Quaker Meeting House (QMH) has a comic strip up in the QMH offices.
 
It's a Peanuts comic strip from a Sunday long, long ago. In the strip, Linus is watching TV and he is amazed by something. He then goes outside, sees Charlie Brown, and launches into a long recap of what he had just seen—in his mind, quite possibly the most amazing finish to a football game.
 
After describing the winning play, Linus says, "people were jumping up and down, and when they kicked the extra point, thousands of people ran onto the field laughing and screaming! The fans and the players were so happy they were rolling on the ground and hugging each other and dancing and everything! It was fantastic!"
 
Charlie Brown—who himself is holding a football—doesn't betray a hint of emotion throughout the telling of this story. When Linus is finally done, in the comic's final panel, Charlie Brown looks at him and says, "how did the other team feel?"
 
QMH remembers the first time he saw that strip, it hit him like a bolt of lightning. After all, this is life when you work in college athletics. There are two sides to every game.
 
QMH has gone back to that comic strip several times these last few days, after the QMH staff made the short trip up to Princeton on Saturday to witness what might be described as a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
 
Of course, it wasn't if you're a Princeton fan. In that case, you could have witnessed the following:
 
*Your field hockey team entering the day with a chance to share the Ivy League title and doing their part by winning a one-goal game. That gave the Tigers second place in the Ivy standings and set them up to host the first two rounds of the NCAA Championship
 
*Your football team taking command of the Ivy League title chase with a win in what had been billed as the biggest Ivy football game in nearly 20 years
 
*Your men's soccer team keeping hold of first place in the Ivy standings with a dramatic overtime win, showing grit and resilience after giving up a tying goal late in regulation.
 
*Your women's soccer team knocking off the top team in the Ivies to clinch a share of the Ivy title with their opponent and also snatching the league's NCAA Championship automatic bid from their opponent in the process.
 
Pretty good day, right?
 
Well, yeah, sure. Except that QMH works at Penn, which was Princeton's victim in field hockey, men's soccer and (most gut-wrenching of all) women's soccer. QMH also is a Dartmouth alum, and it was the Big Green who fell to the Tigers in football on Saturday.
 
The QMH staff witnessed at least part of all four games. To answer Charlie Brown's question: the other teams felt lousy.
 
This was a weird day. For decades now, of course, this was a true "jamboree weekend" with Princeton, as the football team would join their Quakers brothers and sisters in combat with the Tigers. However, the Ivy League football schedule changed this year, which for Penn meant a switching of Cornell and Princeton—the Big Red is now Week 8 on the schedule, while the Tigers are the season finale in Week 10.
 
So it was that football played in Ithaca on Friday night in a game that was broadcast nationally on ESPNU. Penn won the game, 20-7, to retain the Trustees' Cup in the 125th meeting between those programs.
 
That gave Saturday a different dynamic, but there are traditions in place when it comes to Princeton and so QMH convinced much of his staff that the trip should still be made. There was field hockey at noon, with both teams hoping to tie Harvard for the Ivy title. The Princeton-Dartmouth football game was at 1 p.m., and the QMH staff had credentials thanks to their counterparts at Old Nassau. The end of the football game would coincide with the start of the soccer doubleheader, the men at 4 and then the women at 7.
 
The field hockey game had championship ramifications in name only. Penn and Princeton could earn a share of the title with a win, yes, but only if it was coupled with a Harvard loss at home to Columbia. Even the most optimistic fan at Princeton's Bedford Field had to acknowledge that was unlikely. (That proved to be the case, Harvard going up 1-0 less than 10 minutes in on the way to a 6-0 whitewashing.)
 
That said, what a game the "Killer P's" played. Penn went in front when Alexa Schneck's hustle was rewarded with a goal, and then after the third-ranked Tigers tied it up Schneck made a great individual play to make it 2-1 at halftime. Princeton ended up scoring twice in the second half and took a 3-2 decision, but boy there was a lot to be proud of if you were a Penn fan.
 
From there, the QMH staff walked over to the football stadium where Princeton and Dartmouth were tied, 7-7, in the second quarter. In front of a hardy crowd at Princeton Stadium, the QMH staff saw the Big Green go ahead with a safety; miss a field goal; and then hold Princeton on a goal-line stand early in the fourth quarter. At that point, it was time to leave.
 
Men's soccer was already down 1-0 when the QMH staff arrived at the field. It looked like the Quakers were destined for a regulation loss—a rarity this season—but then Alex Touche knotted this up with less than seven minutes left and suddenly the team was headed to its 11th overtime game in 15 matches this season. Crazy, right? It appeared like Princeton had put this one away early in the first OT, but that goal was called back. Which made it doubly hard when the Tigers scored again and this time it counted.
 
That set the stage for women's soccer. Penn was in first place, knowing a win or tie gave them the Ivy title outright and the accompanying NCAA bid. A Princeton win would allow the Tigers to tie the Quakers for the title and give them the NCAA bid by virtue of the head-to-head victory. On paper, the edge probably went to Princeton: they were nationally ranked, and a lot of their players had big-game experience after last year's run to the NCAA quarterfinals. This was uncharted waters for the Penn players in that regard.
 
You know the rest. Princeton's Mimi Asom, the league's leading scorer and one of the Tigers' all-time leading goal scorers, got space around the half-hour mark and fired a shot that Kitty Qu couldn't reach, tucking it just inside the far post. It was a great play by a great player, and QMH could only tip his cap.
 
That gave Penn about an hour to make it up, and boy did they try. In particular, the final minute was bonkers: three Penn corner kicks and two shots that didn't quite make it to goal. Instead, the match ended with Princeton storming the field and unveiling a championship banner, and the Penn bench overrun by tears and consoling hugs.
 
It was a bitter and brutal way to end a tough day for the Penn folks on hand. But, again, QMH was so damn proud of what he had witnessed. The women had left it all out on the field. It was all you could ask for.
 
The only positives on Saturday came from the traditions kept. The QMH staff always does a meal at Conte's Pizza when the Quakers are in Princeton. Conte's is off the beaten path but certainly worth the price of admission, and it's well-known throughout the Ivy League fan base. So lunch came late—Conte's doesn't open until 4 on Saturdays, so the QMH staff left football after the third quarter and missed the first half of men's soccer—but it was tremendous. Then, following the women's soccer game, the QMH staff retired to Houlihan's in Lawrenceville for some dinner and drinks. QMH wouldn't go so far as to say the group drank away its sorrows; after all, there was still nearly an hour of driving ahead. But a few beers, some solid appetizers, good football on TV, and several funny stories recapping the day fortified the group.
 
Also, if you live in the Mid-Atlantic, you know that Saturday could not have been better weather-wise. It had the distinct feel of late fall, for sure, but the sun was out and you could go with your lighter jacket. A picture-perfect day to stand outside for several hours watching great college games.
 
So while Saturday was a tough day from a work perspective, from a personal standpoint it was pretty, pretty good.
 
QMH can't wait to do it again in two years.
 
***
 
QMH'S REQUIRED READING: It seems ironic that this would be the piece QMH picks this week, but he simply had to share this story that Dana O'Neil wrote about Princeton field hockey player Annabeth Donovan, former Tigers hockey player Tommy Davis, and how life can change in an instant in The Athletic. You can read it here. Donovan celebrated her Senior Day on Saturday, and having read the story QMH was thrilled to see her entire family out there supporting her. It's a story that puts a lot of things, college athletics included, into perspective.