Florida hockey tournement

[TimV]

I have a suggestion. When Ned was the lacrosse coach, he wouldn't let anybody shoot in practice standing still.  You had to be moving, and the closer to full speed the better.

Set up the skating treadmill so that it's a medium distance from a goal- maybe the same distance as the top of the faceoff circles at most, and the slot hashmarks at the least, maybe 10 feet or so to one side or the other.  The goal should be wide open to begin with.  After the player  improves to the point where he can hit the goal with a shot in stride on the treadmill, start to hang one of those boards with the cutouts to gain some sniping ability.  And use that sucker every freakin'day.::cuss::

[Trotsky]

Bring a paintball gun to practice.  The moment a player stops skating,...

[dwakelin]

#1 in nation in defense, #55 in scoring, 30th in PWR.
Stats don't lie. This just isn't working.
Acknowledging that we are the host team in Florida annually and the trophy is named after Ned Narkness, it might be time to consider playing one of the
two allowable exhibition games after break instead of preseason replacing this tourney. These games mean too much Pairwise to continue.
Maybe even host a holiday tourney as was the case in years past.

[Towerroad]

I have a suggestion. When Ned was the lacrosse coach, he wouldn't let anybody shoot in practice standing still.  You had to be moving, and the closer to full speed the better.

Set up the skating treadmill so that it's a medium distance from a goal- maybe the same distance as the top of the faceoff circles at most, and the slot hashmarks at the least, maybe 10 feet or so to one side or the other.  The goal should be wide open to begin with.  After the player  improves to the point where he can hit the goal with a shot in stride on the treadmill, start to hang one of those boards with the cutouts to gain some sniping ability.  And use that sucker every freakin'day.::cuss::

I don't understand. How does that improve our defense?

[TimV]

I have a suggestion. When Ned was the lacrosse coach, he wouldn't let anybody shoot in practice standing still.  You had to be moving, and the closer to full speed the better.

Set up the skating treadmill so that it's a medium distance from a goal- maybe the same distance as the top of the faceoff circles at most, and the slot hashmarks at the least, maybe 10 feet or so to one side or the other.  The goal should be wide open to begin with.  After the player  improves to the point where he can hit the goal with a shot in stride on the treadmill, start to hang one of those boards with the cutouts to gain some sniping ability.  And use that sucker every freakin'day.::cuss::

I don't understand. How does that improve our defense?

::banana::::banana::::banana::

[tominvb]

SIGH, again.

Attendance for first game about 1000.  Monday, work day.  I had another engagement for the evening so left.  Missed the upset, man I wish that I had stayed.

The good news.  The boys played with heart, speed, toughness.  Not afraid of the corners, not afraid in the slot.  Often carried the puck in, not the dump crap of the night before.

The bad news.  The comments above sum it up.  They cannot hit the side of a barn with a puck.   They lug it in but carry it behind the goal and one of two things happen - they lose it or they pass to the slot and no help was there.  The big issue is they shoot blindly.

During warm up the Miami players all, and I mean all, shot 90% of their attempts to the two and three hole.  And they were very good at it from every distance.

Stewart seemed a tad sluggish.  The first goal was from a scrum and I being at the opposite end really did not see it.  The second was a thing of beauty if you were a Miami fan, or just a hockey fan, and a disaster as a Red fan.  A semi break a way - one skater with puck one d man skating backwards as he should be.  To Stewarts left between circle and red line, d man about 4 feet in front of attacker.  Attacker snapped a wrister of such beauty that it popped past the d man and past Stewart before he even reacted.  Their shooter made the perfect play - using the d man as a screen.  Coach I think lost confidence in Stewart and replaced him with Gilliam at the beginning of the second.  Maybe his try out is over.

Gilliam was just getting warm when their shooter in the left circle, hardly harassed, shot toward the 4 hole.  Gilliam got the pad on it but the puck was two to four inches off the ice and hit his pad and caromed into the net.  He was brilliant the rest.

The REALLY bad news.  A man came out of the Cornell locker room - a man very much in the know but not a member of the team community.  When I asked about Lowry he stated that it was a back issue.  Then went on to say that it had the potential to be season ending.  No more detail than that so please don't ask.  When I mentioned that I would be putting this out into the blog o sphere he begged for confidentiality.  Again.  He stayed that it MAY BE.

Yes his cred is impeccable.

So boys and girls I am off to the home place, will check in later in the day.

Tom from Vero Beach on the road in Fort Myers

[margolism]

What is somewhat upsetting is how we are wasting the nation's top goaltender and defense.

If our offense was simply middle-of-the-pack, say 30th in the country (out of 59), that would equate to one more goal per game.  

Add one goal to each of our games, holding our defense constant, and instead of being 5-6-2, we would be 7-3-5.  Possibly better, since we probably would not have needed to add an extra attacker in one or two instances, which led to ENGs we gave up.

We seem to have a stellar defense and we are squandering it due to offensive ineptitude.

[Trotsky]

What is somewhat upsetting is how we are wasting the nation's top goaltender and defense.

If our offense was simply middle-of-the-pack, say 30th in the country (out of 59), that would equate to one more goal per game.  

Add one goal to each of our games, holding our defense constant, and instead of being 5-6-2, we would be 7-3-5.  Possibly better, since we probably would not have needed to add an extra attacker in a few instances, which led to a few ENGs we gave up.

We seem to have a stellar defense and we are squandering it due to offensive ineptitude.

I don't think that's quite right.  The System stifles both offenses.  If we were scoring 3 goals a game we would not be giving up 1.5 goals per game.

The car up on blocks in the front yard doesn't use much gas.

The question with Mike's teams has always been, if we were willing to give up x more goals per game, could that give us y more goals per game, where y > x?

