Cornell at Harvard 11/16

[abmarks]

... I can't tell how much of it is missing the players who are hurt and how much is the resulting line shuffling ...

since you know this i wish you would calm down. i know you didn't like the casey jones hire but he's not even in charge yet. let the team weather the injuries and see what the full strength squad looks like instead of rending your garments after every bad shift.

Oh I didn't really have issues with the CJ hire. I was skeptical then that CJ would bring success, and I am even more skeptical now, seeing that Clarkson is off to a good start this year and Cornell seems to have regressed. But it's not clear to me who would have been a better realistic option anyway.

Cornell has been extremely error-prone this year. It's not just the injuries. That plus heinous special teams tells me it's a strategic issue more than anything. If I didn't think the team were capable of being good I wouldn't be so aggravated. It feels like we're blowing a great opportunity.

It's only been 6 games.   Not exactly a large sample size.

And I don't see how you end up at the team have a "strategic issue".   Injuries dont point at strategy.  Taking your argument about being error prone, that doesn't point to strategy either, that points to execution. Look back at the breakaway v Harvard that Regi raced back to break up from behind...from the stream it looked like a plain old bad bounce at the blue line that let the puck out of the o-zone. Whether it's execution or puck luck, that chance wasn't about strategy.  

As for special teams, part of that has got to losing seger and his faceoff mastery.  The injuries have to hurt a lot here as well.  It'd be interesting to see how many different pp and pk unit combos have been used so far this year, it's got to be unusually high.from the injuries and then add in bancrofts game misconduct.

We might not have looked good in many spots so far, but we're 3-1-2, with our sole loss being by one goal.  We're sitting 8th in RPI.

Could we have more points? Absolutely.    
Could we have fewer points?  Probably even more likely.

I'll take the glass half full here. We are out of sync and playing ugly, but we're more than treading water. We might even be overachieving once you factor in the injury bug.

Bearlover, what specifically are the strategic errors you think are being made? I may disagree with you almost always, but usually there's meat on the bone from your end. But you've provided nothing to support your strategy and coaching argument.

What are you arguing we're doing wrong strategically?

[BearLover]

I looked back at the highlights and a few things:

There were several stupid or unnecessary penalties...on both sides. The Bancroft hit that resulted in the major got a lot of attention but the boarding penalty Harvard's MacDonald took late in the 3rd was peak idiocy and resulted in Cornell tying the game on a nice low-slot passing play.

The 2nd Harvard goal should've been called back for being offside. I wasn't sure at first in real time since I was at the other end of the ice, but on the highlights, it's clear that a portion of the puck was over the blue line. Too bad Cornell couldn't challenge at that point.

The 1st Harvard goal was some of the worst PK coverage I've ever seen. No way should a player be left alone like that in front of the net. Net front defense improved as the game went on but definitely some of the same issues we saw last weekend

Was there another angle that they showed of the potential offsides? From the main camera angle, I saw no sliver of ice in between the puck and the blue line, and certainly not anything to overturn the call on the ice (good goal). But maybe another angle showed differently? FWIW, Schafer could have challenged, but Cornell would have gotten a penalty if he lost. They have an assistant upstairs who monitors these things, and he must have deemed it not worth the risk.

[arugula]

We never led the whole weekend. Considering that, 2 points is ok

Rego was a beast last night.

The Harvard announcers were quite good.

[Trotsky]

We never led the whole weekend. Considering that, 2 points is ok

I think we aim for 4 points every weekend for cromulence and 5 for happiness.  The first two weekends we got 4 and 2 points respectively, so we are -2 at the moment.  Let's get back on beam.

[arugula]

We never led the whole weekend. Considering that, 2 points is ok

I think we aim for 4 points every weekend for cromulence and 5 for happiness.  The first two weekends we got 4 and 2 points respectively, so we are -2 at the moment.  Let's get back on beam.

Obviously but as the announcers said, good teams win when they play well, great teams win when they play badly. With all the injuries and not quite being in synch, and not leading all weekend, this was not a disaster.

[BearLover]

We never led the whole weekend. Considering that, 2 points is ok

I think we aim for 4 points every weekend for cromulence and 5 for happiness.  The first two weekends we got 4 and 2 points respectively, so we are -2 at the moment.  Let's get back on beam.

It's more about the pairwise. Shootout points don't matter for that. If we play North Dakota, a win and a tie is a good weekend. If we beat and tie Yale and Brown at home, that's not a good weekend. If we lose and tie to Harvard and Dartmouth, even on the road, that's a very bad weekend. Do we have national title aspirations? If so, this has been a bad start. We've dug ourselves a hole in the Pairwise. The PWR itself won't start to shake out for another few weeks, but we'd be outside the NCAA if you extrapolate the first six games across the rest of the season.

