2023 NCAA QF: Cornell vs BU

[ugarte]

sloppy game after the first period but it's really a result of how much more scared we were of them than they were of us. they didn't give us any room to breathe or set up and we needed to respond with patience and instead it became timidity. right now we don't have the speed or precision or confidence to make a team pay for putting on pressure from end to end and the reward is more defensive pressure. it still starts for me with the fucking insane amount of time we sit behind the net before a breakout unless the other team completely retreats to the neutral zone.

our passes were all either held too long and snuffed out or rushed garbage that killed any flow. and my god how many times can one team chunk or fan on a decent look?

that said, we played really solid defense when we weren't in scramble mode because the offense coughed up the puck. they had so much more possession that losing 2-1 with a final chance at OT was getting off easy.

not a good day, and right on the heels of a great one. oh well. see you next year.

[Dunc]

Loss is devastating but BU deserved this one in the end and I'm happy with our growth this season... at least we got ourselves a couple banners out of it - that's more than Harvard can say

[RichH]

Without having watched BU throughout the year, I'm going to take a wild guess and say that this is that team's best defensive game of the season

Good coaching job by them. Doing what Harvard did to us last week.

Definitely. These one-and-done formats favor skilled teams that can actually play defense. Speed and skill can't be coached but defense definitely can be. Cornell is playing an overall good game but this is clearly a different BU team than the one in January

Well said. They were exceptional at shot-blocking. Beat us at our own game, really.

Our skating speed was there, but the stickhandling seemed so slow.

[scoop85]

sloppy game after the first period but it's really a result of how much more scared we were of them than they were of us. they didn't give us any room to breathe or set up and we needed to respond with patience and instead it became timidity. right now we don't have the speed or precision or confidence to make a team pay for putting on pressure from end to end and the reward is more defensive pressure. it still starts for me with the fucking insane amount of time we sit behind the net before a breakout unless the other team completely retreats to the neutral zone.

our passes were all either held too long and snuffed out or rushed garbage that killed any flow. and my god how many times can one team chunk or fan on a decent look?

that said, we played really solid defense when we weren't in scramble mode because the offense coughed up the puck. they had so much more possession that losing 2-1 with a final chance at OT was getting off easy.

not a good day, and right on the heels of a great one. oh well. see you next year.

Spot on

[Beeeej]

sloppy game after the first period but it's really a result of how much more scared we were of them than they were of us. they didn't give us any room to breathe or set up and we needed to respond with patience and instead it became timidity. right now we don't have the speed or precision or confidence to make a team pay for putting on pressure from end to end and the reward is more defensive pressure. it still starts for me with the fucking insane amount of time we sit behind the net before a breakout unless the other team completely retreats to the neutral zone.

our passes were all either held too long and snuffed out or rushed garbage that killed any flow. and my god how many times can one team chunk or fan on a decent look?

that said, we played really solid defense when we weren't in scramble mode because the offense coughed up the puck. they had so much more possession that losing 2-1 with a final chance at OT was getting off easy.

not a good day, and right on the heels of a great one. oh well. see you next year.

Spot on

Ditto.

[BearLover]

sloppy game after the first period but it's really a result of how much more scared we were of them than they were of us. they didn't give us any room to breathe or set up and we needed to respond with patience and instead it became timidity. right now we don't have the speed or precision or confidence to make a team pay for putting on pressure from end to end and the reward is more defensive pressure. it still starts for me with the fucking insane amount of time we sit behind the net before a breakout unless the other team completely retreats to the neutral zone.

our passes were all either held too long and snuffed out or rushed garbage that killed any flow. and my god how many times can one team chunk or fan on a decent look?

that said, we played really solid defense when we weren't in scramble mode because the offense coughed up the puck. they had so much more possession that losing 2-1 with a final chance at OT was getting off easy.

not a good day, and right on the heels of a great one. oh well. see you next year.

