Graduation Day Reflections

This is my final "column." Have appreciated the feedback over the last four years. As BillHoward said to me recently, "Now you get to join the long line of Cornell fans-now-alumni who thought one of the four years would include that magical NCAA trophy." I'm sure most if not all of you share in my sentiments.


Pardon the delay, but it often takes time to properly reflect on things. So is the case with Cornell hockey for better or for worse. When this gets published, it is likely I will have graduated Cornell, never to be a student spectator again. Fittingly, the commencement for the School of Industrial and Labor Relations, takes place in Lynah Rink. Fitting for me at least. Certainly my most profound experience while at Cornell took place within the confines of that sacred sporting venue that has housed Cornell hockey for several decades. It was probably the painfully mediocre season or underwhelming finish to it that made me delay my final thoughts but comments from readers motivated me to finally get on with it. I am not going to talk about the powerplay this time nor will I criticize on the leadership or coaching. Rather, I will do my best to articulate my thoughts and feelings for an institution within an institution.

I have always been very clear that winning is the most important thing. What winning does that is so great is that it makes one forget about the bad things and remember the good. That is probably what made my final hockey season at Cornell most difficult. It happened to be the team’s worst on the ice and in some ways off of it as well so the final taste in my mouth is not entirely positive. At the same time, perspective is needed to accurately and sufficiently reflect.

When I sit in Lynah for Commencement, I probably will not be spending much time thinking about my academic experiences even though they were certainly gratifying on many levels. I will probably do what I did prior to most games when I would sit in Section B with about a dozen others before any players would take the ice to warm up, look up at the banners. It is not the actual banners so much as it is the breathing past that hits you when you look up. I do not see ECAC Championship, I see 2005 or 1997. Winning is the best but it is the playing that ultimately matters. I have gone to Cornell hockey games my entire life. Most of the teams have been very good to the point where a measly game above .500 record is not satisfying as was the case this season. The hockey is only part of this institution, however. It does not require going to every single game to realize this, just one.

I do not actually remember my first game as I was only a couple years old at the time but when I think back, it all blends together. I think of standing and watching, feeling the crowd, feeling noise, feeling intensity not necessarily seeing victory or even seeing hockey. Hockey is something that often goes beyond just X’s and O’s especially at a place like Lynah. That was all I could think of in what turned out to be my final game as a student at Lynah against Quinnipiac when the team fell behind 1-0 in the first minute only to see Cornell storm back with two quick goals late in the period. They may have lost that game, but what I will remember is the crowd picking up the team in a way I had never really seen to give them the lead. Similar thoughts come to mind when reflecting on Mike Kennedy’s late go-ahead goal against Harvard all the way back in November. I will also think of the long road trips to places in the middle of nowhere, not necessarily the game that took place, but the feeling you have when you and about 50 others are in a dramatic minority.

Recently, I watched the classic Providence-Cornell game of 1979 where the Big Red rallied from what seemed to be an insurmountable 5-1 third period deficit to pull off a miraculous victory. I happened to be watching the game with the daughter of all-time leading scorer Lance Nethery. Seeing and hearing the raucous fans of yesteryear and recognizing almost everything they say and feel was a unique feeling to say the least. We are just part of an institution, large but intimate.

After the game, I checked my email and had a couple of notifications that two players had committed to Cornell for the coming season, Jordan Berk and Tyler Roeszler. I thought to myself, those names sound really familiar. As it turned out, I had just heard Berk and Roeszler called during that 1979 game, the fathers of the recent committed players. It is a fabric that goes well beyond any one person, be it a coach, player, or fan and that fabric is constantly enhancing itself in a variety of ways.

Certainly I will be attending a lot of Cornell hockey games but I will never be able to recapture the feeling of watching a game in Section B as a student. Still, I know that no matter where I am in the world no matter what I am doing, I will always be following Cornell hockey, staying a part of this meaningful institution,

This is one more hole Cornell hockey needs to fill for 2007-08. Thanks for the enthusiasm and for all the time you put in, Ari.

Now start paying off those student loans.

Ari, thanks for bridging the gap among young, medium, and not so young hockey-loving alumni. The years fly by and pretty soon you'll be staring at your 25th reunion upcoming and remembering which bottles of pills you need to take along. And then there's the 50th, and the beyond. I can see it now, your tombstone:

Ari Baum, 1985-2080
R.I.P. 
PM me for details

thanks ari, your columns were always a good read, and though I don't always agree with you, you always have a basis for your arguement and know your stuff.

best of luck in the futute...
if you happen to make a trip to the north country for some hockey in the future, let me know.

Thanks, as well. Now, what happens to the cowbell? I doubt we will soon have another undergrad who puts as much energy into supporting the team and its fans as you did. I'm glad I got to meet you.

Doug Weinberg (posts as Doug '08) was passed the cowbell duties during the 2nd intermission of the final game of the season.

Ari:

It's interesting that you finish your last column up by mentioning the generations of Cornell hockey players and the new sons of Cornell players who will join the team in the next couple of years. Cornell has a large number of legacy students, both atheletes and non-atheletes...there is something about having that connection. And of course there's the Cornell connection between you and me going back to when you were a little boy growing up in Ithaca.