ECAC standings aren't that important. All that really matters is getting a first round bye. If we aren't a top 4 ECAC team, then we're having a very bad year. If we are, then all that matters is the Pairwise anyway because we've already achieved the most important prize of the ECAC regular season.

[Dafatone]

We never led the whole weekend. Considering that, 2 points is ok

I think we aim for 4 points every weekend for cromulence and 5 for happiness.  The first two weekends we got 4 and 2 points respectively, so we are -2 at the moment.  Let's get back on beam.

It's more about the pairwise. Shootout points don't matter for that. If we play North Dakota, a win and a tie is a good weekend. If we beat and tie Yale and Brown at home, that's not a good weekend. If we lose and tie to Harvard and Dartmouth, even on the road, that's a very bad weekend. Do we have national title aspirations? If so, this has been a bad start. We've dug ourselves a hole in the Pairwise. The PWR itself won't start to shake out for another few weeks, but we'd be outside the NCAA if you extrapolate the first six games across the rest of the season.

ECAC standings aren't that important. All that really matters is getting a first round bye. If we aren't a top 4 ECAC team, then we're having a very bad year. If we are, then all that matters is the Pairwise anyway because we've already achieved the most important prize of the ECAC regular season.

The pairwise is 99% just RPI, with maybe a few irregularities from head to head and common opponents here and there.

We're 8th in RPI.

[BearLover]

We never led the whole weekend. Considering that, 2 points is ok

I think we aim for 4 points every weekend for cromulence and 5 for happiness.  The first two weekends we got 4 and 2 points respectively, so we are -2 at the moment.  Let's get back on beam.

It's more about the pairwise. Shootout points don't matter for that. If we play North Dakota, a win and a tie is a good weekend. If we beat and tie Yale and Brown at home, that's not a good weekend. If we lose and tie to Harvard and Dartmouth, even on the road, that's a very bad weekend. Do we have national title aspirations? If so, this has been a bad start. We've dug ourselves a hole in the Pairwise. The PWR itself won't start to shake out for another few weeks, but we'd be outside the NCAA if you extrapolate the first six games across the rest of the season.

ECAC standings aren't that important. All that really matters is getting a first round bye. If we aren't a top 4 ECAC team, then we're having a very bad year. If we are, then all that matters is the Pairwise anyway because we've already achieved the most important prize of the ECAC regular season.

The pairwise is 99% just RPI, with maybe a few irregularities from head to head and common opponents here and there.

We're 8th in RPI.

I get that. I'm saying that RPI is pretty meaningless at this point with so few games played (at least for the Ivies). It's too circular to conclude anything. For example: Princeton is 1-2-1 against H,D,Y,B and is 24th in the PWR.

[BearLover]

... I can't tell how much of it is missing the players who are hurt and how much is the resulting line shuffling ...

since you know this i wish you would calm down. i know you didn't like the casey jones hire but he's not even in charge yet. let the team weather the injuries and see what the full strength squad looks like instead of rending your garments after every bad shift.

Oh I didn't really have issues with the CJ hire. I was skeptical then that CJ would bring success, and I am even more skeptical now, seeing that Clarkson is off to a good start this year and Cornell seems to have regressed. But it's not clear to me who would have been a better realistic option anyway.

Cornell has been extremely error-prone this year. It's not just the injuries. That plus heinous special teams tells me it's a strategic issue more than anything. If I didn't think the team were capable of being good I wouldn't be so aggravated. It feels like we're blowing a great opportunity.

It's only been 6 games.   Not exactly a large sample size.

And I don't see how you end up at the team have a "strategic issue".   Injuries dont point at strategy.  Taking your argument about being error prone, that doesn't point to strategy either, that points to execution. Look back at the breakaway v Harvard that Regi raced back to break up from behind...from the stream it looked like a plain old bad bounce at the blue line that let the puck out of the o-zone. Whether it's execution or puck luck, that chance wasn't about strategy.  

As for special teams, part of that has got to losing seger and his faceoff mastery.  The injuries have to hurt a lot here as well.  It'd be interesting to see how many different pp and pk unit combos have been used so far this year, it's got to be unusually high.from the injuries and then add in bancrofts game misconduct.

We might not have looked good in many spots so far, but we're 3-1-2, with our sole loss being by one goal.  We're sitting 8th in RPI.

Could we have more points? Absolutely.    
Could we have fewer points?  Probably even more likely.

I'll take the glass half full here. We are out of sync and playing ugly, but we're more than treading water. We might even be overachieving once you factor in the injury bug.

