2019-02-22: RPI 3 Cornell 2 (ot)

[ursusminor]

RPI is another incredibly bad team that plays a cheap defensive system to try to steal low-scoring games from better teams. I don't blame Cornell for only scoring twice so much as I blame them for giving up three goals to a team incapable of creating offense. Just horrific turnovers in the defensive end and bad goaltending. The turnovers are nothing new, but the goaltending is a recent phenomenon. The Colgate game revisited.

Cornell is now an underdog to make the NCAAs, despite what the garbage "pairwise predictor" says/said.

RPI has not been incredibly bad since the 2nd semester, and that is without the top two offensive players. You must have been watching the women's game.

[Dafatone]

RPI is another incredibly bad team that plays a cheap defensive system to try to steal low-scoring games from better teams. I don't blame Cornell for only scoring twice so much as I blame them for giving up three goals to a team incapable of creating offense. Just horrific turnovers in the defensive end and bad goaltending. The turnovers are nothing new, but the goaltending is a recent phenomenon. The Colgate game revisited.

Cornell is now an underdog to make the NCAAs, despite what the garbage "pairwise predictor" says/said.

We're 13th in the pairwise (but have a bit of a leg up going forward at the moment because we're currently winning the pairwise against ASU). This means that if we pass one of the two teams ahead of us in RPI, we pass both of them in the pairwise rankings.

Mathematically speaking, we're probably more likely to make it than not. Plenty of hockey left and plenty of room for things to get worse or better.

The math doesn't change just because we're sad about a bad game.

[Dafatone]

RPI is another incredibly bad team that plays a cheap defensive system to try to steal low-scoring games from better teams. I don't blame Cornell for only scoring twice so much as I blame them for giving up three goals to a team incapable of creating offense. Just horrific turnovers in the defensive end and bad goaltending. The turnovers are nothing new, but the goaltending is a recent phenomenon. The Colgate game revisited.

Cornell is now an underdog to make the NCAAs, despite what the garbage "pairwise predictor" says/said.

RPI has not been incredibly bad since the 2nd semester, and that is without the top two offensive players. You must have been watching the women's game.

RPI certainly played well tonight. We've been getting out-muscled down low throughout the season. We kept the puck on the doorstop all night but RPI pushed us out of scoring chances.

[BearLover]

RPI is another incredibly bad team that plays a cheap defensive system to try to steal low-scoring games from better teams. I don't blame Cornell for only scoring twice so much as I blame them for giving up three goals to a team incapable of creating offense. Just horrific turnovers in the defensive end and bad goaltending. The turnovers are nothing new, but the goaltending is a recent phenomenon. The Colgate game revisited.

Cornell is now an underdog to make the NCAAs, despite what the garbage "pairwise predictor" says/said.

RPI has not been incredibly bad since the 2nd semester, and that is without the top two offensive players. You must have been watching the women's game.

I watched Cornell's two games against them this season. Maybe they've looked better in their other games. Cornell has outshot them 78-31. Outplayed us in goal, that's for sure.

[Scersk '97]

That was Nuttle with the whiff. Oddly, Kaldis had a number of those tonight that he got away with. The guys just seem to be holding their sticks a bit tight right now.  That being said, two weeks ago Barron would've buried that OT shot.

On defense, we don't clear the puck with authority and intention, whether as a considered first pass out of the zone or a desperation chop. It's why we seem to have no "shutdown" defense at the end of games. On offense, our forwards have stretches of purposeful motion through the neutral zone that leads to good cycling and then have stretches of utter carelessness with the puck, whacking the puck into the middle of the goalie's chest protector or an opposing player with no real thought, and overskating so there's no one left to pass it to in the slot.

When the forwards are careless with the puck, they are absolutely killing our D.

[Dafatone]

RPI is another incredibly bad team that plays a cheap defensive system to try to steal low-scoring games from better teams. I don't blame Cornell for only scoring twice so much as I blame them for giving up three goals to a team incapable of creating offense. Just horrific turnovers in the defensive end and bad goaltending. The turnovers are nothing new, but the goaltending is a recent phenomenon. The Colgate game revisited.