Watching you at Lynah yesterday at the ILR Commendement ceremony, I was thinking about the first time you told me you wanted to attend Cornell. You were about three of four, sitting on my lap at Lynah watching Cornell hockey. You said that you wanted to be a hockey player and play for Cornell. I'm not sure what I told you that day, but as you grew up in Ithaca, you developed your passion for hockey and you kept "going to Cornell" as your number one priority.

Although at about 14, you figured out that you didn't have the talent needed to play hockey at a high level, your drove yourself to learn more and more about the game and it's nuances. You see the game of hockey differently than I do and differently than most. I guess that's part of the reason that you always want to win...you see a way to win even when the team may not.

And you drove yourself about going to Cornell. It was always there waiting in your future. There was that very odd trip we took out to Michigan and Wisconsin to look at two very fine universities with great academic programs when you were a high school junior. In both places, we visited the campus hockey rinks. You walked around, looked at their banners and stands, and just walked back out. I knew you would only attend either one very reluctantly. Your passion for college and for college hockey only had one calling...Cornell University.

The night you woke up the house when you read on-line that you were accepted into the Cornell ILR School will always be special to your Mother and me. You were so incredibly excited knowing that your hard work had paid off. And you were the consumate fan while at Cornell...not only with your passion during games, but with your writing and SlopeRadio show where I learned a lot about you as well what you were thinking about the game and the players.

And here you are just a quick four years later graduating from Cornell and joining the rest of us Cornell alumni and Cornell hockey fans who will remember many of the best times of our lives on the hill.

So welcome, my son, to the fraternity and sorority of Cornell Alumni Hockey Fans. You'll have your memories of your four years in Section "B" like many Cornell Alumni. You'll also have the memories from the many years before attending Cornell and hopefully many years in the future watching Cornell hockey. And who knows..one day maybe your children and/or the children of the current hockey team will return to attend Cornell.

Larry '72

It is truly impossible to replace someone like Ari. I think he only missed 7 games total in 4 years here as an undergrad. One of the many things that make lynah what it is is the fact that we the fans actually make a difference. Ari certainly did that… and then some. Not only did he create such an amazing camaraderie among the lynah faithful, but I think it is safe to say his passion seeped down onto the ice and was at times reflected in the Win-Loss record of games.

I have only been following Cornell Hockey since I got here, and am not nearly as knowledgeable as Ari and many of the eLynah regulars. As soon as I went to my first game as a freshman, that did it… I was hooked. I took special notice of the super-fan in Section B who was more fired up about the game than some of the players. I thought wow, this is awesome. This is what Cornell hockey is all about, people like that. This is what Cornell is all about… I knew right then it would be the best four years of my life. Soon I started going to road games, places like the Colgate, the North Country, Harvard, each trip was better than the next. I met so many amazing people and made friends young and old, not the least of which was Ari Baum.

I look forward to meeting those of you whom I haven’t already at road and home games alike, and contributing here as well. I don’t claim to be as well-informed as Ari, but I’ve missed only a handful of games and plan on being at all of them next year. If I can bring only a fraction of the passion, commitment, and energy that Ari did, I will consider my duties a success.

Congratulations Ari, good luck and best wishes.

Ari:

While I didn't know you as well as some here, I did get to see your energy and enthusiasm first hand in Green Bay last year (and join in of course). Clearly I can see that you're going to be one of those crazy alumni who will follow the team to Vladivostok. I think I know the type.

Good luck in the real world, and here's to the next time we meet at a rink somewhere - preferably at a frozen four.

Thanks for the memories.

Jeff JH

Ari,

Nice post.

Just in case you were worried, if you are at all like me then your passion for Big Red hockey will not wane. Quite the opposite. You will go to games and lament how the current students just don't cheer as loudly and passionately as you did (do).

Roy

Roy 82
You will go to games and lament how the current students just don't cheer as loudly and passionately as you did (do).

I'd say Ari's already been quite entitled to that lament for 4 years (if not longer!).

Good luck, Ari - thanks for your passion and devotion to the team, at the rink, on the road, online, and on the air!

Having two sons of my own and another boy or girl on the way, I hope that I write what Larry did to you Ari. I teared up just reading it. You helped make a displaced alum in UNH country almost see the game as if I was back in Section B during the wasted 1990-1994 seasons. Thank you Ari...

Ari, I've enjoyed your commentary immensely over the past few years. It was great to finally meet you at Union in 2006.

And if I can make it back to Ithaca for most of the home games as well as to half the away games (now 9 years out, as I pat myself on the back), so can you.

Kyle

Congratulations, Ari (and to Larry, of course, as well as all the other eLynah 2007 graduates and their families). Thanks for all your hard work.

Thanks to everyone. The last four years have been most interesting. Congratulations to all of our graduates and their families regardless of where they attended.

Larry '72

Ari,

Thanks your your insights. You have brought the team to life for some of us who are too far away for frequest campus visits.

Larry,

See you at Reunions.