Cornell at Union, 2/12/22

[Trotsky]

Win 3 of the final 4 RS and we get the bye.

You are assuming that Colgate doesn't win out?

Nope, I didn't see that Colgate has a game at hand.  So our magic number for points is actually 12, you are right.

[Trotsky]

Love all of the heartfelt chatter in these game logs, but let's face facts: Cornell is just not that good. The scores don't lie. Wins and losses are how teams are judged. Winning teams make good breaks and good luck fall their way; losing teams the opposite, No very good team loses and ties a slew of bottom-dwelling teams for weeks on end. A few years ago, Princeton had one of their usual poor regular seasons, then turned on the jets in the playoffs and won the ECACs. That will be Cornell's only chance this year.

Welcome to the forum.

The crown jewel of every season (IMO) is winning the ECACs so I would say that taking the title in Lake Placid is the season. The NC$$ is a nice treat afterwards, but it's almost like exhibition games.  Wildly fun to win, but dénouement.

Cornell has beaten Q and should have beaten Clarkson -- they can hold their own against the conference's royalty, at least over SSS.  So like every year my attention is fixed on the ECACs to cap the season.  Win that and this goes down as an A plus.

[Scersk '97]

Win 3 of the final 4 RS and we get the bye.

You are assuming that Colgate doesn't win out?

Nope, I didn't see that Colgate has a game at hand.  So our magic number for points is actually 12, you are right.

It's a reasonable bet, however. I'd be willing to put (meager) money on Colgate losing at least one of those games.

[scoop85]

Win 3 of the final 4 RS and we get the bye.

You are assuming that Colgate doesn't win out?

Nope, I didn't see that Colgate has a game at hand.  So our magic number for points is actually 12, you are right.

It's a reasonable bet, however. I'd be willing to put (meager) money on Colgate losing at least one of those games.

Colgate has to play Clarkson and Q too, so no way they win all 4

[CU2007]

Love all of the heartfelt chatter in these game logs, but let's face facts: Cornell is just not that good. The scores don't lie. Wins and losses are how teams are judged. Winning teams make good breaks and good luck fall their way; losing teams the opposite, No very good team loses and ties a slew of bottom-dwelling teams for weeks on end. A few years ago, Princeton had one of their usual poor regular seasons, then turned on the jets in the playoffs and won the ECACs. That will be Cornell's only chance this year.

Welcome to the forum.

The crown jewel of every season (IMO) is winning the ECACs so I would say that taking the title in Lake Placid is the season. The NC$$ is a nice treat afterwards, but it's almost like exhibition games.  Wildly fun to win, but dénouement.

Cornell has beaten Q and should have beaten Clarkson -- they can hold their own against the conference's royalty, at least over SSS.  So like every year my attention is fixed on the ECACs to cap the season.  Win that and this goes down as an A plus.

You keep saying this but I'm not sure everyone agrees. After watching Yale and Union win national championships, winning the national championship is very much on the radar

[BearLover]

Love all of the heartfelt chatter in these game logs, but let's face facts: Cornell is just not that good. The scores don't lie. Wins and losses are how teams are judged. Winning teams make good breaks and good luck fall their way; losing teams the opposite, No very good team loses and ties a slew of bottom-dwelling teams for weeks on end. A few years ago, Princeton had one of their usual poor regular seasons, then turned on the jets in the playoffs and won the ECACs. That will be Cornell's only chance this year.

Welcome to the forum.

The crown jewel of every season (IMO) is winning the ECACs so I would say that taking the title in Lake Placid is the season. The NC$$ is a nice treat afterwards, but it's almost like exhibition games.  Wildly fun to win, but dénouement.

Cornell has beaten Q and should have beaten Clarkson -- they can hold their own against the conference's royalty, at least over SSS.  So like every year my attention is fixed on the ECACs to cap the season.  Win that and this goes down as an A plus.

You keep saying this but I'm not sure everyone agrees. After watching Yale and Union win national championships, winning the national championship is very much on the radar

This is one of those takes that, were I to express it, half the forum would call for me to be banned, flayed, exiled to the Fighting Sioux forum, etc. I don't think anyone here besides Trotsky believes it.

[upprdeck]

Cornell plays RPI and outshoots tham 41-19 and loses 6-2  Colgate plays them outshoots them 31-24 and wins 3-2.

Its a funny game sometimes. colgate has been outshot 3-4 times in this stretch and has won them all.   we are the opposite lately.

Not to say all shots are equal in quality.

