Cornell 3 RIT 5

The football team won. Autumn dominance beckons.

RIT 212
Cor 021

Starting Lineup

G - 33 Andy Iles
D - 6 Nick D'Agostino
D - 19 Sean Whitney
F - 26 John Esposito
F - 12 Sean Collins
F - 22 Joe Devin

The other day I was wondering when was the last time we won a fall Ivy title. The Ivy League site is undergoing an overhaul and I gave up looking rather quickly.

I dont know if this was the most recent but Women's volleyball won 3 straight years 2004-6, those used to be the only recent banners in Newman a few years ago

nyc94
The other day I was wondering when was the last time we won a fall Ivy title. The Ivy League site is undergoing an overhaul and I gave up looking rather quickly.

2006 - Volleyball and Sprint football (not exactly Ivy, but close enough for me)

Sloppy looking first period.

Nearly everything about this team was sloppy. Absolutely ghoulish performance this weekend.

Loved watching UNH and RIT...the game's all about speed and skating. They've got it & they do it.

Few other tidbits: It took Cornell 6 games last year to surrender 12 goals. Cornell gave up 12 goals on 54 shots. RIT senior goalie, Jan Ropponen picked up his first career win.

Two empty netters, though. If that helps.

Thanks, but not in the least.

Wanted: defensive

I don't have that much time to comment, but, as mentioned before, defense definitely needs work. It could simply be that it's a new season and these guys didn't have enough chances to play with each other on different shifts. However, our team was definitely less physical in the defensive zone than they were last year and RIT used a lot of aggressive stickwork. There were plenty of questionable crosschecks on their end that were not called, which had a major effect on puck control in our zone and resulted in some unnecessary goals. The other goals Iles gave up were breakaways, and one slipped under his leg. After watching both games this weekend, neither starting goalie is particular impressive in my opinion, although the crowd loves Iles.

Oh ya, there was this new "sexy... sexy..." chant whenever Iles lifted his helmet for water. Kind of weird considering most of the chanting came from guys.

Kind of interesting that for a few years the talk was all that Schafer can't win it all with his defensive system. Now that it's all offense we wonder where the defense went.

Jim Hyla
Kind of interesting that for a few years the talk was all that Schafer can't win it all with his defensive system. Now that it's all offense we wonder where the defense went.

I feel like we can't qualify this as an "all offense" when players can barely connect on passes or know where to correctly position themselves around the goal. Players also need to do more deking drills and learn how to handle stick harassment from smaller players. On defense, you can get away with this by checking your opponents really hard (which played to the advantage of our size) but if you're carrying the puck down the offensive zone, that same strategy obviously doesn't work when the focus is more control. By shifting the emphasis to more offense, Schafer needs to rely on a new defensive strategy and more time to perfect some offensive plays. Right now, none of that seems to be put together.

Assuming this is a fundamental shift in the style of hockey (still just an assumption) there is no reason to believe that the transition will be smooth or easy. Most of the team will have been recruited for and mastered the "Schafer System" of defense first last and always hockey. Making the change will take time and will not be pretty and not everyone will adapt well.

I will give Mike credit for trying to adapt (if that is what is going on). Over the last few years we have been vulnerable to teams that can skate and handle the puck well. Yale for instance has our number. If the game is becoming faster and placing a premium on passing and puck handling we will need to evolve our style of play in order to maintain our place in the college hockey pantheon.

It could be that the team looks more offensively aggressive and defensively lax early in the year before they have their assignments down. As they get more proficient, the defense tightens up and the offense is less all over the place, and the result is a more conservative (but effective) style.

Prague Springs are fun but they don't end well.

I think we're in for a loooooooong season. Hope I'm wrong.

I'm not sure if what we're seeing qualifies as a "fundamental" shift, but the style of play has unquestionably changed in the past four games as compared to last year. It will be interesting to see how Schafer adapts after the losses this past weekend.

On the other hand, if this is indeed "fundamental," I hope Schafer will give it a couple more games before giving up on it. It's new to the team, as well as coach himself, so writing off on a new strategy so soon would not be very prudent.

Kyle Rose
I think we're in for a loooooooong season. Hope I'm wrong.

Actually, I hope you're right, if you catch my drift.

It will be a season-long struggle to find their spot somewhere between 4th and 9th, with lots of ups and downs -- the season half the teams in the conference have each year. We've been very fortunate to have been above the fray for so long and to have every reason to believe that we will be again someday. For now, it's going to be a dogfight every shift, and that should be exciting rather than disheartening. Essentially, we will watch a best-of-22 playoff series.