[margolism]

What is somewhat upsetting is how we are wasting the nation's top goaltender and defense.

If our offense was simply middle-of-the-pack, say 30th in the country (out of 59), that would equate to one more goal per game.  

Add one goal to each of our games, holding our defense constant, and instead of being 5-6-2, we would be 7-3-5.  Possibly better, since we probably would not have needed to add an extra attacker in a few instances, which led to a few ENGs we gave up.

We seem to have a stellar defense and we are squandering it due to offensive ineptitude.

I don't think that's quite right.  The System stifles both offenses.  If we were scoring 3 goals a game we would not be giving up 1.5 goals per game.

The car up on blocks in the front yard doesn't use much gas.

The question with Mike's teams has always been, if we were willing to give up x more goals per game, could that give us y more goals per game, where y > x?

Our system can allow for a good offense.  

Case in point - the 2002-2003 team.  Looking at the stats Cornell led the nation in defense, giving up 1.36 goals per game, while still scoring 3.69 goals per game.  That's a full goal more than I suggested in my original post, while giving up even fewer goals per game.

[TimV]

The question with Mike's teams has always been, if we were willing to give up x more goals per game, could that give us y more goals per game, where y > x?

Perhaps. But I would add the following two questions:

Could we get y more goals per game if our shots were more likely to hit net (specifically GOAL net) than glass or wood?

Could we get y more goals per game of our big guys could post up in the slot and bang in some feeds?

The System has nothing to do with pathetic shooting.

[BearLover]

SIGH, again.

Attendance for first game about 1000.  Monday, work day.  I had another engagement for the evening so left.  Missed the upset, man I wish that I had stayed.

The good news.  The boys played with heart, speed, toughness.  Not afraid of the corners, not afraid in the slot.  Often carried the puck in, not the dump crap of the night before.

The bad news.  The comments above sum it up.  They cannot hit the side of a barn with a puck.   They lug it in but carry it behind the goal and one of two things happen - they lose it or they pass to the slot and no help was there.  The big issue is they shoot blindly.

During warm up the Miami players all, and I mean all, shot 90% of their attempts to the two and three hole.  And they were very good at it from every distance.

Stewart seemed a tad sluggish.  The first goal was from a scrum and I being at the opposite end really did not see it.  The second was a thing of beauty if you were a Miami fan, or just a hockey fan, and a disaster as a Red fan.  A semi break a way - one skater with puck one d man skating backwards as he should be.  To Stewarts left between circle and red line, d man about 4 feet in front of attacker.  Attacker snapped a wrister of such beauty that it popped past the d man and past Stewart before he even reacted.  Their shooter made the perfect play - using the d man as a screen.  Coach I think lost confidence in Stewart and replaced him with Gilliam at the beginning of the second.  Maybe his try out is over.

Gilliam was just getting warm when their shooter in the left circle, hardly harassed, shot toward the 4 hole.  Gilliam got the pad on it but the puck was two to four inches off the ice and hit his pad and caromed into the net.  He was brilliant the rest.

The REALLY bad news.  A man came out of the Cornell locker room - a man very much in the know but not a member of the team community.  When I asked about Lowry he stated that it was a back issue.  Then went on to say that it had the potential to be season ending.  No more detail than that so please don't ask.  When I mentioned that I would be putting this out into the blog o sphere he begged for confidentiality.  Again.  He stayed that it MAY BE.

Yes his cred is impeccable.

So boys and girls I am off to the home place, will check in later in the day.

Tom from Vero Beach on the road in Fort Myers

The past few years have been too large a sample to conclude anything other than that our offense is horrible year-in and year-out and something NEEDS to change.  Being sound defensively and being offensively skilled are NOT mutually exclusive; look at Q or BU or the Bruins or the Kings (or practically any good team).  If Lowry is out for the season, then this team is not going to average more than 1.5 goals per game.

[billhoward]

Gilliam was just getting warm when their shooter in the left circle, hardly harassed, shot toward the 4 hole.  Gilliam got the pad on it but the puck was two to four inches off the ice and hit his pad and caromed into the net.  He was brilliant the rest.

If this is the Monday consolation game, I thought Stewart gave up all 3 Miami goals and then was replaced early in the second. (box score: http://cornellbigred.com/documents/2014/12/29//mih_1229_miami_box.pdf?id=6354 )

The Miami game was disappointing but Cornell just as easily could have been playing Notre Dame for the title had one of the three (more?) pipe strikes gone in against LSSU. What are the odds of shooting 0 for 39?  

Sunday-Monday is a poor combo for getting attendance. Christmas in 2015 is Friday. A Saturday-Sunday series would be nice. Let's hope the tournament keeps going. Or Monday Tuesday or Tuesday Wednesday.

[tominvb]

Ouch

My bad, this 68 year old missed the goaltender switch.  Thought Gillam came on in he beginning of the period.  After the score we had a group discussion looking away from the ice.  Again gujys my bad.  My statement that Stewart's try out may be over still stands.  
Thanks for the correction.

[marty]

Ouch

My bad, this 68 year old missed the goaltender switch.  Thought Gillam came on in he beginning of the period.  After the score we had a group discussion looking away from the ice.  Again gujys my bad.  My statement that Stewart's try out may be over still stands.  
Thanks for the correction.

One other point which, due to no video can be debated, is that the second goal was deflected in by a Cornell player.  It wasn't quite as beautiful as explained in a prior post in this thread. ( According to Jason on WHCU )

[ugarte]

My takeaway from the Penn State game is that the team is good defensively and stocked with decent skaters but they seem confused about why the coach makes them carry a stick everywhere. They are basically figure skaters who enjoy violence.