Princeton

[Swampy]

I'll start this thread. This is going to be a challenging weekend. Princeton has killed 100% of penalties, has taken the fewest penalty minutes of any team in the country, and is second on the power play (guess who's first). Cornell is going to have to stay out of the box and score at even strength, things it has yet to show it can do.

[Josh '99]

I'll start this thread. This is going to be a challenging weekend. Princeton has killed 100% of penalties, has taken the fewest penalty minutes of any team in the country, and is second on the power play (guess who's first). Cornell is going to have to stay out of the box and score at even strength, things it has yet to show it can do.

Not to disagree with your general point, but I'm not sure how significant those stats are given the small sample size; for example they've killed 100% of five power plays, one of which was only 24 seconds long.

[Swampy]

I'll start this thread. This is going to be a challenging weekend. Princeton has killed 100% of penalties, has taken the fewest penalty minutes of any team in the country, and is second on the power play (guess who's first). Cornell is going to have to stay out of the box and score at even strength, things it has yet to show it can do.

Not to disagree with your general point, but I'm not sure how significant those stats are given the small sample size; for example they've killed 100% of five power plays, one of which was only 24 seconds long.

Good point, I didn't know that. But despite the small sample size, these games are the only way to discern what each team's early strengths and weaknesses are. Seeing how much UNO has been penalized, Schafer may have focused on the powerplay with what limited practice time the team has had. Princeton may have done something similar. Things will change as the season progresses, both because teams will have time to work on other aspects of their games and because of regression to the mean. But early on, this looks like a difficult matchup.

Add to this the fact that #7 Quinnipiac is on deck for the following night, with no love lost between the teams after last year's playoffs, and Princeton could be a classic trap game.

[TimV]

Add to this the fact that #7 Quinnipiac is on deck for the following night, with no love lost between the teams after last year's playoffs, and Princeton could be a classic trap game.

I like your take here, but another factor is that most times the coaches prep more for the Friday game of the weekend pair, so Schafer will prep for P and Q's coach will want to avoid Colgate being his team's trap game.

Animosity aside, looks like a wash to me.

As for me, I am looking past Princeton and am stoked to see the Q. game.

[RatushnyFan]

Q reloaded nicely with the Clifton brothers and others.  Connor Clifton is a beast.

[Trotsky]

IMHO Q and the Capitol District teams are the big threats this year, with Yale fading.  I think Brown also has a shot at being a dark horse candidate.

But we really need to clean up on the ostensible bottom feeders (Colgate, Princeton, Clarkson, Harvard) since more offense-oriented squads tend not to drop as many points against them (winning 5-2 gives you more room for error than winning 2-1).

[Rosey]

with Yale fading.

Would have been nice if Cornell had been able to figure out how to beat Yale at their peak. Once in 5 years is pretty bad, and does not give me confidence that the coaching staff has any clue how to beat teams playing a similar game.

[Trotsky]

with Yale fading.

Would have been nice if Cornell had been able to figure out how to beat Yale at their peak. Once in 5 years is pretty bad, and does not give me confidence that the coaching staff has any clue how to beat teams playing a similar game.

I don't think there was really any "figuring it out."  They were just better than we were -- during part of that stretch, a lot better.  We did beat them twice (2-8 in RS plus the two spectacular crash and burn ECAC finals), which will stand up as fairly ordinary cold streak against a superior squad, assuming we can break it this year:

2-8-0 Yale 09-13
0-5-1 Dartmouth 00-02
2-6-0 Clarkson 96-99
2-9-3 RPI 93-99
0-4-2 Colgate 93-95
1-5-0 Brown 93-95
1-4-1 Clarkson 92-94
0-6-0 SLU 87-89

Lest we forget The Standard for frustration:

0-17-3 Harvard 86-95

[Josh '99]

IMHO Q and the Capitol District teams are the big threats this year, with Yale fading.  I think Brown also has a shot at being a dark horse candidate.

But we really need to clean up on the ostensible bottom feeders (Colgate, Princeton, Clarkson, Harvard) since more offense-oriented squads tend not to drop as many points against them (winning 5-2 gives you more room for error than winning 2-1).

I'll believe Yale is fading when it becomes apparent that their goaltending isn't up to the task; with all due respect to Miller and Laganiere, they didn't lose all that many players from last year's championship team (contrast with Cornell losing 4 of the top 5 scorers after 2002-03) and if one of their two freshman goalies turns out to be good, I don't think they'll have too much of a drop-off.

[BearLover]

with Yale fading.

Would have been nice if Cornell had been able to figure out how to beat Yale at their peak. Once in 5 years is pretty bad, and does not give me confidence that the coaching staff has any clue how to beat teams playing a similar game.

I don't think there was really any "figuring it out."  They were just better than we were -- during part of that stretch, a lot better.

