Lacrosse welcomes No. 6 Princeton

Duke lore has always glorified a Duke-Princeton connection. As the story goes, when James B. Duke offered $6 million to "establish an institution of learning to be known as Duke University," his private estate was near Princeton's campus. Mr. Duke greatly admired the architecture at the nearby school, and therefore when Duke's campus was designed, the buildings took a very Princetonian flavor.

It would appear that similar ties exist between the schools' women's lacrosse teams, which meet today at 3 p.m. in Koskinen Stadium. After all, Duke's lacrosse team was formulated in 1995, a year after their Ivy League counterparts won the national title. Princeton has been a consistent Final Four participant since then, the Blue Devils seem to have emulated its formula.

"Even though it'd be easy to compare us because I think we're very similar lacrosse schools, in terms of we're both highly competitive lacrosse programs, but we're also [highly ranked] academic institutions as well," Duke head coach Kerstin Kimel said. "I think even if you ask our kids that looked at the two schools, it was like a love-hate thing. I'd say we probably tried to set our own standard for what we wanted to do. And I think that we have a different way of operating than the Ivy Leagues."

Regardless, Kimel and the No. 4 Blue Devils (6-1) have a great deal of respect for the defending national champion Tigers. And though No. 6 Princeton (1-2) has lost two consecutive games to Loyola and Virginia, Duke is prepared for a prolific Tigers attack.

"They have a lot of good players at both ends, and we just have to shut them down," senior All-American Kate Kaiser said. "[We just have to] play our game, and not play into their's."

Duke's game is entrenched in controlling the tempo of the game, the outcome of which rests in the hands of Duke's offensive leaders: Kaiser, Lauren Gallagher and Katie Chrest. The trio has scored an impressive 49 goals and recorded 15 assists in just seven contests this season. It is a triple threat that only No. 2 Maryland has been able to outperform, as the Terrapins won a 9-8 overtime decision earlier this year. But since dropping the game to Maryland, the Blue Devils have taken their game up a notch or two.

"We realized one of the big things we had to do was winning the draws and finishing on our shots," Kaiser said. "Those are two things that we've really been focusing on for the past couple games, and we know they'll be just as important tomorrow because Princeton is just as good as Maryland."

Duke's offense will have to score on a stingy defense, headed by Tewaaraton Trophy candidate Rachael Becker. The All-American leads Princeton's defense with 12 caused turnovers and 13 ground balls in just three games.