The actual GAME against Harvard

[ugarte]

Because the server crashed (and most of the usual suspects were in LP anyway), there wasn't any discussion about the game on the board.  (By the way, thanks to Age for getting it back up so quickly.)

OK, so we are in the tournament and the past is the past but. . .

We were outplayed on Saturday.  I thought that we were lucky to last as long as we did, and it was very disappointing to see.  We have a very solid D, but the offense never seemed in synch at all.  We didn't move the puck with what looked like a coherent goal, we seemed to dump-without-chase when there was very little pressure on the puck and our goals came from defensive breakdowns rather than well-played passing.  We made it to OT with Harvard, but I thought that they were the better team for the first 3 periods.  And we let a shitty goalie beat us by keeping the pressure off. It was as if we were constantly looking for the perfect shot when we were playing a goalie who will get beat with far less than perfect.

We started to play well in the first OT, but couldn't cash in.  Disappointing, but understandable.  The breaks don't always happen. And then we lost on what was a pretty soft goal.  Underhill looked like he had Moore in his sights, and he got beat anyway. Blech.

I'm glad that we have Quinnipiac to get our sea legs back, but we are going to have to play much better to compete with UNH.

[A-19]

i'm surprised that you didn't mention any of the officials' calls. ultimately, as i saw it (@ placid), three factors were instrumental: 1) harvard's tying goal with 15 seconds left in per two, 2) some of the most disgraceful and ridiculous breaks in officiating through the two overtime periods, and 3) our offense on breakaway mode instead of a full press. as per the first one, from row 4 in the cornell section (as underhill was on our side in per 2), it looked like he was hit by a harvard player with 30 sec left, and his stick was jerred from his hands. after making  a save, the action was still around the goalmouth, and as soon as he had a spare moment to grab his stick, harvard shot. with regards to the officiating, i was, along with every other cornell fan there, incredibly stupefied by the blatant bias in referree hansen's calls. i dunno what those of you listening to the game heard the commentator say, but i saw hornby get tackled numerous times, and he didn't retalliate, hoping for a call. this was the story of the night- these penalties were right in front of the refs, and they acted like it was clean hockey. paolini was also laid out by a nasty cross check, etc. however, as soon as murray taps a harvard player on the rush with a minute left in the third, the ref calls him for roughing...the calls were absolutely ridiculous and ruined numerous chances for a cornell power play, and thus a scoring opportunity. lastly, i do not agree with those who have said we were outclassed, or slow, or the game was harvard's to win (i.e. USCHO news). we didn't look magnificent like we did against rpi the night before, but our players only started dragging into the overtimes, as theirs did. i dont think we exhibited any less hussle getting to the puck. in fact, our defense and underhill were phenomenal. however, we seemed content to hope for a breakaway score, as opposed to sending rushes like harvard kept doing, hoping we would screw up once. ultimately, the game was well-played in my opinion. i am gonna get up early and see what i can do with student sect tix to the ncaa's baby!

ps did anyone else see harvard's Welch give the crowd the finger in the second OT?

-mike

LETS GO RED!

[ugarte]

I thought that the problems with our play outstripped the officiating problems. But, if you want to know what I thought of the officiating, I thought they were generally very hands off.  There was a lot of mucking around that didn't get called on either side, and Harvard got a slight advantage from it.  There were two bad calls that clearly went against Cornell, but it would be unfair to say that either one cost us the game.

The first was the no-call when Paolini got a stick in the throat.  The only Harvard fan who showed up at the Park Ave. CC to watch the game was shocked by the no-call.  Yes, Harvard scored during a time that Cornell should have been on the power play, but there really isn't a cause/effect relationship it was just an unfortunate coincidence.

The second was the insane call against Murray at the end of the third.  Murray was molested as he crossed the blue line, he shook off the defender, and he got 2 minutes for his troubles.  He knocked off the Harvard player's helmet, and I'm sure that was all the ref saw.  But I think a penalty against Harvard would not have been warranted, and so this penalty really didn't effect the game much either.

