Cornell presence at Thursday's game

[jtwcornell91]

How many folks will be in Placid Thursday for the RPI-Dartmouth game?  I plan to don all my Cornell paraphenalia and go sit with the RPI fans.  B-]

Pre-game, some of us will be meeting at Mr. Mike's pizza on Main Street.  (Best pizza I've had in Lake Placid.)  We haven't fixed on a time, but since it's a 7:30 game, 5:30 should be plenty early.  (I want to be there for the start of warmups in case I get the urge to heckle Boucher for being a safety sieve. :-P)

[chrisatpc2]

Unfortunately, some of us (myself and 4 others included) will be still in sunny Ithaca on Thursday night taking prelims.  But have no doubt, we will be there on Friday.

[melissa]

you can count judy and i in - as long as no deer have anything to say about it!;-)

this is going to be a REALLY interesting week-end!

am thinking that sporting cornell stuff and sitting with RPI thurdsay to show support is in fact superb idea. LGR!

[Jim Hyla]

We will be there, but maybe not early enough to eat with you. I'm sure we can find you somehow.

[judy]

you can count judy and i in - as long as no deer have anything to say about it!

screw the deer. it didn't stop us last year...

and GO RED! (by this I mean, RPI on Thursday, Cornell the rest of the days)

[rhovorka]

am thinking that sporting cornell stuff and sitting with RPI thurdsay to show support is in fact superb idea.

NO!!!  As long as my team is still playing, I can't and won't show support to any other team, especially to R-P-frickin-I.  Frankly, the only thing I'll be rooting for on Thursday is a game that goes 26 overtimes and beats the hell out of the team that advances to play Cornell.

Also, just because we have 2 wins against them this year, doesn't mean that RPI is the less dangerous team.  In fact, I'd argue that RPI is the 2nd hottest team in the league right now, brimming with confidence after having felt they were robbed vs. Cornell, and the subsequent destruction of Colgate and Princeton.  

I've heard "I just don't wanna see Dartmouth in the playoffs" so many times since January it's old.  Well, that's tough, because they're one win away from it, so we better be ready.  If we can't beat them, we don't deserve to move on.  Dartmouth has had a weird season.   Go look at the game recaps on uscho for their wins since January.  Here are some snippets:
They scored three times in the last four minutes to beat RPI.
They scored three goals in 6 shots vs. Union to win.
They beat us with 1 minute left in OT.
They were down with 2 minutes left vs. Colgate and won in regulation
In the first QF game, they let Colgate score the go-ahead goal with 44 seconds remaining, and then tied it with 15 seconds to force OT (and they won in the 2nd OT).  

Dangerous, sure.  Explosive, possibly.  But all this came in the 3rd period, which shows they have a habit of getting down by the 3rd.  I'll take Cornell over anyone when given the task of locking down a 3rd period lead.  They played 6-7-4 since January in the regular season, including 5 losses and 2 ties to teams not even in the playoffs anymore (not to mention a loss to Vermont earlier in the year).  Gaudet seems like he doesn't know what to do with his goaltending situation.  As is with most teams in the ECAC, flip 2 of their miraculous wins I listed above, and they missed the playoffs.    

You can play the "Dartmouth has our number" card all you want.  Looking at that team I see a chance for revenge, and a less confident team.  We've gotta be able to beat everyone to win.

And how stupid would we look to root for a team Thursday only to get beat by that same team the next night?   ugh.  I'm rooting for nobody but Cornell.

[tml5]

I agree that RPI is just as dangerous, if not moreso, than Dartmouth.  I think Cornell matches up a little bit better with RPI in terms of skaters, but Marsters is generally better than anyone Dartmouth has in net.  Of course, if Dartmouth wins the PIG and Gaudet goes with Boucher, all bets are off - it'll either be impossible to score or Boucher will give up 2 soft goals early and get yanked.  He's had that kind of a season.

As for other factors - assuming a Cornell win in the SF RPI is the better opponent for ranking purposes.  Of course, assuming a Cornell win in the SF isn't really safe.

Bottom line, and as I think everyone here knows - it makes absolutely no difference who wins the PIG.  If Cornell loses, it'll hurt badly.  If Cornell wins, nobody will really care much.

I think Cornell fans should root for Dartmouth just because nobody else will.  :-P

[Melissa \'01]

In the last 24 hours, thinking about placid, i have come to the conclusion that it rally doesn't matter who plays cornell on friday. i feel confident that cornell can beat either team if they come out and put their best foot forward. yet, i still intend to cheer on RPI on thursaday. i have 2 reasons. 1) i wanna see that jerk Boucher go home ASAP and 2) I want to have the opportunity (note: i am not saying we will DEFINITELY win if we play RPI) to watch RPI eat thier words (whatever they actually were) about RPI being able to beat cornell.

Thus, LGR!

[Keith K]

As long as my team is still playing, I can't and won't show support to any other team,

Amen Rich.

[Al DeFlorio]

What Keith said.  Fly 'em in pizzas from Canton, but don't cheer for 'em. ::nut::

[twh2]

Screw RPI, THE SUCK!  Screw Dartmouth, THEY SWALLOW!  As far as I'm concerned, we've got a bone to pick with either one of these two pretenders, I feel a need for vengence on both of them, I cannot actively route for either one.  I know anything can happen in a single elimination tournament, but that aside if we cannot beat either of those two teams in our own playoff tournament when we're seeded #1 we don't deserve to move on to the NCAAs.

Cheers to everyone who made it already or will make it eventually to Placid.   LET'S GO RED, LET'S GO RED, LET'S GO RED, LET'S GO RED...

[Jeff Hopkins \'82]

I've never understood this concept of cheering for an opposing school because they'll cheer for us in return.  There is one team to cheer for - they wear Carnelian and White.  All others are something lower than pond scum and should be treated as such.

CU in Lake Placid (Section 12, row M).  LGR!!!

[jason]

Jeff, if your post is in response to John Whelan's initial post, I don't see where he's stating that he's going to cheer for RPI in the hopes that their fans will reciprocate in kind.  In fact, most of the posts here assume that John was going to sit with RPI as a some sign of allegiance --maybe he just wants to have fun ticking off some opposing fans and figures that he can get under the skin of the RPI fans with his Cornell paraphernalia more readily than the Dartmouth fans. (Ok, that's a stretch, since it struck me as well that John was saying that he planned to root for RPI given his Boucher-safety sieve comment.)

Also, I generally don't go so far as to actively cheer for another team, but I certainly will pull --and even be vocal about it-- for other teams when the results benefit my team. Saturday at Lynah, each time the Brown-Harvard score was announced I yelled out "Come on, Brown!"

[Keith K]

Pulling for another team because it helps Cornell's situation isn't rooting for them, it's rooting for Cornell.

The only good time to really root for another team is durnig the NCAAs when it's perfectly acceptable to root for an ECAC squad.  But then again that's essentially rooting for Cornell too - you want our conference to win because it makes us look better.

[judy]

add another reason. I don't want to hear Dartmouth's "pep band" any more than necessary  ::yark::