Post-Game Thread Sat 2/28

[jy3]

some thoughts after chapter house and the drive back.

mckee was solid as usual. he had no chance on the clarkson goal as i think it hit a CU defensman in the skate and went in. i actually thought he made more than a couple good saves including good control over the puck and trapping the puck on saves to prevent rebounds.

cornell looked good 2nite except they could not find the back of the net more than twice. i think all around it was a solid effort.

the officiating was aweful both ways. murphy blew the call on the minor that lead to the clarkson goal. the forward was dancing on his skates and fell down on his own. aweful call. then murphy blew his whistle too quickly leading to a shorthander waved off that would have been a goal for clarkson. a lot of dangerous hits ignored and then some phantom interference calls that just baffled me. plenty of hitting from behind and boarding that was not call as well as plenty of dirty and cheap shots from clarksons #42.

the game winning goal was an awesome shot by moulson. the reason the cornell player was on top of the sieve was because a clarkson defensman was on top of him.

unfortunately i will be unable to make the playoff games. i may have vouchers available...

[dss28]

Any word on Flemenella's condition?  I'm not one to revel in another player's pain... is he okay?

[Keith K \'93]

This may not be a stellar year for the ECAC. But finishing in 2nd place, one point out of 1st plus sharing the Ivy title in a rebuilding year is pretty sweet.

[Greg Berge]

Only need to compare what happened in 87, 93, and 98, the other years we took huge talent hits.

The guys should be proud.  Also, this is the first time Cornell has finished 4th or better for 5 straight seasons since the ten year string between 1966 and 1975: http://members.cox.net/tbrw/cornellHistory/cornellRSBargraph.html

So, Mike has something to shoot for.  ;-)

[LB]

If we, knock on wood, win out. Provided Colgate makes it to the finals....does the ECAC send two teams to the NCAAs?

It's always irks me when we can only get one team into the tournament....

[RedAR]

I think Colgate is currently on the bubble, and if they lose to any teams from this point out, they'll most likely be on the outside, looking in.

[Steve Marciniec \'85]

RedAR wrote:

I think Colgate is currently on the bubble, and if they lose to any teams from this point out, they'll most likely be on the outside, looking in.

Colgate moved up to 13th from 14th in the PWR even though they only split against two teams with bad records.

Colgate has a very good chance at an at large bid, even if they lose a game before the ECAC championship.  They don't, however, control their own destiny.  A lot depends on what happens to the other bubble teams, and to teams on the "TUC bubble" (those that have an RPI just above or below 0.500).

[RedAR]

From what I've read, a lot of the strength of Colgates PWR comes by barely edging out TUC comparisons with certain teams.  If they lose a game to any TUC at this point, their PWR will drop significantly because the comparison will flip.

I don't understand this this stuff all too well, so if someone with a more mathematical explanation can jump in, I'd appreciate it.  But if I understand things correctly, Colgate will retain the #13 ranking only if they win out.  A single loss to a TUC at this point will put them in a 3 way tie with other teams, and Colgate loses the tie-breaker with the other teams.

[DeltaOne81]

Few things:

Colgate at-large: 13 would be the absolute last spot to make it at-large, 15 and 16 will go to the MAAC/CHA champ (as usual), and if Colgate doesn't win the ECAC, then 14 would go to the ECAC champ, so they'd have to lose but not drop (rough), and have no other of the 'Big 4' have a significant upset (more feasible). So we'll see, but it won't be easy.

Murphy: jy3 said it perfectly in the "officiating was awful both ways" paragraph. I'll add one (maybe biased thing) though. There were a lot of awful no-calls, but I think we by far got the worst of the awful "yes-calls". The one that lead to the Clarkson goal, and I can think of TWO in the third that I am SURE (from my perspective) were just a Clarkson player hitting the ice without (or with barely) being touched. But it's not like he was good the other way either.

Our second goal: I was lucky enough to be in CTB yesterday a bit after 11 when they were replaying the game on tv. I was our 2nd goal and saw it in replay 2 or 3 times. The Clarkson guy hooked/tripped/stick between the legs/pushed over Hynes (or whoever it was). Hynes landed on the ice in the crease and slide UNDER Traylen's right leg. He wasn't on top of him, he was under him, knocking him and keeping him somewhat off balance, when Moulson buried it a second later in the top-right (from his perspective).