I agree with some of this, but I thought possession was pretty even. The big difference between the Denver game and this one was that on Thursday, a bounce went Cornell's way on the opening goal. Today, a bounce went BU's way. I think if Cornell had scored first, there's a good chance their defense would have allowed them to hold on to win. BU is just too talented and if they're smartly playing defense, coming from behind against them is almost impossible.

[Dafatone]

We played well. BU played well. Just wasn't meant to be.

BU definitely did a better job taking away space than Denver did.

[BearLover]

Even though Cornell was the underdog coming in and BU played a bit better overall, sometimes the underdog wins and sometimes the worse team wins. Schafer is now 1-8 in NCAA regionals finals. We're going to be the underdog and the worse team in most regional finals, but we should be winning them more than we have. It would be nice to get lucky for once.

[Dafatone]

Even though Cornell was the underdog coming in and BU played a bit better overall, sometimes the underdog wins and sometimes the worse team wins. Schafer is now 1-8 in NCAA regionals finals. We're going to be the underdog and the worse team in most regional finals, but we should be winning them more than we have. It would be nice to get lucky for once.

Our record in regional semis has to be pretty good though, right? Feel like most years we win one.

[BearLover]

Even though Cornell was the underdog coming in and BU played a bit better overall, sometimes the underdog wins and sometimes the worse team wins. Schafer is now 1-8 in NCAA regionals finals. We're going to be the underdog and the worse team in most regional finals, but we should be winning them more than we have. It would be nice to get lucky for once.

Our record in regional semis has to be pretty good though, right? Feel like most years we win one.

9-4. We've been lucky in the regional semis, unlucky in the regional finals.

[Dafatone]

Even though Cornell was the underdog coming in and BU played a bit better overall, sometimes the underdog wins and sometimes the worse team wins. Schafer is now 1-8 in NCAA regionals finals. We're going to be the underdog and the worse team in most regional finals, but we should be winning them more than we have. It would be nice to get lucky for once.

Our record in regional semis has to be pretty good though, right? Feel like most years we win one.

9-4. We've been lucky in the regional semis, unlucky in the regional finals.

Thanks. 10-12 combined is pretty good, since we've been the underdog more often than not. I guess it's 10-13 in total across the tournament.

But 9-4 one round, 1-8 the next, is unlikely.

[ugarte]

... I thought possession was pretty even.

in terms of "we knocked them off the puck and have it until we give it back" or "we have the puck and we're going to do something with it that looks like offense"? because it was a lot of the former and very little of the latter.

[dbilmes]

In the big games late in the season, our lack of elite offensive talent showed up. We were shut out in 8 of the last 10 periods we played. Perhaps we would have done better if Steinburg had time to work himself back into the lineup. Our power-play also fizzled once the post-season began. We didn't have any 5-minute majors against Union to get it back on track.

[RichH]

Even though Cornell was the underdog coming in and BU played a bit better overall, sometimes the underdog wins and sometimes the worse team wins. Schafer is now 1-8 in NCAA regionals finals. We're going to be the underdog and the worse team in most regional finals, but we should be winning them more than we have. It would be nice to get lucky for once.

Our record in regional semis has to be pretty good though, right? Feel like most years we win one.

9-4. We've been lucky in the regional semis, unlucky in the regional finals.

Thanks. 10-12 combined is pretty good, since we've been the underdog more often than not. I guess it's 10-13 in total across the tournament.

But 9-4 one round, 1-8 the next, is unlikely.

I happened to be looking it up today: Ted Donato is 1-7 in the first round. 2-8 overall. Harvard is 3-13 in the NCAA Tournament since Cleary retired in 1990, with the only wins coming in 1994 and 2017. They were 0-7 from 1955-1980, then 8-6 in the decade of the 1980s.

[Dafatone]

... I thought possession was pretty even.

in terms of "we knocked them off the puck and have it until we give it back" or "we have the puck and we're going to do something with it that looks like offense"? because it was a lot of the former and very little of the latter.

We got outshot 21-14, so a whole lot of nothing happened in both directions.

We actually had more total shot attempts, something like 46-43, but we took a lot of shots from distance that went right into a BU guy's ankles.