ELynah Forum

What would the t-shirt say for the UAH Baby Crimson?  Perhaps "As Shocked To Be Here As You Are To See Us" would fit?

I think the last thing we want to do is look past UNH to a potential second-round matchup with Denver.  

Although we looked very good when we won at their place in January, UNH was coming off a long break, so there must have been some rust.  The long 6 X 6 shift in their zone was very impressive for us, but the UNH coach highlighted it after the game and is no doubt reminding his players about it now.  As if being in the NCAA tournament isn't motivation enough, UNH has some real incentive to play well against us to show they're a better team than the one we saw earlier.  Also, they did win the Hockey East regular-season title this year, an impressive result in any season.  And they've had an extra week off to rest and prepare.  

We have the experience of having played them this year, so we know their team.  And this time the teams will skate in a regular-sized rink which would seem to be to our advantage as well.  Plus they took us out of the NCAA tournament in 2002 and 2003, so we also have some motivation.  

This seems like it will be a very tough first-round game, and we'll need to play well to win.  Unfortunately we are not in the same position as Miami; the Red Hawks can probably safely look past the baby Crimson to their regional-final game.  We cannot.  This may not be UNH's best NCAA tournament team in recent years, but the baby Crimson they are not.

With last weekend's win against Hofstra, Cornell advances to the quarterfinal round of the NCAA tournament for the fifth time since 2002--not bad at all, and a sign of how much things have improved following a down period in the 90's.

There was a great run in the late 80's driven by Tim Goldstein and a high-octane offense that was built around him.  The 1987 team was undefeated and made it to the championship game at Rutgers thanks to a thrilling 18-15 semifinal win over Syracuse (we beat them in the Dome that year 19-6).  We lost by a goal in the title game (the team looked tired and tight) to a Dave Pietramala-led Hopkins squad.  Goldstein had 100 points that year including 73 assists.  

The next year, we sqeaked into the tournament with a .500 record (SOS? RPI? Was Richie on the selection committee?) and advanced to the quarterfinals against Carolina.  Carolina was coming off three national titles already in the 80's and had yet to lose a playoff game at home.  Nobody seemed to give us much of a chance.  I went to Chapel Hill for the game (that's the last time I have been able to see Cornell play live), and I remember it was a very hot day at Fetzer Field.  Schimoler stood on his head (27 saves?), and we won 6-4.  In the semifinals, we blew out Virginia 17-6 before losing to Syracuse and the Gaits 13-8 in the final.  

Then came the lost decade of the 90's, with only one tourament appearance: a 1995 first-round loss to Brown.  

Pietrama got the team back to the tournament in 2000, but we lost to the G-men in the first round.  After Tambroni took over, the 2002 team easily beat Stony Brook in the opening round before losing a heartbreaker to 'Ole Virginny in the quarterfinals 11-10 on a last-minute goal by John Christmas.  In 2004 we lost the quarterfinal game at home to Navy 6-5.  McMonagle played a great game, and a star was born.  Navy went on to make it to the final but lost to Syracuse.  

In 2005 we lost to the Duke Dukes in the quarterfinal game 11-8.  It was close at the half, but Duke pulled away in the third quarter before we put up some goals later in the game to make the score more respectable.  

The 2006 first-round loss to UMass was a great disappointment (to me more so than last year's first-round performance vs. the Ohio State States), because that '06 team seemed to have the potential to make a real push for the finals (Virginia, clearly the best team in 2006, was in the other bracket).  Our only losses during the season were at Penn 8-6 and at home against 'Cuse 12-11.  But we couldn't seem to win a faceoff against UMass and lost by one.  UMass went all the way to the title game before losing to 'Ole Virginny.  

For this week's game against Princeton, I don't think we can count on controlling faceoffs and dominating possession like we did at Schoellkopf last month.  We need to move the ball a lot on offense and do a better job of finishing our inside chances than we did against Hofstra; hopefully Hurley can return to earlier-season form.  We will also need decent goaltending to support what I hope will be another solid effort by our close defense.  Does anyone know the latest on Moyer?  Princeton will be motivated in light of their last game against us, and their midfielders lit up UMass last week.

As Al says, flipping the outcomes on our games with Brown and Duke does nothing to our RPI and SOS.  So, there we have it: who you play means more than whether you actually win or lose those games.  Assuming a team can finish the season above .500 (um, "can do" with the right padding in the schedule ::innocent:, then ACC teams and certain other indepedents are always going to have the advantage when it comes to tourament admission and seeding.  

