Cornell vs Denver, NC$$ First Round, 3/27/26

[BearLover]

[ But he also deserves some of the blame for the fact we did not improve down the stretch. At the end of the day, we went 2-3 in the most important games of the season and didn't play very well in them.

And Casey is accountable to that, right?  He almost there literally said that:

"I thought we might have peaked maybe a month too early," Jones said. "I'm not sure if we hit a wall a little bit with our youth. I'm not sure. ... But we were trying to find our A-game down the stretch. We were really trying."

To me, that quote is accountability.

Oh yes. I'm sure he'd be the first to take accountability for it. Even if mentioning it on here pisses off a lot of ELynah posters.

[stereax]

[ But he also deserves some of the blame for the fact we did not improve down the stretch. At the end of the day, we went 2-3 in the most important games of the season and didn't play very well in them.

And Casey is accountable to that, right?  He almost there literally said that:

"I thought we might have peaked maybe a month too early," Jones said. "I'm not sure if we hit a wall a little bit with our youth. I'm not sure. ... But we were trying to find our A-game down the stretch. We were really trying."

To me, that quote is accountability.

Oh yes. I'm sure he'd be the first to take accountability for it. Even if mentioning it on here pisses off a lot of ELynah posters.

Didn't he also take accountability for perhaps focusing on the staff a little too much?

What preceded this is even more interesting:

"I think we have a good staff. That was my main priority this year, and I left our captains a little bit on an island there with bringing our young guys along. I'm trying to bring our staff along, get us all on the same page." 1/2
"So we had some missteps. If I look back at it, I'd like some gimmes,  and little do-overs and some things I did this year as a coach in my first year. But overall, proud that I thought we got on the same page." 2/2

[stereax]

Everyone holds a piece of the blame, IMO

Penalties taken, passes missed, turnovers, faceoffs not won.....

Every piece of the puzzle needs to complete the entire game

It's not just on Casey or any single person

I feel like at some point, when you get to "everyone is to blame", you circle back into "you can't really blame anyone here".

Shit happens. It's hockey. It's why you play the games.

It's easy to blame someone when you see their mistake directly cost you the game - like a terrible clear by a Princeton player that lets Dartmouth win it in overtime. But in a game where it was just - everyone being outmatched - it's hard to point fingers, especially with a clear conscience.

(Plus, I feel like blaming individual players for losing games - besides the most basic fuckups - both a) is Pecknoldy and b) ignores that it's a game of inches played out over 60 minutes where thousands of microdecisions affect the outcome.)

I just think we were outmatched, simple as, and once you get into the 2-0, 3-0 hole after 20-30 minutes, it's incredibly difficult to claw back up. Especially when you're not playing shitty ECAC teams and instead a legit title contender who can shut you down. And then you get into the mental games of it all too.

I think we're so pessimistic right now in part because our skid came at the end of the season. I mean, most of us were on Cloud 9 at this point last year, even despite the BU elimination, because we got hot at the right time. It felt like we gave it all we possibly could. When we sputtered out in February this time and couldn't work it back, well, it looks worse because the recent games weren't good. (Strangely enough, us beginning to sputter out coincides with a super long roadstand... just saying...)

[Bluelightning]

     Every time I get disappointed, I have to remind myself that we are kind of playing with house money. We dressed 7+ freshman every game including a goalie. We have a new coaching staff (Casey's first solo year in Cornell). I think everyone would have taken 22 wins back in October. They had us all thinking great things late January...which turns out to be unfair. I think this team ca beat anyone when we bring out A+ game. But anything less that A+ won't get it done as young as we are.
    I wanted to beat Denver because nobody really gave us a chance. Not much talk of an upset or "we are a dangerous team".  Ugh to that now.
     I know he's not elite like Walsh or Castagna, but Jack O'Brien was solid this season. Very few mistakes, didn't seem like he took any bad penalties, and just a solid gritty defenseman. Really came to appreciate him
     

[adamw]

One of the differences between Mike Schafer and Casey Jones is that Casey is more willing to be forthcoming and introspective in his thoughts. Coach Schafer was usually more guarded - publicly - if not defiant sometimes.

They are both GREAT coaches. That doesn't mean they never make a mistake. And hindsight is 20/20. Casey shouldn't be looked at as a lesser coach just because he's more honest about what MAYBE were mistakes. It just means he's more willing to contemplate those things publicly. Praise him for that.

So set all of that aside in order to judge performance.

Fact is, this team was always going to be in transition, and shouldn't have been expected to be as good as last year's team. A lot younger, more skilled in many ways, lots of turnover, including behind the bench. Those are big deals. It's frankly remarkable they made the NCAAs at all.

Going forward, they are set up for a great future. And we'll see. Get back to me if this turns into an annual thing where Cornell wilts a bit in the last month.

Casey's coaching style is also different than Mike's ... not as much cycling, more making plays in transition. Sometimes when that doesn't work with a young team, it can look uglier. Turnovers, hard to set up in the zone.  It's not like the coaches don't know this.  It's a transition year.  They got that far despite that.  Again, if it continues to look messy for years on end, then you can criticize.  But a transformation was taking place this year.  Let's see how it goes.  I think people should be excited.

[stereax]

One of the differences between Mike Schafer and Casey Jones is that Casey is more willing to be forthcoming and introspective in his thoughts. Coach Schafer was usually more guarded - publicly - if not defiant sometimes.

