New ECAC Playoff Format

This is actually picking up from another thread ("goalies" that had briefly drifted off its original topic...

Ok, the new format will have two rounds of best-of-3 with the top 4 teams getting a bye for the first round. So what is the timing for all of this? Does this mean that the ECAC playoffs will require another week and that the bye teams will be idle for the first weekend (which I would think would not be that desirable to the bye teams) or are they cramming in the additional round midweek with the second round happening on the first weekend just as the "quints" do now? That latter plan is terrible for the student part of the student-athlete since with travel the away teams could be missing up to 4 days of classes (won't/didn't the Ivy powers-that-be balk at this?). I fear that this new playoff format could undermine the Ivies' chances of increasing the cap on regular season games.

The extra best-of-three series will take place over the weekend, increasing the playoffs from two to three weekends. (Eliminating the week off between the NCAA Regionals and Frozen Four[TM] will create an extra week which was going to be used to give Harvard more Beanpot relief, but which will now accomodate the longer playoffs.)

> ...Beanpot relief...

So, in a way, the new format screws Harvard?

All of a sudden, I like this new format a lot more

Amen Bill.....

And does anybody else feel ill whenever someone mentions the Cleary(Sucks) Cup?

I think that we should continue to refer to the ECAC Championship, and ignore the hardware

ABSOLUTELY!!!

We have to call it the Cleary Cup because the ECAC Championship is the one associated with the Whitelaw Trophy. (Besides, "Clea-ry Tro-phy" makes a better chant.)

You'd think the ECAC tourny would have the "Ned Harkness Trophy."

That is the Everblades Holiday Tourney Trophy, yes?

It wouldn't be the first time he covered his bet.

So the bye teams are idle for a weekend. I'm inclined to think that the surviving non-bye teams would be better prepared for the second round. Barring injuries that would heal with an extra week's time, the bye week doesn't strike me as wholly positive for the bye team. Or am I attributing too much significance to the "rust" factor for a two week period?

There may be rust, but since it's a best of three it'll be less of a factor than if it were single elimination.

I'm sure the bye teams will do something during the weekend to keep their rhythym. Maybe Cornell should schedule red-white open practices at Lynah and invite the fans -- it could be a pep rally.

This brings up one of my favorite annoying sports themes. Will the team have too much "rust," or will they be "well-rested"? Does a team coming off a few wins "have momentum" or are they "due for a loss"? Are they "hungry" or will they "overlook their opponent"? And most important, do they have "bad personal hygiene"?

What was the name of that Chris Farley character, Lowell?

Matt Foley, who lives in a van down by the river.

What's the knock on Billy Cleary?

I thought Matt Foley, motivational speaker, and the quotes guy were different...maybe not.

You are right. The quote guy was Bennet Brauer.

Among other things, the very last games of Cleary's coaching career (before he stepped up to be Harvard's AD) were a QF series at Cornell in 1990. It's traditional not to shake hands after the first game of a two or three-game series, but after Cornell swept Harvard 2 games to 0, he marched his team off the ice without a handshake at the end of the series. He was very clearly upset to have been "robbed" of the remainder of his playoff run, especially less than a year after winning the national championship.

Just not very classy.

Beeeej

I don't remember that, and instead just recall the Big Red icers and some fans who climbed over the boards/glass celebrating on the ice, but perhaps after almost 12 years my memory is faulty.

But I submit that the Faithful's dislike of Cleary is mostly tied to his long and prideful association with, and promotion of, the hated Harvard hockey program. Much of it is a knee-jerk reaction due to the "rivalry", but in his later years Cleary made a good number of holier-than-thou remarks about the Cornell team and the fans (and he was a notoriously poor winner whenever Havard beat Cornell on the ice).

N.B. In the '85-'86 season, during an 11-3 loss to Harvard at Lynah, tri-captain Mike Schafer put a puck out of play, and it "just happened" to whiz right at Cleary on the bench. So perhaps the team felt similarly about the esteemed Harvard skipper.

Jeez... did ya hafta mention the score?!

Cleary was widely despised because:

1. He was always...for many of us...the personification of the "We are better than you because we are Hahvahd" (sucks) attitude.

2. His constant bellyaching to the refs during fish and chicken incidents at Lynah.

3. His frequent sore loser act

4. Stories that he denied permission for the Cornell Sports Network to televise Cornell/Hahvahd(sucks) games from Lynah East because he didnt want Hahvahd(sucks) alums seeing the game courtesy of Cornell (better that they cant see the game)

One of my favorite cheers was at the 1985 ECAC championships in the Boston Garden, after beating Clarkson in the Consolation game, a mostly Cornell/Clarkson crowd was watching the beginning of the RPI/Hahvahd(sucks) Final, and the crowd started to cheer "Fat" (pointing at RPI coach Mike Adessa (sp?), "Bald" (pointing at Cleary) "Fat...Bald...Fat...Bald"

That was a great cheer!

In Cleary's defense, he was probably the most outspoken and influential supporter of ECAC hockey that the league has ever seen.

He is the embodiment of the Bostoncentric school of hockey (the Beanpot is the be all and end all, give me Arlington Catholic over the Golden horseshoe anyday, the Boston Globe as the New York Times of college hockey, and all that xenophobic idiocy that seems to be bred in the bones of Bostonians), but it was also nice to have a guy with very sharp elbows fighting the ECAC (and Ivy) fight against the lunkheads from Michigan and Minnesota.

We don't have anybody with national stature supporting the league anymore (Tim Taylor is well into the early stages of senility, and though Joe Marsh is a fine human being nobody west of Appleton gives a damn what he has to say), and it shows.

Greg is 100% correct about Cleary. But didn't Marsh do a good job for the league back when he was on the NCAA selection commitee?