Cornell 4 Harvard 1, 1/24/26

[marty]

The weekly Casey:

What a weekend at Lynah Rink! We welcomed back so many former players and families to celebrate Alumni Weekend — and our guys delivered with two huge ECAC wins to make it even more special.

Friday Night vs. Dartmouth:
Friday's game was critical in the ECAC standings, and our team turned in one of its most complete games of the season. We outshot Dartmouth 31–16 and ultimately earned a 2–1 overtime victory. While it was disappointing not to finish the game in regulation given how well we played, our group stuck with our process and was rewarded with the win.

After a strong start, Dartmouth struck first at 8:49 of the opening period. Our team didn't flinch, continuing to push the pace and control the game. The second period was dominant, and we drew even while shorthanded when Jake Kraft tapped in a Jonny Castagna rebound. Moments later, Charlie Major nearly put us ahead with a breakaway on the same penalty kill — and if that one had gone in, the roof might have come off Lynah.

We generated some great looks on the power play but couldn't find the go-ahead goal until overtime. Winning the critical opening faceoff in OT proved pivotal, as Kraft broke free for another breakaway and buried the game-winner to seal an important conference victory.

Saturday Night vs. Harvard
Saturday brought another sold-out crowd with our long-time rival Harvard in the building, and all the traditions that make Lynah so special — including the annual fish toss before lineups. The energy was incredible from the start.

The only disappointment of the night came from the language used in some of the chants directed toward Harvard. We have one of the best environments in all of college hockey, and I truly believe our students can continue to make a huge impact without crossing that line. The atmosphere was unbelievable — and it can be just as electric with respect and pride leading the way.

The game itself was outstanding. After an evenly played first period, the team completely took over in the second. Jake Kraft opened the scoring at 11:27, followed by George Fegaras, who buried a rebound just 25 seconds later. Moments later, Charlie Major nearly extended the lead but was denied by a big save. Lynah was hopping!

Before the period was out, Aiden Long made it 3–0, and Jonny Castagna added one in the third to secure a 4–1 final. Alexis Cournoyer earned the start in both games and was rock-solid all weekend.

Looking Ahead: Road Warriors
We now hit the road for 7 of our next 8 games, starting with our trip this weekend to Yale and Brown. As we head into the stretch run of February, ECAC hockey continues to show incredible parity — and if you take a period or a night off, you'll lose. We'll be back to work this week, using last weekend as both a confidence boost and a measuring stick for what's ahead.

A huge thank-you to all our alumni who returned to celebrate our 1986 and 1996 ECAC Championship teams.

What a turnout, what a weekend, and what a reminder of what makes this program so special.

Let's Go Red!

Casey Jones '90

Jay R. Bloom '77 Head Coach of Men's Hockey
Cornell University

I'm going to guess the "language" was the "fuck you, Harvard" chants?

And here is an audio recap of the weekend,  "Between the Lines".

[TimV]

"AAAAAAHHHHHH  SEE YA, CRIMEBAG!!!!"  

[BearLover]

Correct me if I'm wrong but I only remember one "fuck you Harvard" chant. I agree that it was way too much during that playoff series a few years ago, and good ok Schaf for calling that out. But, plenty of our other chants use swear words too so I wouldn't be careful as a coach so as to not overstep and discourage chants when they are not excessive. It feels like sports have shifted into more and more of a soft environment recently, and I don't think we need that to continue. It's not just the chants too, over winter break my group was standing at the back of section B, making sure not to block anyone, and we got asked to sit down by the usher. Point is, you don't need to try to control every little thing that the crowd does, unless it gets truly excessive or repulsive.

There was an older woman in the back left of C a week or three ago during winter break who was upset that I (several rows in front of her way to the side above the tunnel) was standing up and kept signaling for me to sit down.

So I slouched a bit onto the rail but absolutely did not sit down.

Screw that.

But yeah if it came through on ESPN+... hahaha.

There were definitely two chants. One at the start, one at the end.

That is my one and only pet peeve-people who don't wait for stoppages in play to go up or down the stairs, or make a whole row stand up so they can get in or out

I'm all for the chants - it's tradition

"Fuck you Harvard" isn't really tradition, it's a crude and unoriginal chant that was never much of a thing until recently. I can sympathize with parents who don't want to take their kids to a game where half the arena is screaming the F-bomb. Not something I'm losing sleep over, but I get it. Agreed they shouldn't be policing the fans, but also this chant is kinda just lame. Also, Casey calling it out in an email that none of the students read is silly.