No, it wasn't just that they were better than us.  In fact, they were barely any better.  We finished 3 points behind them in '09, 1 point behind them in '10, way behind them in '11, way ahead of them in '12, and last year was an unmitigated disaster.  Aside from last year, we were right there with them--except when we played them.  So the problem is, in fact, that we match up horribly with them and have no idea what to do about it.  And given that after last year's debacle they're going to win the recruiting battle, things aren't getting any better any time soon.

[RichH]

No, it wasn't just that they were better than us.  In fact, they were barely any better.  We finished 3 points behind them in '09, 1 point behind them in '10, way behind them in '11, way ahead of them in '12, and last year was an unmitigated disaster.  Aside from last year, we were right there with them--except when we played them.  So the problem is, in fact, that we match up horribly with them and have no idea what to do about it.  And given that after last year's debacle they're going to win the recruiting battle, things aren't getting any better any time soon.

But if you actually look at last year, we weren't right there with them in the standings, but we were when we played them. Yale beat CU both times, true, but 3-2 in OT and 2-1 in two barnburners. The eventual NCAA champs did not blow this team out of the water last season.  Even in the standings, Yale finished only 6 points ahead of us, which thanks to the log-jam we failed to get on top of in Jan & early Feb, was the difference between 3rd and 10th.  

The disaster last season wasn't how we played against the top 4 of the league, it's that we didn't take care of the Princetons, Clarksons, and Harvards.

[Trotsky]

No, it wasn't just that they were better than us.  In fact, they were barely any better

The Yale squads that had O'Neill, Miller, Agostino, Little, Kearney and Backman over a span of just a couple years were significantly better than we were.  Those were all very special players.  The two ECAC final losses demonstrated the difference in quality.

I do not think Yale will be able to recruit to replace them because them all hitting at once was basically a fluke.  Even if Yale can continue as a strong program, they won't be getting players like that anytime soon because those players are very, very rare.

They made the most of their Moment, right at the end of their window, and just by the skin of their teeth (one result away from failing to make the NCAAs at all).  Good for them.  But just like apparently dominant programs of prior periods, they're coming back to pack, and based on the accumulated losses of the program over the past few seasons, they're ripe for a crash.

[Trotsky]

The disaster last season wasn't how we played against the top 4 of the league, it's that we didn't take care of the Princetons, Clarksons, and Harvards.

There's a table for that!  

Cornell's record vs the 4 worst ECAC teams not named "Cornell" was 2-4-2 .375, as opposed to 6-7-1 .464 vs the rest of the conference: 0-4-0 against the Frozen Four finalists and 6-3-1 against the rest.  As you say, that is what hollowed out last season.  If Cornell had played the worst 4 teams the way they played the non-F4 rest, they would have had 4 more points and finished 5th.

[Rosey]

with Yale fading.

Would have been nice if Cornell had been able to figure out how to beat Yale at their peak. Once in 5 years is pretty bad, and does not give me confidence that the coaching staff has any clue how to beat teams playing a similar game.

I don't think there was really any "figuring it out."  They were just better than we were -- during part of that stretch, a lot better.

No, it wasn't just that they were better than us.  In fact, they were barely any better.  We finished 3 points behind them in '09, 1 point behind them in '10, way behind them in '11, way ahead of them in '12, and last year was an unmitigated disaster.  Aside from last year, we were right there with them--except when we played them.  So the problem is, in fact, that we match up horribly with them and have no idea what to do about it.  And given that after last year's debacle they're going to win the recruiting battle, things aren't getting any better any time soon.

This is exactly my point. H2H, we simply couldn't figure them out despite on a number of occasions being near them in the standings. Yale just had our number, and I don't have any confidence that the Cornell coaching staff has any idea how to counter their playing style even after five years.

[Trotsky]

Yale just had our number, and I don't have any confidence that the Cornell coaching staff has any idea how to counter their playing style even after five years.

I think this line of criticism is not very relevant.  There is a certain point where the only "strategy" is "get much better players."  We've run into that four times since 1980: the three ECAC squads that won national titles and the SLU team that should have in '88.  Plus we were that during the middle '00's when we should have won ours.

Now, I don't think anybody here is going to argue against us recruiting much better players (except Ralph ), but I do not think the big issue against Yale was strategic failure.  It was dealing with a ridiculously over-skilled opponent.  The only way in against them was to exploit their crappy goaltending and force them into a defensive mode, and faulting a team built to win 2-1 games that it isn't a team built to win 8-7 games is like faulting a well-designed submarine that it can't fly.

Yale has, however, refuted a main tenet of The System: this it is impossible for an Ivy to recruit the quality of offensive players needed to win up tempo national championships.  I think this was actually completely valid when Mike became coach, and since then circumstances have gradually changed with the loss of the highest tier offensive talent to the CHL, the improvement of the overall pool of college players to where third and fourth line guys are now competent, and the huge improvement in aid opportunities for Ivy athletes.  But I do not think it is realistic to expect Mike to completely revise his approach.  For as long as he remains coach, we will be built from the goal out.  If that's no longer tenable because of systemic changes in the ECAC, we'll make a change.  If Cornell gets back to the top playing defense, well, we can enjoy the mounting shutout totals.