Cornell is now an underdog to make the NCAAs, despite what the garbage "pairwise predictor" says/said.

RPI has not been incredibly bad since the 2nd semester, and that is without the top two offensive players. You must have been watching the women's game.

I watched Cornell's two games against them this season. Maybe they've looked better in their other games. Cornell has outshot them 78-31. Outplayed us in goal, that's for sure.

They're 6-5-3 in 2019. We certainly controlled play tonight, but they did a good job minimizing our best chances.

[BearLover]

RPI is another incredibly bad team that plays a cheap defensive system to try to steal low-scoring games from better teams. I don't blame Cornell for only scoring twice so much as I blame them for giving up three goals to a team incapable of creating offense. Just horrific turnovers in the defensive end and bad goaltending. The turnovers are nothing new, but the goaltending is a recent phenomenon. The Colgate game revisited.

Cornell is now an underdog to make the NCAAs, despite what the garbage "pairwise predictor" says/said.

We're 13th in the pairwise (but have a bit of a leg up going forward at the moment because we're currently winning the pairwise against ASU). This means that if we pass one of the two teams ahead of us in RPI, we pass both of them in the pairwise rankings.

Mathematically speaking, we're probably more likely to make it than not. Plenty of hockey left and plenty of room for things to get worse or better.

The math doesn't change just because we're sad about a bad game.

I'm basing this in part on the fact that I believe Cornell to be trending in the wrong direction rather than strictly on the math. The defensemen are making horrible mistakes every game, probably because Schafer doesn't have enough faith in Leahy (and even less in Cairns) to  alleviate the pressure on them. The late-season grind has laid bare this reality. Losing Haiskanen was brutal. Need Andreev back because Schafer has little faith in the fourth line too.

[BearLover]

RPI is another incredibly bad team that plays a cheap defensive system to try to steal low-scoring games from better teams. I don't blame Cornell for only scoring twice so much as I blame them for giving up three goals to a team incapable of creating offense. Just horrific turnovers in the defensive end and bad goaltending. The turnovers are nothing new, but the goaltending is a recent phenomenon. The Colgate game revisited.

Cornell is now an underdog to make the NCAAs, despite what the garbage "pairwise predictor" says/said.

RPI has not been incredibly bad since the 2nd semester, and that is without the top two offensive players. You must have been watching the women's game.

I watched Cornell's two games against them this season. Maybe they've looked better in their other games. Cornell has outshot them 78-31. Outplayed us in goal, that's for sure.

They're 6-5-3 in 2019. We certainly controlled play tonight, but they did a good job minimizing our best chances.

I personally believe teams that can't generate offense and give up 40 shots are bad teams. The RPI goalie looked very good, but our goalie is supposed to be very good too. All I can say for sure is that Cornell has absolutely no business losing to (or tying) a team like that.

[Dafatone]

RPI is another incredibly bad team that plays a cheap defensive system to try to steal low-scoring games from better teams. I don't blame Cornell for only scoring twice so much as I blame them for giving up three goals to a team incapable of creating offense. Just horrific turnovers in the defensive end and bad goaltending. The turnovers are nothing new, but the goaltending is a recent phenomenon. The Colgate game revisited.

Cornell is now an underdog to make the NCAAs, despite what the garbage "pairwise predictor" says/said.

We're 13th in the pairwise (but have a bit of a leg up going forward at the moment because we're currently winning the pairwise against ASU). This means that if we pass one of the two teams ahead of us in RPI, we pass both of them in the pairwise rankings.

Mathematically speaking, we're probably more likely to make it than not. Plenty of hockey left and plenty of room for things to get worse or better.

The math doesn't change just because we're sad about a bad game.

I'm basing this in part on the fact that I believe Cornell to be trending in the wrong direction rather than strictly on the math. The defensemen are making horrible mistakes every game, probably because Schafer doesn't have enough faith in Leahy (and even less in Cairns) to  alleviate the pressure on them. The late-season grind has laid bare this reality. Losing Haiskanen was brutal. Need Andreev back because Schafer has little faith in the fourth line too.