I'm not sure if there's enough time to pull this off, but we may want to try to cram in a quick two-game set this week against the Dukes in Durham (we are, of course, used to travelling there and know it well).  Whatever happens in the games won't matter, and we will move up the seeding charts come Sunday.

It's a big disappointment to lose this game and with it the chance at the outright Ivy title.  Brown is a good team with a very solid defense and a great goaler.  And they had plenty of motivation going into the contest (chance to win the league, our high ranking, senior day, opportunity to battle back into the NCAA tournament picture, etc.).  Still, with our talent on offense, I was hoping we could prevail in a close one.  

As it relates to our NCAA tournament seeding, it didn't seem that our position was particularly good even before this game.  That's because of the strange system used to seed the tournament.  In a hypothetical seeding presented last week on one of the lacrosse websites, they had us at a seven seed, well behind both Princeton and the Duke Dukes.  I have never understood how the "committee" can ignore head-to-head results, but that's exactly what they do (just ask our 07 team).  As a result, both the Princes and the Dukes, two teams we beat this year, are almost certain to have much better seedings than us.  

Here's the bottom line: even if Brown beats the Princes next week and wins the league (and autobid), we still should be able to make it to the NCAA tournament.  However, look for our seeding to be barely inside the top eight with a Princeton win and somewhere in the unseeded logpile with a Brown win.  

Remember, when the "committee" looks at seeding, it's all comes down to who you played, not how you did against those teams when you played them.

Solid win by the Big Red in New Haven.  It was close at the half, but we took control part way through the third and never looked back.  And Germ is right: it's great to be coming home for the next two tilts.

Overall, a great week for the team.  First, we take out the Duke Dukes in Durham for the third straight time (this time we held them to six goals--even less than the seven-goal average from 2006 and 2007 when the Dukes had such a great offense).  Then there's yesterday's win at Yale.  Nice to see Harer building on his great game on Tuesday.  

The Dukes took out the G-men yesterday, so the Hoyas are going to be struggling to get a bid this year.

With the outstanding win against the Duke Dukes on Tuesday, this game gives us a chance to build some momentum as the team heads into the Ivy League part of the schedule.  Yale knocked off the Penn Penns 14-13 in a recent game; that was a big improvement for the Yales after getting waxed in a couple of games prior to that.  

Last year, it took a 9-8 OT cliffhanger to get past Yale at home, while we ran them right out of their yard the previous season.  I hope we can build on our big improvement in goaler play on Tuesday while continuing with our attack's performance (they're stepping up in the big games this year--a real improvement over '08) and gelling further on what seems to be a solid defensive team.

It's definitely a big game for us, and I hope that we can get some support in two key areas:

1.  Our goaler needs to have a solid day.
2.  We need to avoid the type of extendo-scoring-drought crisis that has plagued us in certain games.  

I believe that the Dukes' goaler is saving at a 46% clip--not particularly impressive.  We need to pepper him with good shots early and try to establish our offense in the first half.

Despite graduating all those big-name players, Duke remains a very strong team, and they are a much different team now than in the loss to the Harvs earlier.

Nice to get the solid win at home.  Even with the bad weather and weak opponent, the offense must have been clicking nicely to build a 9-1 halftime lead.  Of course the Griffiths are not much of a test, but we handled them better than the Princes did (Canisius was ahead in that game 3-2 at the half).  

Now it's back to Durham--again--to face the Duke Dukes.  We've had two very big wins down there recently: 11-7 in '06 and 7-6 in '07.  Strong defense was a key in those two contests.  And in both cases, we rode good second-half performances to victory.  Given the character of this year's team and our results to-date, I'm hoping for two things next Tuesday: (1) at least decent goaltending and (2) no prolonged scoring droughts.  If we can combine that with the stengths we've shown so far, we should have a solid chance.

Germ is probably right.  If I had to pick just one area to shore up at this point, it would be the goaler position.  Too bad our key recruit from Ithaca H.S. doesn't hit campus until next fall.  

Depending on how the game goes, maybe our other goalers will get a chance to play against Canisius.  The Griffifths are 0-2, with a 15-11 loss to the 'Gate Men and a 14-6 loss to the Princes.  I think Canisius was up 3-2 at halftime against the Princes before the wheels came off.

Pannell, by the way, is quietly leading the nation in points per game (5.3) and assists per game (3.3).

