Princeton

At this month's BET Awards, the Viewers' Choice award seemed like a battle of front-runners. Nominees Beyonce, Jay-Z and Kanye West were seated in the front row, a skip away from the podium. Chris Brown and Lil Wayne were also nominated. They all lost to four teenage boys. Mindless Behavior, the Los Angeles boy band of Prodigy, Princeton, Ray Ray and Roc Royal, bounced up to the stage to accept the night's only award decided on by fans. After catching his breath, Princeton ended his speech with a declaration.

Baltimore-based sporting goods maker STX announced today that it has signed five new members to Team STX, the first-ever elite post-collegiate women's lacrosse team. Added to the roster are Kitty Cullen (McDonogh), Sam Farrell (Severna Park), Alyssa Kildare (Johns Hopkins), Taylor Thornton and Lauren Schmidt . The new athletes join captain Josie Owen (Severn), Grace Gavin (Loyola, St. Paul's), Julie Gardner (Severna Park), Lauren Benner (Severn)

Colleges Terps get ex-Princeton standout Chanenchuk All-America midfielder Mike Chanenchuk and long-pole midfielder Taylor Morgan have transferred to play lacrosse for Maryland this season. Chanenchuk, of Poquott, N.Y., was a second-team USILA All-American at Princeton in 2010 and the unanimous 2010 Ivy League Rookie of the Year after scoring 28 goals and adding eight assists. He didn't play for the Tigers last spring. Morgan, a Potomac native who helped lead Georgetown Prep to state titles in 2009 and 2010, missed the 2011 season at Syracuse because of illness.

Rob Pannell is smart enough - getting accepted to Cornell would seem to be plenty of proof of that - to realize that he is not invincible. Even as he has registered six goals and nine assists in two NCAA tournament games and is preparing the Big Red (14-3) for Saturday's Final Four clash with seventh-seeded Duke (14-5), the fifth-year senior attackman knows that there is a defenseman, a coach, perhaps even a scheme that can slow him as he continues his assault on a couple Division I records.

Senior attackman Chris Boland has been ruled out for No. 2 Johns Hopkins' road contest at Princeton on Friday. The Jessup native and Boys' Latin graduate has sat out two games since injuring his shoulder in the season opener against Towson Feb. 17. Boland has returned to practice, but coach Dave Pietramala declined to outline a timetable for his return. “He's doing well,” Pietramala would only say Wednesday morning.

Erin McMunn, Princeton Freshman, Westminster, attacker An All-Metro player who helped Winters Mill win three state titles, McMunn is making a stellar debut with the Tigers. Last week, she set a Princeton record for most assists in a game with six and finished with a career-high seven points in a 14-13 win at Temple. She also had a goal and two assists in a 12-4 win over Yale. She has played in all 10 games, starting eight, and contributed at least two points in each.

No. 5 Johns Hopkins had thought that Friday night's contest against No. 14 Princeton would be a good barometer of the team's progress thus far. The result, however, was not what the Blue Jays had been hoping for. The 11-8 setback exposed Johns Hopkins on several fronts. The defense was slow on its slides and had problems with the Tigers' picks, the offense was inaccurate and couldn't take advantage of a retooled defense, and the team was turnover-prone. It all adds up to what should be a good deal of soul-searching among the Blue Jays.

After scoring double digits in goals in each of its first two contests - something that hadn't happened in 2011 - Princeton's offense returned to earth in a 10-8 loss to No. 2 Johns Hopkins. The No. 20 Tigers' day was exemplified by a disastrous second quarter in which the unit failed to take. Coach Chris Bates said of the team's five possessions in that period, the first four ended in turnovers. “We didn't feel like we were firing on all cylinders,” he said Monday.

Alex Aust recorded a career-high 10 points Wednesday, including a school-record six assists, as No. 5 Maryland beat host Princeton, 15-9. Aust led Maryland (12-3) in goals with four and was backed up by a trio of hat tricks from Katie Schwarzmann , Kelly McPartland and Kristy Black . Brooke Griffin had four points on a goal and three assists. The Tigers fell to 6-5. Maryland erased an early 3-1 deficit with an 11-0 run that capped the first half and began the second.

These teams rank second and third in Division I in national championships with Johns Hopkins winning nine and Princeton six. The Blue Jays have dominated this series, winning 55 of 82 contests. Prior to Johns Hopkins' 10-8 win last year, however, the Tigers had won three consecutive games. No. 14 Princeton opened the season last Saturday with a 10-7 victory over Hofstra that featured the debut of four freshmen in the starting lineup. The offense is headlined by junior midfielder Tom Schreiber and senior attackman Jeff Froccaro.

