival St. Josephs by one goal, and Dartmouth cracking the top-20 for the first time since 2007, Yale’s hopes might be dashed unless it can pull off upset wins that allow the squad to claw its way back into contention. Ivy League lacrosse once again reigns supreme in the polls.

The lacrosse landscape looked unfamiliar through both Saturday and Sunday, though, with top-ranked Maryland falling in triple OT to Michigan, No. 2 Penn State falling to No. 9 Ohio State, No. 3 Army falling to unranked Boston University in OT (who the Crimson will be facing tomorrow, in the Charles River Rivalry), Dartmouth toppling No. 16 UPenn, unranked Brown besting No. 17 UMass, unranked Rutgers handily putting away No. 11 Johns Hopkins, and No. 14 Richmond eking by No. 13 Georgetown.

With the top-ranked teams easily handled by programs not even receiving votes, in-league play will become even more vital as these squads look to posture for coveted spots in their post-season tournaments.

Princeton fell in its first league matchup, as well, trading rankings with the Cornell Big Red, which handily put away the Tigers. Phenom CJ Kirst, who became the all-time leading goal scorer for Cornell during that contest, made light work of a tight Princeton defense, which showed its prowess against Harvard yesterday.

Heading into play, Princeton held tight in the cage, only allowing an average 11.50 goals per game — made even more impressive by its strength of schedule. Netminder Ryan Croddick, who ranks 27th in the nation for total saves so far this season (a feat, given the truncated nature of the Ivy League schedule, which allows for far fewer games than the other conferences) will be a player to watch this season.

In the Harvard cage, though, is the freshman goalie Graham Stevens, who has made a name for himself in the last few games. Stepping up big time in the position, Stevens has proved clutch through several tight contests. Being ranked the No. 25 on the 2025 Freshman Impact Ratings with his 47% save rate and 73 saves, the defense will come down to a battle of the goalies. Senior middie Leo Johnson was a threat from the right wing with his winding outside lefty sniper last week against Yale, and Stevens will have to expect a similar stroke from Princeton’s senior middie Coulter Mackesy, who has a lethal outside lefty shot that mimics Johnson’s. Stevens excels when reading inside shots on the doorstep, so the defense will have to get out on Princeton’s hands and cut off the outside lanes, much like it did when junior SSDM Finn Pokorny made waves with a solid hit against the Bulldogs.

“Graham Stevens is going to be a problem in this league for however long he is a part of it,” said one of the ESPN+ broadcasters covering the contest.

A problem he indeed was. Posting 12 massive saves, Stevens was a bright point for the squad, easily reading Mackasey’s outside lefty snipes, and making light work of several tight, inside shots that had the Princeton bench shaking its head in amazement. Man down defense is something Harvard will work on heading into its future contests, allowing Princeton — which ranked as the No. 1 most efficient man up unit in the country heading into the game — to score on its first of two attempts just 10 seconds into the possession. But, other than that slip up, the defense played lights-out, locking down one of the slipperiest offenses in the nation.

Generating offensive motion wasn’t hard for the Crimson, but finding the back of the cage on its 50 shots certainly was. Creating the opportunities it needed didn’t elude the team, but capitalizing on its takes — part of which was due to Croddick’s 17 saves — and being more selective with its takes will serve the team.

The team’s ride was again a point of pride for Frisbie Family Head Coach Gerry Byrne, who lauded his squad’s hustle, but was quick to note that it “struggled at the faceoff which led to a 60% possession time advantage for Princeton.” The ride, which was a critical tool that the team relied on especially at the faceoff X, helped to mitigate the team’s inability to win clamps against the Tigers — who won about 63% of the takes. Still sitting at the second-worst faceoff possession percentage in the nation, the ride proved crucial in helping to swing possession time back to the Crimson, and to getting the ball back down to its attacking end.

“We rode really well which helped get some extra offensive possessions,” senior middie Owen Gaffney said. “Our attack set the tone with its aggressiveness.”