Hopefully we can continue to get healthier. Easy for me to say, but I think we need to risk playing Leahy/Cairns a little more and keep the rest of the defensemen fresher.

[ugarte]

RPI is another incredibly bad team that plays a cheap defensive system to try to steal low-scoring games from better teams. I don't blame Cornell for only scoring twice so much as I blame them for giving up three goals to a team incapable of creating offense. Just horrific turnovers in the defensive end and bad goaltending. The turnovers are nothing new, but the goaltending is a recent phenomenon. The Colgate game revisited.

Cornell is now an underdog to make the NCAAs, despite what the garbage "pairwise predictor" says/said.

We're 13th in the pairwise (but have a bit of a leg up going forward at the moment because we're currently winning the pairwise against ASU). This means that if we pass one of the two teams ahead of us in RPI, we pass both of them in the pairwise rankings.

Mathematically speaking, we're probably more likely to make it than not. Plenty of hockey left and plenty of room for things to get worse or better.

The math doesn't change just because we're sad about a bad game.

I'm basing this in part on the fact that I believe Cornell to be trending in the wrong direction rather than strictly on the math. The defensemen are making horrible mistakes every game, probably because Schafer doesn't have enough faith in Leahy (and even less in Cairns) to  alleviate the pressure on them. The late-season grind has laid bare this reality. Losing Haiskanen was brutal. Need Andreev back because Schafer has little faith in the fourth line too.

Agreed - one of the hidden killers is that he's wearing out our top lines. The best guys will still have great moments but the little mistakes pile up.

Thank you Scersk - I'm glad someone else has noticed that this team doesn't clear the puck with intention. I'm constantly frustrated by half-assed attempts to send it around the boards that go right to the guy at the point or gentle flips up the center of the ice that are easily picked off. It leaves the defense scrambling because nobody is in position for a D man to have clear control of the puck.

But seriously guys, pass to each other! I'm down on our NCAA chances too, because we can't bear more losses, and certainly not to teams outside of the top 20.

[sah67]

All I can say for sure is that Cornell has absolutely no business losing to (or tying) a team like that.

We also have no business letting a team like that dominate possession for the first 10 minutes of the game, putting us in that 2-0 hole that we had to dig out of after we decided to wake up and play hockey.

[Scersk '97]

The defensemen are making horrible mistakes every game, probably because Schafer doesn't have enough faith in Leahy (and even less in Cairns) to alleviate the pressure on them.

Agreed - one of the hidden killers is that he's wearing out our top lines.

I don't think Leahy's even half bad, either! We'll have a pretty crap D next year if he keeps having his playing time cut.

But seriously guys, pass to each other! I'm down on our NCAA chances too, because we can't bear more losses, and certainly not to teams outside of the top 20.

At this point, I don't give a rat's ass about the NCAAs. I'll be happy if we somehow back our way into a bye, the way they've been playing.

[Trotsky]

RPI certainly played well tonight. We've been getting out-muscled down low throughout the season. We kept the puck on the doorstop all night but RPI pushed us out of scoring chances.

Topher opined that despite our control of territory all night we had very few quality scoring chances.  The question is how much of that was RPI and how much of it was us?

Except for the one minute against Brown and the entire Yale game, I think we've been playing very well in these maddening games.  I thought that Cam being back settled the lines and in particular the Starrett line was stellar (Malott had 2 or 3 chances for the hats).  And I thought our D was great against RPI -- we held them to 5 total SOG in periods 2-3.

It's bad to drop so many points to bottom-third teams, absolutely.  It's a bummer to blow first place.  But I think this is a really good team.

[osorojo]

Not passing (not looking) in the offensive or defensive end is symptomatic of unfamiliar offensive and defensive pairing or poor coaching, or both.

[Dafatone]

Not passing (not looking) in the offensive or defensive end is symptomatic of unfamiliar offensive and defensive pairing or poor coaching, or both.

I didn't think we weren't passing. We just kept trying to pass to guys in front of the net and make cross-crease passes. RPI controlled the crease well.