[osorojo]

Cornell's hockey players are not lacking talent. That leaves game strategy and motivation to explain their peculiar win/loss history.

[Scersk '97]

The crown jewel of every season (IMO) is winning the ECACs so I would say that taking the title in Lake Placid is the season. The NC$$ is a nice treat afterwards, but it's almost like exhibition games.  Wildly fun to win, but dénouement.

Cornell has beaten Q and should have beaten Clarkson -- they can hold their own against the conference's royalty, at least over SSS.  So like every year my attention is fixed on the ECACs to cap the season.  Win that and this goes down as an A plus.

You keep saying this but I'm not sure everyone agrees. After watching Yale and Union win national championships, winning the national championship is very much on the radar

This is one of those takes that, were I to express it, half the forum would call for me to be banned, flayed, exiled to the Fighting Sioux forum, etc. I don't think anyone here besides Trotsky believes it.

I do. NCAA success would be enormously sweet icing on any particular great season, but I far more enjoy and get personally invested in continued dominance over our peeps. In the NCAAs, whatever happens happens.

Seeing how dominant we were in 2003 and yet how a couple of bad bounces could end and then did end a wonderful season on a somewhat sour note taught me to have reasonable expectations. If, however, we continue to be dominant in the ECACs, another NCAA championship will happen in the fullness of time, as it did for Yale when they had almost stopped looking for it and as it did for that dominant Union team. I may not be around for it, but eventually the thousand celestial monkeys banging out the ticker tape of fate will hit upon our name.

[BearLover]

The crown jewel of every season (IMO) is winning the ECACs so I would say that taking the title in Lake Placid is the season. The NC$$ is a nice treat afterwards, but it's almost like exhibition games.  Wildly fun to win, but dénouement.

Cornell has beaten Q and should have beaten Clarkson -- they can hold their own against the conference's royalty, at least over SSS.  So like every year my attention is fixed on the ECACs to cap the season.  Win that and this goes down as an A plus.

You keep saying this but I'm not sure everyone agrees. After watching Yale and Union win national championships, winning the national championship is very much on the radar

This is one of those takes that, were I to express it, half the forum would call for me to be banned, flayed, exiled to the Fighting Sioux forum, etc. I don't think anyone here besides Trotsky believes it.

I do. NCAA success would be enormously sweet icing on any particular great season, but I far more enjoy and get personally invested in continued dominance over our peeps. In the NCAAs, whatever happens happens.

Seeing how dominant we were in 2003 and yet how a couple of bad bounces could end and then did end a wonderful season on a somewhat sour note taught me to have reasonable expectations. If, however, we continue to be dominant in the ECACs, another NCAA championship will happen in the fullness of time, as it did for Yale when they had almost stopped looking for it and as it did for that dominant Union team. I may not be around for it, but eventually the thousand celestial monkeys banging out the ticker tape of fate will hit upon our name.

Bad bounces and bad luck happen just as often in the ECAC, though. In 2019, Galajda got trapped in the net and the refs didn't stop play—end result, Galajda was lost for the remainder of the season. Then, minutes later, the refs missed an offsides call against Clarkson, which scored the OT winner against Austin McGrath to win the ECAC title.

The difference between NCAA and ECAC is that Cornell has shown time and again over the past 25 years that it is an elite ECAC team, winning the tournament as much as anyone else. It has *not* achieved the same at the NCAA tournament. It has racked up ECAC trophies but an NCAA title eludes it. Meanwhile, two of our rivals have won the NCAA. An ECAC title is probably about 10 times more likely in a given season, but an NCAA title would be 10 times as sweet.

[ugarte]

The crown jewel of every season (IMO) is winning the ECACs so I would say that taking the title in Lake Placid is the season. The NC$$ is a nice treat afterwards, but it's almost like exhibition games.  Wildly fun to win, but dénouement.

Cornell has beaten Q and should have beaten Clarkson -- they can hold their own against the conference's royalty, at least over SSS.  So like every year my attention is fixed on the ECACs to cap the season.  Win that and this goes down as an A plus.

You keep saying this but I'm not sure everyone agrees. After watching Yale and Union win national championships, winning the national championship is very much on the radar

This is one of those takes that, were I to express it, half the forum would call for me to be banned, flayed, exiled to the Fighting Sioux forum, etc. I don't think anyone here besides Trotsky believes it.

I do. NCAA success would be enormously sweet icing on any particular great season, but I far more enjoy and get personally invested in continued dominance over our peeps. In the NCAAs, whatever happens happens.

