Dec 8 Polls: Cornell is in the top 10

[Robb]

Eh.  By the end of the year, the polls pretty much end up looking like the Pairwise anyway.  Speaking of which... with SLU's win over UVM and NoDak coming on strong, we flipped a few comparisons last night and now sit at #3 in PWR (#4 in KRACH).

Our next 5 games (all non-conference) are critical to maintain that lofty perch, though, especially SCSU, UMass, and Maine (should we play them).  Umass and Maine will be beaten like rented mules by the HEA powers going down the stretch, so we need to win both of those games for Common Opponent and possibly TUC purposes.  I have a bit more confidence that SCSU will do a *little* better in-conference, but the same logic applies.

[Swampy]

[quote Beeeej][quote Al DeFlorio][quote imafrshmn][quote Al DeFlorio]Not clear to me why a team that was beaten by Cornell and also lost to Mercyhurst (huh?) is ranked five places ahead of a Cornell team that's lost only to North Dakota.[/quote]

They do have a real marquee win in having beaten Northeastern, but other than that, they are still riding their preseason hype.[/quote]
Princeton is ranked ahead of Northeastern, so our "marquee win" over Princeton--at their rink--should be better than their win over Northeastern.[/quote]

Al, I'm surprised you give it more than about five seconds' worth of thought.  It's a poll.  People are going to vote how they're going to vote, and no amount of analysis is going to make the poll mean any more than it does, which is zero.  Is it nice to get the respect on a national level?  Sure, but I think if you spend any time at all on sweating the difference between #5 and #10, and which one is which, and who beat who, it's already too much time spent on it.  My short answer would be "strength of schedule," but even that short answer is more time than it deserves.

If this were the BCS, where poll rankings might actually have an effect on our playoff seeding, I'd be concerned.  But it isn't, so I'm not.

Let's win the games.[/quote]

I think the scores by which the two teams have won influence the polls. Given its style, this disadvantages Cornell. IMHO, head-to-head is more meaningful.

We are not alone in this. In football, Mack Brown routinely clears his bench during the 4Q when Texas is winning by a substantial margin. Consequently, his teams rarely score over 60 points against weaker opponents. Look where this got UT compared to Oklahoma!

[ugarte]

[quote Swampy]I think the scores by which the two teams have won influence the polls. Given its style, this disadvantages Cornell. IMHO, head-to-head is more meaningful.[/quote]
Head to head is one game! It is a good tool for tiebreaker purposes but, with an insignificant sample size, if Princeton is routinely winning against common opponents by a larger margin than we are, that seems like a good reason to vote Princeton higher, even with the Mercyhurst loss.

We are not alone in this. In football, Mack Brown routinely clears his bench during the 4Q when Texas is winning by a substantial margin. Consequently, his teams rarely score over 60 points against weaker opponents. Look where this got UT compared to Oklahoma!

This is a bad analogy on so many levels. You can compare Princeton to Oklahoma or Cornell to Texas - and Oklahoma hasn't really run up the score against weak teams.

Princeton has basically played the same teams that we have. They aren't "piling it on" and we are hardly pulling our starters for the third period. From what I've read, we are winning one-goal games because - while Scrivens is unquestionably playing well, he also apparently brings his own a net with an extra-wide post.

Oklahoma is hardly running up the score on weak opponents. OU has scored 58 or more in their last 6 games. Missouri, Texas Tech and Oklahoma State are all Top 25 teams and the Sooners shut the offense down before the 4th quarter - or earlier - against Texas A&M, Nebraska and K-State after piling up huge early leads.

[Robb]

[quote ugarte]From what I've read, we are winning one-goal games because - while Scrivens is unquestionably playing well, he also apparently brings his own a net with an extra-wide post.[/quote]
I've only seen a couple games on-line this year, so I'm no expert, but this sounds like crazy talk to me.  Even with the NoDak game, he's #1 in the country in both GAA and Save %, and has one loss on the season.  

Discount the first NoDak game when the wheels fell off for everyone, and his line is 97.0% and 0.765 GAA with 3 shutouts in 9 games.  Wow.  

If he brings his own net (i.e. implying that he's just lucky) well, then, I'd love to see the numbers that a "competent" goaltender would be putting up.

[Beeeej]

[quote Robb][quote ugarte]From what I've read, we are winning one-goal games because - while Scrivens is unquestionably playing well, he also apparently brings his own a net with an extra-wide post.[/quote]
I've only seen a couple games on-line this year, so I'm no expert, but this sounds like crazy talk to me.  Even with the NoDak game, he's #1 in the country in both GAA and Save %, and has one loss on the season.  

Discount the first NoDak game when the wheels fell off for everyone, and his line is 97.0% and 0.765 GAA with 3 shutouts in 9 games.  Wow.  

If he brings his own net (i.e. implying that he's just lucky) well, then, I'd love to see the numbers that a "competent" goaltender would be putting up.[/quote]

It's the system!!  ::smashfreak::

[dragonfan]

Scrivens is a great first save goaltender,the rebounds are being cleared out.