Bearlover, what specifically are the strategic errors you think are being made? I may disagree with you almost always, but usually there's meat on the bone from your end. But you've provided nothing to support your strategy and coaching argument.

What are you arguing we're doing wrong strategically?

First of all, I'm pretty sure the first PP unit of Bancroft-Walsh-Major-Castagna-Robertson has been the exact same for almost the entire year (obviously Bancroft got DQ'd last night). Off the second PP unit, they've lost Psenicka and Mack at points I think.

On strategy/coaching, I'm no expert. On the PP and the offense more broadly, there's little fluidity and way too much hesitating. I actually thought this improved somewhat this past weekend.  On the PK, Cornell has done a horrible job tying up/boxing out guys in front of the net. They've been scored on this way by Harvard and twice by Yale and probably some other times I've forgotten. Traditionally, with Syer coaching the PK, Cornell has rarely given up these types of goals. Given that the players are almost exactly the same as last year's team while the coaches are different, that suggests to me it's a coaching issue. More broadly, special teams are probably the two most coachable part of hockey, and it is special teams where Cornell has failed the most this season, by far.

When I watch Cornell play, I can tell their players are good. Moreover, they were good for a full season last year. The issue is that their decisionmaking has been terrible. Bad turnovers, converging on the wrong guy on the PK, failing to clear the puck even with time and space. That's a coaching issue as much as anything. If the players aren't executing, the coaches need to better coach them how to execute.

[Scersk '97]

Traditionally, with Syer coaching the PK, Cornell has rarely given up these types of goals.

We were 37th in the nation last year; thus, not exactly "tearing it up" in Syer's last year. It irked me all last year.

PK is personnel and dedication. We've traditionally had some "hard men"-type seniors who make it a point of pride. Andreev comes to mind. If this year's seniors want to have a great year, someone will have to step up.

I'm sure someone will.

[Trotsky]

Whether it's PWR or RPI or conference percentage the prescription is the same.  Just win.

I try to capture a feeling for where we are in terms of ECAC warmth during the season -- it's a vibe check.  Given expectations the goal should be to get to orange (5 over .500) as soon as possible and then march relentlessly towards red (10 over) to number among the best Schafer squads. I am personally hoping we can move into the orange by game 11 and into the red by game 22.  That would feel good.  NC RS games will take care of themselves, and they have a great start.

And then the post-season is a crapshoot.

But at the end of the day: just win baby.

[Trotsky]

On the PP and the offense more broadly, there's little fluidity and way too much hesitating. I actually thought this improved somewhat this past weekend.

Our guys seem rooted to one spot on pp.  They try to open lanes by passing back and forth forcing the defenders to adjust.  But a good pp combines that passing with movement, both by the guy with the puck and the potential pass recipients.  It makes defense 100x harder.  It also makes playmaking 100x harder but I swear our players have the intelligence and skills.  Making the environment harder helps IMO separate the better teams -- it helps us say pull away from Brown so we don't need a miracle finish.

[arugula]

Tie resolution has been:

10 mins 5x5
5 mins 5x5
5 mins 3x3

The last of which is garbage but what isn't since, say, the death of D. Boon.

I would say the death of Bob Stinson but I just wanted to recognize the reference.

[Scersk '97]

On the PP and the offense more broadly, there's little fluidity and way too much hesitating. I actually thought this improved somewhat this past weekend.

Our guys seem rooted to one spot on pp.  They try to open lanes by passing back and forth forcing the defenders to adjust.  But a good pp combines that passing with movement, both by the guy with the puck and the potential pass recipients.  It makes defense 100x harder.  It also makes playmaking 100x harder but I swear our players have the intelligence and skills.  Making the environment harder helps IMO separate the better teams -- it helps us say pull away from Brown so we don't need a miracle finish.

My problem is that they're hesitating too long after receiving passes. It's either good ol' indecision or taking too much time winding up for a wicked slappah. Instead, they should flick it on net every time we have a screen set up and close in to clean up the garbage. If a flick gets blocked, it usually doesn't end up squirting out past the blue line. We just have to track it down and try again.

We don't need to try to blow a hole through the goalie's chest every time. Just put it low and look for rebounds.

To address exactly what you describe, I agree that it's probably necessary against good teams to get a lot of movement that sets up slappahs. Against Brown, however, you just have to get it on net over and over and react quicker than they do, which we will.

[Trotsky]

Tie resolution has been:

10 mins 5x5
5 mins 5x5
5 mins 3x3

The last of which is garbage but what isn't since, say, the death of D. Boon.

I would say the death of Bob Stinson but I just wanted to recognize the reference.

Had no idea he was dead.

All rise for the Weltanschauung before ChildWorld.

"But hey, enjoy that videogame."