Traylen has every right to be pissed off from his perspective, he was clearly interfered with, but it wasn't our fault. As for Clarkson people saying Hynes (?) could have gotten up, yes, he could have, but he was UNDER Traylen, so getting up would have knocked Traylen over and then the goal would certainly have been waived off. The smartest thing to do from his perspective was lay there for a second until after the shot. It's a sucky situation for all involved, but it *was* started by Clarkson roughness in the crease. Perhaps the "fairest" call woulda been no goal/2 minutes for tripping/hooking/roughing, but after the 3 or 4 phantom calls against us (one leading to a goal), I feel it was kinda justice :-D .

[Section A]

top 15 results from the weekend:

Team        (First Place)    Record  Pts   
 1 Boston College       (40)    25-3-4  600     W, L (New Hampshire)
 2 North Dakota                 22-6-3  552     W, W (Minnesota-Duluth)
 3 Maine                        23-6-3  506     L, W (Mass.-Lowell)
 4 Michigan                     23-8-1  474     L, L (Notre Dame)
 5 Minnesota-Duluth             22-8-3  465     L, L (North Dakota)
 6 Wisconsin                    18-9-7  379     W, W (Alaska-Anchorage)
 7 Minnesota                   20-11-3  374     L, L (Denver)
 8 New Hampshire               17-10-5  280     L, W (Boston College)
 9 St. Cloud State             18-10-4  260     L, L (Colorado College)
10 Miami                       18-11-3  256     T, W (Western Michigan)
11 Denver                      19-10-5  202     W, W (Minnesota)
12 Ohio State                  20-14-0  135     idle
13 Colgate                      18-9-5  119     L, W (Clarkson, St. Lawrence)
14 Michigan State              21-14-1   92     idle
15 Massachusetts                16-9-6   30     idle 

Meanwhile, teams ranked #16-#20 (Colorado College, Brown, Cornell, Notre Dame, RPI) went a combined 9-1-0 this weekend.



Post Edited (02-29-04 15:42)

[Section A]

Anyone know how much, if any, of the ECAC tournament will be on TV? I know the Final Four in Albany will be on CSTV. Is that it though?

[Al DeFlorio]

Avash '05 wrote:

Anyone know how much, if any, of the ECAC tournament will be on TV? I know the Final Four in Albany will be on CSTV. Is that it though?

I believe it's just the ECAC championship game that CSTV will televise.  On Friday night, they're showing the CHA championship game.::rolleyes::

As of now, at least, the TV package for the ECACs is not nearly as good as last year's.

[atb9]

Well, most of us.  Chief still is not used to it...  :-D

[atb9]

We don't rebuild!  We reload!    ;-)

[atb9]

Just got home from the weekend trip to Ithaca...

The first 30 minutes of the game against Clarkson was the best first 30 minutes of the season out of the games I've seen (home games, Albany, New England).  We will score.  The effort was awesome and Traylen got lucky with flailing, diving saves/misses/posts--ugh!

Nickerson was not impressive from the get go.  We got in his head all night...he made a lot of mistakes, never got a big shot on net, slammed his stick on the ice a bunch of times, looked slow, and generally played like a goon (but some said the same about Murray his first year and look how he turned out).  We did a bunch of overweight chants in B and I especially rid him for being fat when he got in the box.

McKee gave Nickerson a long embrace during the handshakes...anyone know their connection and want to save me from researching?

I really liked Cook bringing the puck out of the d zone on the rush and there were no fancy loopings around the net before the break out!  Maybe we have found our solution?

Wow, Murphy sucks.  Against RPI he called nothing--completely swallowing the whistle and then this weekend he calls a lot of dinky, questionable calls (missing diving and skaters simply tripping over their own feet) and misses huge, dangerous hits.

George, I hope you watched the game film today.  You whined and complained all night to Murphy and every time you were wrong.  Maybe that's how you level with Murphy but to me you looked like a fool.  I hope you enjoyed your first trip to Ithaca, sucka.