While in past year's we tended to know what we've had from the get-go, I for one and looking forward to seeing how this particular team develops over the course of the season. I think we'll have a chance to see the coaching staff work wonders with a very raw product.

I hope all you optimists are correct. For me, I'm disheartened rather than excited. I still firmly believe we need excellent defense to compete with the big boys. Maybe Yale will prove me wrong, but I think a high powered offense can win in the ECAC, but once you get to the NCAAs, everyone has a high powered offense, and they all have better offensive players than we will ever have. Do you think that if Yale faces UND and BC in the NCAAs again, that they have a good chance to beat them with no defense. I don't.

Jim Hyla
I hope all you optimists are correct. For me, I'm disheartened rather than excited. I still firmly believe we need excellent defense to compete with the big boys. Maybe Yale will prove me wrong, but I think a high powered offense can win in the ECAC, but once you get to the NCAAs, everyone has a high powered offense, and they all have better offensive players than we will ever have. Do you think that if Yale faces UND and BC in the NCAAs again, that they have a good chance to beat them with no defense. I don't.

If it makes you feel any better, Jim, I seem to remember this exact conversation from 4 years ago.

Cornell got bounced from the NCAAs after scoring something like 3 goals in 9 periods of hockey. The sense of pride over hanging with Wisconsin into 3 OTs was eventually replaced by people wondering if Schafer's defense-first system can win in the NCAAs with the new direction of college hockey (never mind that a nearly identical but generally more talented Wisconsin team just won the whole thing).

The following year, Cornell lost some defensive talent and a large chunk of what little offensive firepower the team could claim. Schafer said something about changing recruiting strategies a little bit, but he never claimed to be shifting to an up-tempo style. A few bright young freshmen with good skating skills, some offensive ability and questionable defensive zone responsibility joined the team. For part of that season Cornell's team defense was not all that good and the forwards were carrying the puck more and trying to be creative through the neutral zone. Fans, of course, thought Schafer's comments + the appearance of guys like Tony Romano and the approach they brought to the game meant the end of the defense + puck possession approach of the past 12 years. It didn't happen - 2 years later Cornell was still playing the same defense-first system, and still running an offense predicated on puck possession in the cycle. Oh yeah, and they were back in the NCAA tournament.

I haven't seen this team play, so maybe there really is something different about the system, but my guess is anything resembling a new style of play is a combination of new players, a young team and fans seeing whatever they want to see when they watch hockey. My memory of the 06/07 and 07/08 squads is of two teams that were frequently caught out of position in the defensive zone and usually had a hard time moving the puck or establishing a cycle in the offensive end. They showed some signs, but for the most part they just weren't up to the high standards of the early part of the decade. This was partly due to a few key early departures, but a lot of it had to do with having young teams that were still figuring stuff out. It happens.


I predict the following, assuming Cornell doesn't suffer a big run of injuries or defections to the pros:

1) Cornell will have a rough season or two while the new players learn the defensive system. It should still be better than average in the ECAC, but don't expect any titles or NCAA appearances.

2) You'll see the same emphasis on defense and puck possession that you've seen for the last 15 years, although the next couple of seasons will be characterized by painful breakdowns and (hopefully) occasional flashes of brilliance. Within 2 years the teams will actually be able to execute the system effectively, and the results will turn in Cornell's favor.

3) If the optimism on this thread is justified, Cornell will have a bit more offensive creativity and better goal scorers up front. In the grand scheme of things this won't amount to much because they will not be as good as the guys who go to BC and Minnesota, and honestly will not be much better offensively than what we've seen over the last 10 years. I think that's ok, because the defense and forechecking will be superior and hopefully the puck movement will be there, but I'm sure people will bitch and moan when Cornell is "only" in the hunt for the ECAC title and in the NCAAs with a decent shot at the Frozen Four.

In addition to agreeing with Tom Lento, I want to write that I don't perceive a shift in Cornell's fundamental strategies. As a result of defensive breakdowns (which tend to happen frequently with young teams), Cornell fell behind in both games last weekend. Playing from behind forced Cornell to open things up and take chances. Cornell never had a lead to protect last weekend.

I expect that the players will execute better in the near future, and we'll see plenty of the 2-1 games that we were anticipating when the season began.

Tom said it extremely well. The only thing I would add is a truly exceptional goaltender can salve growing pains and amplify fat years. Maybe we have one in Garman and/or Iles. We'll see.