While it's disappointing to lose the game, there are some positives to take away from it:

1.  Pannell is the real deal.  Two goals and four assists against Ole Virginny and at their yard--especially given that he's a freshman and this is only his third game--is very impressive.  He also piled up some points against Bingo and would have had more against the Arms had we been able to finish more effectively.  

2.  Moyer did a great job on Glading--one of the best attackmen around.  I think Glading ended up with one assist.  Again, very impressive.  Overall, our defensive work against their attack looked good.  Other than Steele Stanwick (That name sounds familiar--does that guy have his own TV mini-series?), nobody else on their attack line did much in the scoring chart.  

3.  Despite giving up a potential confidence-deflating goal just a few seconds in the game, we kept our composure and were actually ahead at halftime.  

4.  Hurley continues to look strong this year.  And it's encouraging to see him step up in a big game like this one.  His scoring dropped off a lot last year against the tougher competition.    

On the other hand, there were some problems.  

1. Goaltending looked weak.  Ole Virginny only put 18 shots on goal, and 14 went in.  

2. Clearing, normally a Cornell strength, looked ghastly in the third quarter.  The game seemed to turn during this quarter.  

3.  Face offs didn't go our way in the second half, especially in the fourth quarter when we were 0-7.  

4.  They are obviously a deeper an more-experienced team than us.  While we controlled their attack well, we couldn't shut down the midfield, and their midfielders seemed to bury the shots they got.  We didn't seem to have the horses to run with them in the second half.  

I don't think you can expect to save less than a quarter of the opposition's shots, clear poorly and lose 11 of 13 faceoffs in a half against anyone and still be in the game no matter who you play.  In this case, despite doing all that, we still managed to make the score respectable against a very good team.  With at least decent goaltending and faceoffs in the second half, who knows?  This one may have been  different.

On to the Silver Giffiths on Tuesday.

It seems that every game we play at Army is very tough.  Even the '07 freight-train team just barely got out of West Point with a low-scoring win.  I believe that was close to our lowest offensive output that year.

I didn't get to see the game, but from all I've heard it sounds like Army's goaler stood on his head.  When is the last time a D-1 goaler recorded double-digit saves in one quarter?  On the other hand, maybe we didn't take advantage of the chances we had?

Next week's competition at 'Ole Virginny is at a higher level altogether.  We can't afford to not finish many doorstep shots, if we want to be competitive in that one.  

Glad to hear that the G-men dropped a loud clanger to St. John's.  Perhaps the Hoyas don't quite deserve all the hype and love heaped on them after the Maryland game.

I didn't get to see the game.  If you take a look at the general stats (without seeing the score), you would expect that we won the game.  What the hell happened?  

Being down 11-2 at halftime in a home playoff game is downright ghastly.  I know Ohio State is good, but I didn't think they were that good.  And I know we can play poorly at times, but we're not that bad.  

If you look back at the last several years, there have been very few if any games in which we haven't even been competitive.  I thought we seemed to be finally coming together a bit after the Brown and Hobart games.  I guess not.  Today's game was a real clanger.      

On the bright side, what a game by Glynn: 13 of 19 faceoffs along with two goals and two assists.  There's one guy at least that showed up.  And, all in all, a good year in light of our experience and skill levels.  We seemed to be clearly outmanned in the Syracuse, Carolina and Ohio State games this year, so there is plenty to work on for 2009.  We badly need help in the goaltending department; that's the key place to start.  And some fundamentals on offense also need work: off-ball movement; passing accuracy; not relying on Glynn and Siebald too much; etc.

Let's hope we can build on this for a better 2009.

I can't complain much about this year's bracket.  We had a good--but not outstanding--year, and for our efforts we get a home game in the first round against Ohio State.  And if we can win that one, we're looking at another home game in the quarter-final round.  Do any other teams have a realistic shot at consecutive home games in the first two rounds?  

If we beat the Buckeyes, our second-round opponent is--unfortunately-- likely to be Duke, a scary team that has completely dismantled virtually every team they've played this year.  One good thing is that we've seen that team four times since 2005, so at least we're familiar with them and their style of play.

Hillel is right: Duke didn't get much of a reward for their season.  And how about the G-men?  They were the only team to beat Duke.  And they beat Navy, but Navy gets in.

Probably not.  Head-to-head competition matters not in the formula used by the committee.  Just ask Georgetown; I'm not a big fan of the G-men, but I can't understand how a team like Denver would get in, while the G-men will sit at home.