Every game has bad calls.  The reffing in this game was not bad enough to bear the blame for the loss.

[DeltaOne81]

As for the refing, yes, it was pretty damn bad, but it didn't loose us the game, we did that all on our own. Except for that Murray call, the ref was horrible both ways, ignoring everything. He decided to swallow his whistle way too early and way too extremlye that night. Why he pulled it back out to give Hahvahd a last second opportunity I have no idea.

What bothered me even more is what seemed like the lack of conditioning on our part. I'm not insulting out boys (they're a million times stronger than me any day), but it seemed clear that we had no legs by the end and Hahvahd (sucks) was still going pretty strong for a second OT. And *they* were the ones that had played an OT game the night before!! I just don't get that and am probably most disappointed for that.

As for Quinnipiac, we don't want to overlook them. Maybe I'm a MAAC apologist (too many friends at UConn?), but this is hockey and any team can beat any other on any night (see Brown over St. Cloud; Lake Superior over Mich (if that was the NCAA's LSSU would have advanced) ). We (the team nor the fans) should go into this game with a "warm-up" attitude. It's a real game just like any other. Don't make me mention Sacred Heart... yes, it's a different team and that was a different season and a fluke, but flukes can happen again...

All that being said, I will be there watching the MAACs hopes going down the drain as they take on a Cornell squad with something to prove (edit: so long as i figure out how to get tickets).

-Fred, DeltaOne81 '03

[kaelistus]

I agree with both of you..

The reffing in this game was AWFUL. It was hands off for the most part, but then he goes ahead and calls against cornell with a minute left on a penalty that simply did not happen. Harvard had some very nasty shots on the Cornell players that should have been called no matter how hands off you want to be.

And the team that should have won, did. The Red lost that game themselves with no help from the officials. I don't know what happened to Cornell's offense but it just wasn't there at all. It wasn't Harvard's D either, Cornell had the chances and just didn't set anything up correctly. On the other end of the ice, Harvard was setting some nice attacks all overtime long - one of them was bound to go in.

Its not over yet tho'. I won't care about the whitelaw if we take the NCAAs :-)

[Greg Berge]

I disagree with much of what has gone before.

(1) The officiating was not awful or biased.  It was a clear case of hands-off except for two conditions: (i) intent to injure or (ii) impact on a legitimate scoring opportunity.  Hansen help to both conditions all game except for the Murray penalty -- presumably he may have considered that intent to injure; I respectfully disagree.

(2) Oh, but it definitely was a penalty.  Doug was reaching for the puck, got his hand around the Harvard skater's head, and when he yanked back... he looked a lot like the new Cornell bear logo.

(3) We were out-hustled.  Cornell put a good effort together for most of the game, and at times they played inspired hockey.  Harvard, however, had more intensity than any other Crimson squad I've ever seen.

(4) Speed kills.  With the whistle in Hansen's pocket, Harvard's far faster skaters continually broke up Cornell's rushes by skating in from behind and draping all over them.  Cornell's skaters couldn't catch Harvard's rushes, so at best there were wide poke checks as the Crimson forwards broke away from their defensive zone.  As they entered the Red D-zone, the Cornell defenseman steered them outside but then *they* couldn't really catch them, so Harvard had lots of chances to set up on the perimeter.  They also got to far more free pucks.  Our size is great, but it was terrible to look on when we didn't have a single speed merchant to send out when we couldn't afford to allow Harvard to control the puck.

(5) The Red won just 2 or 3 faceoffs in the offensive zone in the entire game.  You're always going to lose a majority of O-zone faces, but this was lopsided.  Grumet-Morris froze the puck *a lot*, and that was equivalent to a turnover.

(6) Even with all that, this was a 50-50 game; it only seemed to be "Harvard's game to lose" because the previous night Cornell just erased RPI, and many (way too many) Cornell fans assumed they'd do the same to Harvard.  Didn't happen, because the Crimson had that extra jump.