They are both GREAT coaches. That doesn't mean they never make a mistake. And hindsight is 20/20. Casey shouldn't be looked at as a lesser coach just because he's more honest about what MAYBE were mistakes. It just means he's more willing to contemplate those things publicly. Praise him for that.

So set all of that aside in order to judge performance.

Fact is, this team was always going to be in transition, and shouldn't have been expected to be as good as last year's team. A lot younger, more skilled in many ways, lots of turnover, including behind the bench. Those are big deals. It's frankly remarkable they made the NCAAs at all.

Going forward, they are set up for a great future. And we'll see. Get back to me if this turns into an annual thing where Cornell wilts a bit in the last month.

Casey's coaching style is also different than Mike's ... not as much cycling, more making plays in transition. Sometimes when that doesn't work with a young team, it can look uglier. Turnovers, hard to set up in the zone.  It's not like the coaches don't know this.  It's a transition year.  They got that far despite that.  Again, if it continues to look messy for years on end, then you can criticize.  But a transformation was taking place this year.  Let's see how it goes.  I think people should be excited.

I mean, hell, this team did 1 game worse than last team. Both in the ECACs and on the national level.

I think we'd all take that at the start of the year.

Also, Casey hockey is fun. I like Casey hockey.

I feel like, whatever mistakes MAYBE were made, the coaching staff will now learn from and build upon. And that's the critical thing - you can "fail", so long as you learn from it and work to mitigate it moving forward.

Forwards and onwards. I can't wait for next season.

[Dafatone]

Again, we replaced literally more than half a starting lineup. Two full forward lines, two d pairs, a starting goalie, and a coach.

The fact that we were in the same ballpark this year as last year is borderline miraculous.

[Trotsky]

One of the differences between Mike Schafer and Casey Jones is that Casey is more willing to be forthcoming and introspective in his thoughts. Coach Schafer was usually more guarded - publicly - if not defiant sometimes.

Mike understood the media are snakes.  Casey will learn.

[Trotsky]

Again, we replaced literally more than half a starting lineup. Two full forward lines, two d pairs, a starting goalie, and a coach.

The fact that we were in the same ballpark this year as last year is borderline miraculous.

It is.  I would have said we had a 40% chance of finishing in the bottom 6.

Next season I see us as a top 3 league contender with as good a chance at the championship as anybody, and then a very good shot at a 5th dingleberry in a row.

[Snowball]

One of the differences between Mike Schafer and Casey Jones is that Casey is more willing to be forthcoming and introspective in his thoughts. Coach Schafer was usually more guarded - publicly - if not defiant sometimes.

They are both GREAT coaches. That doesn't mean they never make a mistake. And hindsight is 20/20. Casey shouldn't be looked at as a lesser coach just because he's more honest about what MAYBE were mistakes. It just means he's more willing to contemplate those things publicly. Praise him for that.

So set all of that aside in order to judge performance.

Fact is, this team was always going to be in transition, and shouldn't have been expected to be as good as last year's team. A lot younger, more skilled in many ways, lots of turnover, including behind the bench. Those are big deals. It's frankly remarkable they made the NCAAs at all.

Going forward, they are set up for a great future. And we'll see. Get back to me if this turns into an annual thing where Cornell wilts a bit in the last month.

Casey's coaching style is also different than Mike's ... not as much cycling, more making plays in transition. Sometimes when that doesn't work with a young team, it can look uglier. Turnovers, hard to set up in the zone.  It's not like the coaches don't know this.  It's a transition year.  They got that far despite that.  Again, if it continues to look messy for years on end, then you can criticize.  But a transformation was taking place this year.  Let's see how it goes.  I think people should be excited.

I'm completely with you on this.

One of the things I actually respect most about Casey is exactly what you pointed out: the willingness to be self-reflective in public. That's not weakness, that's confidence.

Honesty about what might not have worked isn't a knock on Casey. If anything, it should be praised. It shows he's thinking critically and planning for the future.

And Casey's  not Rand, he's not Rand, he's not Rand. Thank God!

Stepping back, the bigger picture matters. This was always a transition year, yet the team exceeded everybody's expectation. The fact they had the wins that they did and made the tournament again is impressive.

Plenty of reason to be optimistic.

[jtwcornell91]

Thank you to Casey Jones, the athletic department, hell, the whole team for embarrassing ourselves like this on a national stage.

You signed up to post this crap?

I, and I'm guessing most here, are proud of this team.

Unfortunately the new forum still doesn't have a mute/block feature.

[ursusminor]

I prefer the Russian bots...

Assuming that iowabasedtraveler is the same one who uses that handle on USCHO, he is a Colgate fan. https://fanforum.uscho.com/members/iowabasedtraveler.11417/

[Dafatone]

I prefer the Russian bots...

Assuming that iowabasedtraveler is the same one who uses that handle on USCHO, he is a Colgate fan. https://fanforum.uscho.com/members/iowabasedtraveler.11417/

Good lord. Intersection of Iowa and Colgate. What could be worse.

[stereax]

gonna need this thing to shut the fuck up

[BearLover]

Like I said, Casey deserves a lot of the credit and also some of the blame. Doesn't mean he's a bad coach or that these problems will repeat themselves. It was a good year overall. But when the entire team plateaued or even regressed down the stretch, the buck stops with him. I don't expect that to happen next season.