The Tewaaraton Foundation announced Thursday morning the five finalists for the Tewaaraton Award, and the list is generally solid. Albany sophomore attackman Lyle Thompson and Cornell fifth-year senior attackman Rob Pannell headline the list. Thompson, the first Native American (Onondaga Nation) to be named a finalist, leads Division I in points (108) and assists (62) this season. The America East Player of the Year, Thompson is seven points away from passing former UMBC attackman Steve Marohl for the most points in a single season in NCAA history.

No. 14 Yale broke a 6-6 tie with five straight goals in the third quarter to defeat No. 12 Princeton, 12-8, in the Ivy League men's lacrosse tournament championship Sunday afternoon at Cornell. The Bulldogs (11-4) beat the Tigers (9-6) in the title game for the second straight year and earned the automatic bid to the NCAA tournament field of 16. Nine Bulldogs scored in the contest. Yale's Dylan Levings, who won 19 of 23 faceoffs, was named the tournament's Most Outstanding Player.

The Towson men's lacrosse team (10-7) withstood a rally from No. 9 host Penn State (12-4) to win, 11-10, and claim its first Colonial Athletic Association title since 2005 on Friday. The victory gave the Tigers the conference's automatic bid into the NCAA tournament. The Nittany Lions (12-4) outscored Towson 4-3 in the fourth quarter as it tried to rally from an 8-6 deficit. The game was tightly contested until late in the second quarter and into the third, when the Tigers (10-7)

Princeton's Erin McMunn, a Winters Mill graduate, was named Ivy League Attacker of the Year and teammate Sarah Lloyd, a Severna Park graduate, made first team when the conference's postseason awards were announced Wednesday. McMunn was the Ivy League Rookie of the Year last season and is the first Ivy League women's lacrosse player to win one of the top position awards the year following her rookie selection. She is also only the second sophomore in conference history to win one of the major awards.

Caroline Franke (Severn) matched a career high of 13 saves to anchor the defense as host No. 13 Princeton defeated No. 6 Penn State, 14-8, at Sherrerd Field at Class of 1952 Stadium. Offensively, Sam Ellis had a career game with four goals and two assists. Erin McMunn (Winters Mill) also had a six-point game with three goals and three assists. Jaci Gassaway (Severna Park) reached a milestone, scoring her 100th career goal. The Tigers (10-5) started with a 4-0 run, of which Ellis had two. Princeton would never relinquish the lead and led by as many as six goals.

No. 11 Syracuse scored six unanswered goals in the fourth quarter to down No. 3 Notre Dame, 10-4, in the Konica Minolta Big City Classic on Saturday at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J. After leading 3-1 at halftime, the Fighting Irish (10-3, 4-2 Big East Conference) were held to three shots on goal in the second half as the Orange (11-3, 5-1) put the game out of reach. No. 5 Cornell 17, No. 12 Princeton 11: The Big Red (12-2, 6-0 Ivy League) took a 9-3 first-half lead and held off the Tigers (8-5, 3-3)

Princeton's comeback tour got off to a good start last Saturday as the Tigers defeated Hofstra, 12-6. It was a resounding beginning for a program that had lost five players to season-ending injuries and had 15 players deal with various aches and pains en route to a 4-8 overall record and a 2-4 Ivy League mark last season. “There's a lot of pride in this program, and I think we all recognized that as we were going through a very unique set of circumstances last year,” coach Chris Bates said Tuesday morning.

Steele Stanwick (Loyola High) fed fellow senior attackman Chris Bocklet for a fourth-quarter goal that proved to be the difference as No. 5 seed Virginia outlasted visiting Princeton, 6-5, Sunday afternoon in NCAA tournament first-round game. The six goals were the fewest the Cavaliers (12-3) had ever scored in an NCAA tournament win, and the 11 total goals tied for the fifth-fewest ever in a tournament game. Bocklet and senior midfielder Colin Briggs led Virginia with two goals apiece, while Stanwick - one of five finalists for the Tewaaraton Award, given to the top college player - added an assist.

Shannon Mangini scored her third goal of the game with 2:16 left in overtime to give host Pennsylvania a 10-9 win over No. 13 Princeton and clinch at least a share of a seventh consecutive Ivy League women's lacrosse championship on Wednesday. The Quakers (8-4, 6-0 Ivy League), who earned the right to host the league tournament, did not lead until there was 21:29 to play in the game, and led again only after Mangini's winning goal. The game never featured a lead of more than two goals and was tied five times.