[ugarte]

[quote Robb]Discount the first NoDak game when the wheels fell off for everyone, and his line is 97.0% and 0.765 GAA with 3 shutouts in 9 games.  Wow.  

If he brings his own net (i.e. implying that he's just lucky) well, then, I'd love to see the numbers that a "competent" goaltender would be putting up.[/quote]
I didn't mean to imply that he is just lucky. His excellent numbers obviously don't bear that out. (Edit: HEY! I even said "he is unquestionably playing well"!)

What I am saying is this: I have seen zero minutes of hockey this year and listened to very little. My life has taken a turn and I the only time I have for Cornell hockey is when I am at work. ::whistle:: What I have done is read the game threads and the postgame threads. Cornell has played most of the season on the razor's edge. In 9 games we've won 4 games by one goal and tied twice. Every game seems to have at least one shot that hit the post or a puck that got behind Scrivens and was cleared. After each game the sentiment seems to be "whew" not "outstanding!", as it used to be with Lenny and McKee. He appears to those reporting contemporaneously to be a combination of lucky and good.

I expect that he will remain very good through the year but his luck will probably run out and those pucks will start hitting the inside of the post.

[ganderson]

Depends... Does Ditka get skates?

[Dpperk29]

[quote ganderson]Depends... Does Ditka get skates?[/quote]

Does it matter?

[Swampy]

[quote ugarte][quote Swampy]I think the scores by which the two teams have won influence the polls. Given its style, this disadvantages Cornell. IMHO, head-to-head is more meaningful.[/quote]
Head to head is one game! It is a good tool for tiebreaker purposes but, with an insignificant sample size, if Princeton is routinely winning against common opponents by a larger margin than we are, that seems like a good reason to vote Princeton higher, even with the Mercyhurst loss.

We are not alone in this. In football, Mack Brown routinely clears his bench during the 4Q when Texas is winning by a substantial margin. Consequently, his teams rarely score over 60 points against weaker opponents. Look where this got UT compared to Oklahoma!

This is a bad analogy on so many levels. You can compare Princeton to Oklahoma or Cornell to Texas - and Oklahoma hasn't really run up the score against weak teams.

Princeton has basically played the same teams that we have. They aren't "piling it on" and we are hardly pulling our starters for the third period. From what I've read, we are winning one-goal games because - while Scrivens is unquestionably playing well, he also apparently brings his own a net with an extra-wide post.

Oklahoma is hardly running up the score on weak opponents. OU has scored 58 or more in their last 6 games. Missouri, Texas Tech and Oklahoma State are all Top 25 teams and the Sooners shut the offense down before the 4th quarter - or earlier - against Texas A&M, Nebraska and K-State after piling up huge early leads.[/quote]

My point is that Cornell plays a tighter-checking game, and this leads to lower scores (and score differentials) even if Cornell dominates. On the other hand, even a sample of twelve games (Princeton) or ten (Cornell) is not much to go by. It's not much more impressive that P beat Colgate, whom C tied, 2-1 in OT or Quinnipiac 2-1 in regulation. The more recent win over Q, 4-1, is more impressive. However, all 3 P wins were at home, but the C's tie with Q was away. But then the Cornell-Q tie was a sample of 1 to begin with.

Overall, C appears to have played a tougher schedule, w/ 2 away games at ND and one apiece against Dartmouth and Harvard. D & H are currently tied for 3rd place in the ECAC, even though H has been sucking more than usual outside the league. Nonetheless, both D and H have much higher PWR, Kratch, etc. than Union or RPI, the two ECAC teams P played instead. So, while I agree that one game is too small a sample to conclude something about the two teams, these other considerations lead me to say it should have more weight.

Regarding Texas vs Oklahoma, I used a poor choice of words by saying "weaker" opponents. I should have said when it's far ahead, although being far ahead late in the game does make the opponent weaker, doesn't it? After the Oklahoma game, UT had a relatively close game w/ Oklahoma State before losing to Texas Tech. Oklahoma beat each one handily. If you watched any part of the Big 12 Championship, you know the commentators wet their pants over Oklahoma scoring over 60 points in 5 straight games. I don't doubt that Oklahoma may be better than UT, but given that the latter won their match up, Oklahoma's high scoring surely helped them win the polls.

[ebilmes]

We stayed at #10 in this week's USCHO poll. USA Today isn't out yet.

http://www.uscho.com/rankings/

[Rosey]

[quote ebilmes]We stayed at #10 in this week's USCHO poll. USA Today isn't out yet.

http://www.uscho.com/rankings/[/quote]
I guess the guys did well enough at "Skate with the Big Red" to maintain their top-ten status.  Whew!

[CM cWo 44]

[quote ebilmes]We stayed at #10 in this week's USCHO poll. USA Today isn't out yet.

http://www.uscho.com/rankings/[/quote]

Red hot NoDak enters the top 20.

[Al DeFlorio]

[quote ebilmes]We stayed at #10 in this week's USCHO poll. USA Today isn't out yet.

http://www.uscho.com/rankings/[/quote]
And crept up just behind Princeton in the USA Today poll;-): http://www.uscho.com/rankings/?data=usatoday&week=poll