Cornell @ Aints

[Dafatone]

To make things even worse, other than the penalties, there's no obvious reason for how bad the team's been, and there's no clear-cut help in sight!

The lack of discipline is a serious problem and can ruin any season (1987 comes to mind).  It's also one of those rare things that is entirely within the control of the team.

The inability to protect a third period lead which marred last season has also been killing us.  It's gotten to where when we blow a late lead it's disappointing... but hardly surprising.  Since this is a holdover from last year the "good" news it isn't some sudden mystery illness besetting us because somebody stole a Polynesian idol over break.  The bad news, of course, is it's unlikely to change -- there is a fundamental deficiency in the way this mix of players, particularly the upperclassmen, play with a lead.  It will probably not end until time changes the composition of the squad.

My suspicion is that random variation is also in there.  With some puck luck 3 of the 8 losses could have been wins and we'd be looking at a 4-5 stretch -- irritating, but not unprecedented or horrifying.  By the same token, we were inches from the 2012 season ending with an unremarkable loss to Michigan or even a soul-destroying crash and burn QF upset to Dartmouth.

Our number may just be up.

The combination of stupid penalties and inability to hold a lead (see, this year: Brock, Princeton, Dartmouth, Maine, Denver, Yale, St. Lawrence, Clarkson -- all games in which we had leads and tied or lost) suggest that the team is mentally weak.

I've only seen a handful of games, but it seems that we're turning the puck over in the defensive zone / getting beaten by forechecks / having our defensemen fail to handle the puck well constantly.

We play pretty well for the most part (other than the awful penalties) but the chances we give up are huge ones, because of the turnovers and inability to clear/possess the puck.

[Trotsky]

I've only seen a handful of games, but it seems that we're turning the puck over in the defensive zone / getting beaten by forechecks / having our defensemen fail to handle the puck well constantly.

Mistakes one expects from a young team early in the season.  Could it be our problems boil down to: we don't learn?

[marty]

OK ask Joe Torre

Or ask Joe about the year after he was MVP. (See Moneyball, the book)