Seeing how dominant we were in 2003 and yet how a couple of bad bounces could end and then did end a wonderful season on a somewhat sour note taught me to have reasonable expectations. If, however, we continue to be dominant in the ECACs, another NCAA championship will happen in the fullness of time, as it did for Yale when they had almost stopped looking for it and as it did for that dominant Union team. I may not be around for it, but eventually the thousand celestial monkeys banging out the ticker tape of fate will hit upon our name.

Bad bounces and bad luck happen just as often in the ECAC, though. In 2019, Galajda got trapped in the net and the refs didn't stop play—end result, Galajda was lost for the remainder of the season. Then, minutes later, the refs missed an offsides call against Clarkson, which scored the OT winner against Austin McGrath to win the ECAC title.

The difference between NCAA and ECAC is that Cornell has shown time and again over the past 25 years that it is an elite ECAC team, winning the tournament as much as anyone else. It has *not* achieved the same at the NCAA tournament. It has racked up ECAC trophies but an NCAA title eludes it. Meanwhile, two of our rivals have won the NCAA. An ECAC title is probably about 10 times more likely in a given season, but an NCAA title would be 10 times as sweet.

I think of the Cleary and the Whitelaw and the NCAA as separate achievements, unrelated to each other but all significant goals.

Winning the regular season title matters - it's the reward for months of watching weekends of winning hockey. Easy to make fun of when a team other than Cornell wins it and blows the tournament, but a valid achievement on its own.

Winning the ECAC tournament matters, and not just as a ticket-punching exercise. A genuine, independent goal. These are the teams we are most familiar with, we want to beat them, we want to see the kids toss their equipment in the air and rush the goalie at the end of the game.

The NCAA tournament absolutely matters. Are we an elite program or are we just a big fish in a small pond? If we are serious about our self-image as a top program, getting the '67 and '70 teams back in the building to see another banner go up before they all die isn't just the cherry on the sundae. Cornell has had good enough teams to win it all. That's the ultimate prize.

[Scersk '97]

I do. NCAA success would be enormously sweet icing on any particular great season, but I far more enjoy and get personally invested in continued dominance over our peeps. In the NCAAs, whatever happens happens.

Seeing how dominant we were in 2003 and yet how a couple of bad bounces could end and then did end a wonderful season on a somewhat sour note taught me to have reasonable expectations. If, however, we continue to be dominant in the ECACs, another NCAA championship will happen in the fullness of time, as it did for Yale when they had almost stopped looking for it and as it did for that dominant Union team. I may not be around for it, but eventually the thousand celestial monkeys banging out the ticker tape of fate will hit upon our name.

Bad bounces and bad luck happen just as often in the ECAC, though. In 2019, Galajda got trapped in the net and the refs didn't stop play—end result, Galajda was lost for the remainder of the season. Then, minutes later, the refs missed an offsides call against Clarkson, which scored the OT winner against Austin McGrath to win the ECAC title.

The difference between NCAA and ECAC is that Cornell has shown time and again over the past 25 years that it is an elite ECAC team, winning the tournament as much as anyone else. It has *not* achieved the same at the NCAA tournament. It has racked up ECAC trophies but an NCAA title eludes it. Meanwhile, two of our rivals have won the NCAA. An ECAC title is probably about 10 times more likely in a given season, but an NCAA title would be 10 times as sweet.

I think of the Cleary and the Whitelaw and the NCAA as separate achievements, unrelated to each other but all significant goals.

Winning the regular season title matters - it's the reward for months of watching weekends of winning hockey. Easy to make fun of when a team other than Cornell wins it and blows the tournament, but a valid achievement on its own.

Winning the ECAC tournament matters, and not just as a ticket-punching exercise. A genuine, independent goal. These are the teams we are most familiar with, we want to beat them, we want to see the kids toss their equipment in the air and rush the goalie at the end of the game.

The NCAA tournament absolutely matters. Are we an elite program or are we just a big fish in a small pond? If we are serious about our self-image as a top program, getting the '67 and '70 teams back in the building to see another banner go up before they all die isn't just the cherry on the sundae. Cornell has had good enough teams to win it all. That's the ultimate prize.

I was there for that unfortunate series of events in 2019. Jeff Malott's freak injury was another big blow. Just somehow not our year, and losses in Lake Placid are crushing.

Yet, within the ECAC, I expect us to be so dominant that we can overcome just about anything. I also believe in our ECAC tournament magic, although that's being stretched thin these days. We are never going to be that dominant in the wider NCAA; in fact, I would say no team can be and that's part of the attraction of college hockey right now. We need a bit of puck luck, as does everyone else.

