Liza Kaufman, Contributing Photographer

The Yale football team (6–3, 3–3 Ivy) sent their home crowd into the offseason on a high note this Saturday, defeating the Princeton Tigers (2–7, 1–5 Ivy) with a score of 42-28. 

The name of the game for the Bulldogs was a powerful rushing attack that chewed up yards all day, led by running back Josh Pitsenberger ’26. Pitsenberger set a carry high of 159 rushing yards on 25 carries against the Tigers. The junior also scored three separate times, twice on the running touchdown and once on a short catch and run. 

Pitsenberger has made it a habit to terrorize the Tigers in his three years at Yale, going over 100 yards in each of the three games he has played against Princeton. In addition to his yardage, he also has a nose for the endzone when he sees the orange jerseys, scoring three touchdowns against the Tigers in 2023 and adding another in 2022. 

Adding on to Pitsenberger’s ground attack was the other man in the Yale backfield, quarterback Grant Jordan ’25. Jordan set a career rushing high of his own with 60 yards, critical on a day during which he only threw for 140 yards.

With the ground game churning out yards, Yale was happy to try to win an ugly game, something head coach Tony Reno commented on postgame.

“I was proud of my team for winning a rock fight,” Reno told Yale Athletics. “We knew we were going to be in the middle of a rock fight. We welcome it. We’re pretty good in rock fights.”

Helping the effort was a Yale pass rush that found its way home to the quarterback five times, a season high. Led by Tamatoa McDonough ’25 and his 2.5 sacks, the defense never let Princeton’s quarterback Blaine Hipa get comfortable, forcing him to get rid of the ball quickly.

Elsewhere in the Ivy League, Yale was being set up to play spoiler in their final game of the season next weekend against Harvard. Following a last-second field goal that gave Harvard a win over Penn, the Crimson claimed at least a share of the Ivy title.

That means that despite being out of championship contention, Yale still plays a massive part in deciding how the final standings will look. With the Crimson sitting atop the Ivy standings at 5–1, a pair of 4–2 teams, Dartmouth and Columbia, will be looking to the Bulldogs to help prevent Harvard from winning the championship alone. 

Harvard has not been the sole champion of the Ivy League since 2014, a feat the Bulldogs completed as recently as 2022.