[scoop85]

Correct me if I'm wrong but I only remember one "fuck you Harvard" chant. I agree that it was way too much during that playoff series a few years ago, and good ok Schaf for calling that out. But, plenty of our other chants use swear words too so I wouldn't be careful as a coach so as to not overstep and discourage chants when they are not excessive. It feels like sports have shifted into more and more of a soft environment recently, and I don't think we need that to continue. It's not just the chants too, over winter break my group was standing at the back of section B, making sure not to block anyone, and we got asked to sit down by the usher. Point is, you don't need to try to control every little thing that the crowd does, unless it gets truly excessive or repulsive.

There was an older woman in the back left of C a week or three ago during winter break who was upset that I (several rows in front of her way to the side above the tunnel) was standing up and kept signaling for me to sit down.

So I slouched a bit onto the rail but absolutely did not sit down.

Screw that.

But yeah if it came through on ESPN+... hahaha.

There were definitely two chants. One at the start, one at the end.

That is my one and only pet peeve-people who don't wait for stoppages in play to go up or down the stairs, or make a whole row stand up so they can get in or out

I'm all for the chants - it's tradition

"Fuck you Harvard" isn't really tradition, it's a crude and unoriginal chant that was never much of a thing until recently. I can sympathize with parents who don't want to take their kids to a game where half the arena is screaming the F-bomb. Not something I'm losing sleep over, but I get it. Agreed they shouldn't be policing the fans, but also this chant is kinda just lame. Also, Casey calling it out in an email that none of the students read is silly.

I agree that I'm not particularly offended by the content of the chant, but rather the lame lack of creativity.

[imafrshmn]

They should do an earmuffs giveaway night for one of the low attendance games. This way we can satisfy the tchotchke collectors and the language sensitive fans

[Beeeej]

They should do an earmuffs giveaway night for one of the low attendance games. This way we can satisfy the tchotchke collectors and the language sensitive fans

Might backfire.

"I said, 'Fuck Hahvahd!!'"

[stereax]

I don't think I've laughed so hard at thread derailment in a WHILE. Love you all.

[Will]

Correct me if I'm wrong but I only remember one "fuck you Harvard" chant. I agree that it was way too much during that playoff series a few years ago, and good ok Schaf for calling that out. But, plenty of our other chants use swear words too so I wouldn't be careful as a coach so as to not overstep and discourage chants when they are not excessive. It feels like sports have shifted into more and more of a soft environment recently, and I don't think we need that to continue. It's not just the chants too, over winter break my group was standing at the back of section B, making sure not to block anyone, and we got asked to sit down by the usher. Point is, you don't need to try to control every little thing that the crowd does, unless it gets truly excessive or repulsive.

There was an older woman in the back left of C a week or three ago during winter break who was upset that I (several rows in front of her way to the side above the tunnel) was standing up and kept signaling for me to sit down.

So I slouched a bit onto the rail but absolutely did not sit down.

Screw that.

But yeah if it came through on ESPN+... hahaha.

There were definitely two chants. One at the start, one at the end.

That is my one and only pet peeve-people who don't wait for stoppages in play to go up or down the stairs, or make a whole row stand up so they can get in or out

I'm all for the chants - it's tradition

"Fuck you Harvard" isn't really tradition, it's a crude and unoriginal chant that was never much of a thing until recently. I can sympathize with parents who don't want to take their kids to a game where half the arena is screaming the F-bomb. Not something I'm losing sleep over, but I get it. Agreed they shouldn't be policing the fans, but also this chant is kinda just lame. Also, Casey calling it out in an email that none of the students read is silly.

I agree that I'm not particularly offended by the content of the chant, but rather the lame lack of creativity.

As a parent who regularly brings my 12 year old daughter to games, I agree that I'm bothered more by the chant being dumb than vulgar. (Of course, I've also been blessed with a child who has never really parroted bad language around her. I realize other parents may not be so lucky with their own children.)