I suppose it's just a matter of emphasis. You both might rank things (1) NCAAs, (2) Whitelaw, (3) Cleary; I rank them (1) Whitelaw, (2) NCAAs, (3) Cleary.

For me—as a fan—it is a matter of atmosphere: the ECAC tournament, particularly now that we are back in Lake Placid, is a great time; the NCAA fan experience continues to degrade into NHL-lite, with far too little emphasis on current student involvement and the uniqueness of the college hockey atmosphere. Not the particular displeasure of attending games at Quinnipiac's rink yet, but getting there. Too much $$$; not enough old-timey fun.

For the boys, I'm sure it all matters, and I'm sure they want to keep playing as long as they can every year. I hope they can look back fondly at some point on seasons that end without a national championship. Perhaps I'm getting old, but I'm starting to be able to believe that it's the process that counts and remains.

[Trotsky]

The crown jewel of every season (IMO) is winning the ECACs so I would say that taking the title in Lake Placid is the season. The NC$$ is a nice treat afterwards, but it's almost like exhibition games.  Wildly fun to win, but dénouement.

Cornell has beaten Q and should have beaten Clarkson -- they can hold their own against the conference's royalty, at least over SSS.  So like every year my attention is fixed on the ECACs to cap the season.  Win that and this goes down as an A plus.

You keep saying this but I'm not sure everyone agrees. After watching Yale and Union win national championships, winning the national championship is very much on the radar

This is one of those takes that, were I to express it, half the forum would call for me to be banned, flayed, exiled to the Fighting Sioux forum, etc. I don't think anyone here besides Trotsky believes it.

I do. NCAA success would be enormously sweet icing on any particular great season, but I far more enjoy and get personally invested in continued dominance over our peeps. In the NCAAs, whatever happens happens.

Seeing how dominant we were in 2003 and yet how a couple of bad bounces could end and then did end a wonderful season on a somewhat sour note taught me to have reasonable expectations. If, however, we continue to be dominant in the ECACs, another NCAA championship will happen in the fullness of time, as it did for Yale when they had almost stopped looking for it and as it did for that dominant Union team. I may not be around for it, but eventually the thousand celestial monkeys banging out the ticker tape of fate will hit upon our name.

Bad bounces and bad luck happen just as often in the ECAC, though. In 2019, Galajda got trapped in the net and the refs didn't stop play—end result, Galajda was lost for the remainder of the season. Then, minutes later, the refs missed an offsides call against Clarkson, which scored the OT winner against Austin McGrath to win the ECAC title.

The difference between NCAA and ECAC is that Cornell has shown time and again over the past 25 years that it is an elite ECAC team, winning the tournament as much as anyone else. It has *not* achieved the same at the NCAA tournament. It has racked up ECAC trophies but an NCAA title eludes it. Meanwhile, two of our rivals have won the NCAA. An ECAC title is probably about 10 times more likely in a given season, but an NCAA title would be 10 times as sweet.

I think of the Cleary and the Whitelaw and the NCAA as separate achievements, unrelated to each other but all significant goals.

Winning the regular season title matters - it's the reward for months of watching weekends of winning hockey. Easy to make fun of when a team other than Cornell wins it and blows the tournament, but a valid achievement on its own.

Winning the ECAC tournament matters, and not just as a ticket-punching exercise. A genuine, independent goal. These are the teams we are most familiar with, we want to beat them, we want to see the kids toss their equipment in the air and rush the goalie at the end of the game.

The NCAA tournament absolutely matters. Are we an elite program or are we just a big fish in a small pond? If we are serious about our self-image as a top program, getting the '67 and '70 teams back in the building to see another banner go up before they all die isn't just the cherry on the sundae. Cornell has had good enough teams to win it all. That's the ultimate prize.

I understand and respect people who feel this way, I just feel differently.  Quite likely because during my first three undergrad years we did not even make the ECAC tournament, for me Boston Garden / Lake Placid / Miscellaneous Silly Locations will always be the capstone.  We each beat off to a different thing.

[billhoward]

Union (not RPI) anthem singer front, Cornell fans visible behind.  

Union announcers well into the first period used the same line Cornell broadcast people have been using at Lynah: "Fans seem to be a little slow filing in tonight."

[RichH]

RPI anthem singer front, Cornell fans visible behind.  

RPI announcers well into the first period used the same line Cornell broadcast people have been using at Lynah: "Fans seem to be a little slow filing in tonight."

Feel like I should correct you: it's Union.