Drawing first blood was the sophomore attackman Jack Speidell, who took it to the hoop himself nine minutes into the quarter. Harvard had 11 shots before it found success, with the sophomore curling around the right side of the cage, making the most of his SSDM matchup. Making the same mistake as previous opponents, the Princeton defense allowed for the short-stick switch on Speidell too often, which allowed the elusive cutter to find space and create space in front of the cage.

Despite making the first move, the Tigers controlled the rest of the first period, quickly scoring a string of five goals in the remaining six minutes to race out to a demanding 5-1 lead. Senior quarterback Sam King does what he does best, and asserted his dominance with a filthy BTB on the doorstep to get things cooking for the second 15 minutes. On the heels of that, Speidell made his move at X once again, tripping his defender up on a nasty left-to-right split dodge that sent his defender sailing, and allowed the attackman to paint the top corner.

Harvard has played relatively clean offense so far this season, posting minimal unforced errors, and the game on Saturday was no exception. On the Tigers’ attacking end, the middle fifteen minutes of play reigned supreme, with the home team finding its largest, five-goal, lead about half way through the third period. It was the work of junior co-captain and offensive middie Logan Ip that enabled Harvard to post a fighting chance, and work its way back into contention.

With two back-to-back goals at 11:11 and 8:11 in the third, Ip — who has been relatively quiet so far this season — showed why he is the sole junior elected to the role of captain as he led by example on the attacking half. The ESPN+ announcer went so far as to say that if the team had been able to successfully stage its comeback, all credit would go down to the junior.

Princeton would re-attack and gain those two points right back, but the spark lit by Ip could not be extinguished for long, and Harvard heard the familiar din of the twine three times in the last 2 minutes of the third.

These two minutes are arguably the best two minutes Harvard has played all season. The action all started with an interception by senior middie Miles Botkiss, who snagged an errant 50–yard pass from Croddick meant for Mackesy as it sailed across the midline and pushed the pace on the transition to find a cutting junior attackman Teddy Malone who buried it deep in the bottom left corner. Panning to the crowd, the Harvard alumni — including Botkiss’s older brother Beau Botkiss ’20 — went wild. Showing the importance of the faceoff, Harvard gained another possession on a technical from Princeton, and just 30 seconds later, junior middie Andrew Perry also made his mark; splitting the double that formed out of an early and drawn-out slide, Perry rolled through trouble, finding a lane down the middle of the arc for a lefty side-arm slugger that sent him sailing as a Tigers defenseman sent him sprawling on the turf on a late, and fruitless, slide.

Perhaps the most exciting goal of the contest came in the form of junior SSDM Finn Jensen’s first ever collegiate goal, which sailed by Croddick with just one second left in the third. Squandering its first chance following Perry’s goal with an unnecessary outside take from a low angle, it seemed as though Princeton would end the period with another chance to extend its lead to four. However, the Harvard ride showed its Valkyrie-like nature, chasing down its opposing offense and quickly getting personnel on the field.

This play was all Jensen from start to finish. Racing in to catch up with Princeton’s 6’5” middie Carson Krammer, who was winding up for an outside bullet with 20 to play, Jensen got to his man in the nick of time, trail-checking the giant and scooping up the GB as his stick collapsed behind him. Racing down the field, Jensen showed immense amount of poise, hitting the SSDM ahead of him before racing into open space in the middle of Princeton’s defensive arc where Malone hit him for the one-two punch. The play was text-book perfect, Byrne couldn’t have drawn it up better than that.

The crowd went nuts, and Jensen went wild.

Despite the momentum shift in favor of Harvard, the Crimson was unable to perfect the upset on the road. Princeton scored the first two goals of the final quarter, and even with a last-minute, two-goal surge from Harvard — which included a nasty goal from junior middie John Aurandt IV with 48 left on the game clock — the Crimson found itself sitting 1-1 in Ancient Eight play.

The Crimson will try to redeem itself on Tuesday as it hosts Boston University in The Charles River Rivalry at 7 p.m.. The Terriers will prove an incredibly tough foe for Harvard following their OT upset victory against No. 3 Army, which until this point had gone undefeated through its first seven games. If you can’t catch the action live, stream it on ESPN+.

– Staff Writer Katharine A. Forst can be reached at katharine.forst@thecrimson.co