[Jim Hyla]

Correct me if I'm wrong but I only remember one "fuck you Harvard" chant. I agree that it was way too much during that playoff series a few years ago, and good ok Schaf for calling that out. But, plenty of our other chants use swear words too so I wouldn't be careful as a coach so as to not overstep and discourage chants when they are not excessive. It feels like sports have shifted into more and more of a soft environment recently, and I don't think we need that to continue. It's not just the chants too, over winter break my group was standing at the back of section B, making sure not to block anyone, and we got asked to sit down by the usher. Point is, you don't need to try to control every little thing that the crowd does, unless it gets truly excessive or repulsive.

There was an older woman in the back left of C a week or three ago during winter break who was upset that I (several rows in front of her way to the side above the tunnel) was standing up and kept signaling for me to sit down.

So I slouched a bit onto the rail but absolutely did not sit down.

Screw that.

But yeah if it came through on ESPN+... hahaha.

There were definitely two chants. One at the start, one at the end.

That is my one and only pet peeve-people who don't wait for stoppages in play to go up or down the stairs, or make a whole row stand up so they can get in or out

I'm all for the chants - it's tradition

"Fuck you Harvard" isn't really tradition, it's a crude and unoriginal chant that was never much of a thing until recently. I can sympathize with parents who don't want to take their kids to a game where half the arena is screaming the F-bomb. Not something I'm losing sleep over, but I get it. Agreed they shouldn't be policing the fans, but also this chant is kinda just lame. Also, Casey calling it out in an email that none of the students read is silly.

I agree that I'm not particularly offended by the content of the chant, but rather the lame lack of creativity.

As a parent who regularly brings my 12 year old daughter to games, I agree that I'm bothered more by the chant being dumb than vulgar. (Of course, I've also been blessed with a child who has never really parroted bad language around her. I realize other parents may not be so lucky with their own children.)

Agree, what's the point of the chant. If anyone can tell me how it helps the team, I'm glad to listen.

If it doesn't help, and may bother some people, why do it.

As an aside, if you're standing in a student section and an "older" lady says to sit down, why not assume that this is her first game and explain to her that students stand. You can even give her my seat number L-12 23 and she can sit there.

[stereax]

As an aside, if you're standing in a student section and an "older" lady says to sit down, why not assume that this is her first game and explain to her that students stand. You can even give her my seat number L-12 23 and she can sit there.

This older lady (there were two of them, actually) was about... 5 rows behind me and in seats probably 2-3, in high C. Would've been a pain in the ass to get up there during the play and explain how Lynah works. Especially in intersession games, where it seems very few people stand and the block is mostly full of families with kids. (This was Alaska weekend, so one of those games where non-students could buy tickets in the ABCDE block.) I'm willing to give benefit of the doubt - and if it's someone directly behind me who isn't a student, I'm generally going to tell them at the beginning of the game that I'm standing and if that's a problem, to let me know, and I'll adjust if they do. But in this case, I'm far enough forward and to the side, and short enough as well, that I really shouldn't be blocking any sight lines... and if I am, I promise there are many empty seats directly nearby one could scoot over to.

[Jim Hyla]

As an aside, if you're standing in a student section and an "older" lady says to sit down, why not assume that this is her first game and explain to her that students stand. You can even give her my seat number L-12 23 and she can sit there.

This older lady (there were two of them, actually) was about... 5 rows behind me and in seats probably 2-3, in high C. Would've been a pain in the ass to get up there during the play and explain how Lynah works. Especially in intersession games, where it seems very few people stand and the block is mostly full of families with kids. (This was Alaska weekend, so one of those games where non-students could buy tickets in the ABCDE block.) I'm willing to give benefit of the doubt - and if it's someone directly behind me who isn't a student, I'm generally going to tell them at the beginning of the game that I'm standing and if that's a problem, to let me know, and I'll adjust if they do. But in this case, I'm far enough forward and to the side, and short enough as well, that I really shouldn't be blocking any sight lines... and if I am, I promise there are many empty seats directly nearby one could scoot over to.

So if it wasn't a student section, practically not literally, maybe many if not most were new fans.

All the more reason to not complain about them, especially if you want to increase attendance. I know it's not center ice, but maybe move to B if you don't want to talk to her/them?

My point, if you're trying to add fans, is to try and make it nicer for all. That's also why FU Harvard doesn't help.