[min \'97]

i saw the game on nesn at a sportsbar in atlanta, and came out thinking how eerie the similarities were between this lake placid game against harvard and the one played at cambridge exactly four months earlier. not only were the outcome and sequence of goals identical, but both harvard's third (and tying) goals came with little time left on the period, with the cornell defense facing tremendous pressure. i had nightmares just thinking about the first game, and the fact that it happened again on saturday really depressed me...
so the rivalry lives.

any thoughts on how will the team react in the ncaa tourney? do you think some of the team's confidence is gone? what strategies will coach schafer introduce (to win more face-offs, to stop opposing team from scoring in the 19th minute or later, etc.)? is the team's OT record worrisome, or is it only a freak occurrence?

[marty]

I thought that the amount of grabbing of the Cornell players once in their offensive zone was unreal.  Harvard seemed to drape themselves all over the Red players.  It looked like the NHL and is exactly what college hockey fans like about the NCAA - the lack of grabbing.

[REDhead]

Mike, Welch did not give us the finger.....there was something on the ice, and he picked it up & flipped it into the crowd....

[nshapiro]

I pretty much agree with Greg.  Speed Kills, but I don't think that was the whole problem.  I spent the whole game yelling "HIT SOMEBODY" at the TV.  On practically every single Hahvahd(still sucks) rush up ice, the Cornell defense was completely passive, letting the puck handler coast into the zone along the boards, sometimes all the way around behind the goal, then come out the other side without being crushed.  

I would love to blame a lack of speed, but I don't buy it.  We just consistently chose NOT to play the body, and this was in a game where the ref was letting everything go from the 3rd period on.

It was hard to believe that the same team that bottled up RPI the night before could completely disappear vs Hahvahd(will always suck).

[Al DeFlorio]

Agree 100%, Neil.  

I was yelling the same thing.  We had a Cornell couple over to watch the game, and I think they were ready to hit me for repeating it over and over and over...

The ref didn't affect the result at all.  I think we should drop that discussion.  Whining gets us nowhere and all we do is look bad for doing it.

It looked to me that Downs's stick barely tipped Kolarik's game-winner which knocked Matt's timing off just enough for the puck to tick off the underside of his glove.  What are you gonna do?  They took the action to us, generated far more chances, and that usually--although not always in hockey; see the PIG--earns a win.

I'll be in Worcester; hope we play back to Friday night's form.

[CUlater \'89]

I agree with Neil and Al; instead of using the body to negate Harvard's speed, Cornell let Harvard dictate too much.

As one of the radio announcers put it (I forget which one), in most games, there is at least one 10 minute stretch where the losing team has control.  There was no such stretch for Cornell.

That said, the fact that Cornell kept it close and had a legitimate chance to win speaks to the talent level of the team plus the experience gained this year from playing so many close games, which we typically were able to pull out.  I hope the team doesn't look past its opening game in the NCAAs.

[Richard Stott]

One problem I think was that Harvard  as much more talent than we do if not more. They get the east's top recruits year in and year out.  Watching the game their overall skill level up and down the roster  is at least equal to Cornell --  it's just unbeleivable with the players they have that they were a .500 team.   I dont know what their problem is this year, some of it apparently has been goldtending, but when they put it together we're going to face a very tough fight.

[CowbellGuy]

Hey, hey, hey. The server didn't crash. The power went out. :-(

[CowbellGuy]

Let me preface this by saying that the officials did not cost Cornell the game. I'm not trying to pin it on them. HOWEVER, Hansen was atrocious. It's not for the ref to decide that only intent to injure should be called in important games. The rules are there to be enforced and they're there to make the game better, cleaner, and fairer, and he should have done his job. And if he was purportedly only calling intent to injure, what do you call the stick to Sammy's throat? A love tap? Spare me Greg. I was sitting 2 seats in front of you and you were bitching about the refs just like everybody else during the game.