Cornell lacrosse at Penn on Saturday

[Al DeFlorio]

Lost the feed again.

[DeltaOne81]

And now no audio again

[Al DeFlorio]

Jacob, help!

[Jacob '06]

Cu wins the faceoff off an illegal procedure, hit a post on the transition.

[Jacob '06]

2mins left, Haswell shot blocked and he is hurt, Penn gets the ball and throws it away on the clear.

[Jacob '06]

Seibald shot blocked and posession awarded to CU on a ground ball. Around 1min left.

[Jacob '06]

1:00 exactly, cornell gets a man-up for 30 seconds and penn takes a time out.

[Jacob '06]

Boulokous shoots out of bounds, :48 left

[Jacob '06]

Shot blocked, Penn just throws it down the field and CU recovers. :15 left.....:02 seconds left there is a flag, but impossible for CU to score 2 in that time.

[Al DeFlorio]

Disappointing game, but in some ways not surprising given the game at Penn two years ago.  Penn was looking ahead last week against Harvard but was ready for us today.  Another tough one at Harvard next week.  We'll be there, but I really wanted us to be undefeated going in.

We apparently missed some really in-close chances when ahead 2-0.  Another goal or two there might have broken it open, but it didn't happen.

[billhoward]

The loss hurts even more because the Southerners had that 15-year cold spell when Yankee teams won most every year ... and they've been champing at the bit waiting to explain how it was just an aberration.

[DeltaOne81]

Top 15 wins for us:
Notre Dame - 9 (before their win over Dartmouth today)
Lehigh - 13
Army - 15

Teams we beat who could end up top 15:
Yale - 20
and of course, who knows how they'll treat Duke (22)


Potential for further top 15 wins:
Princeton - 6
Harvard - 10
Syracuse - 16
Dartmouth maybe (19, before loss today)


And if they actually use RPI like they did last year, we're #1 in RPI even after our loss. If we can recover alright, keep playing well, and get at least 2 of those remaining wins (and root for 'Cuse the rest of the way except against us), we're in very good shape. They just need to bounce back and not let it effect them.

[Hillel Hoffmann]

That wet popping sound in West Philly wasn't Drexel's annual egg drop competition.

It was Cornell's bubble bursting.

That was freaking awful. Penn earned it. Cornell got their butts kicked in every aspect of that game. The Quakers packed in their zone and easily kept Cornell's attackers near the crease, especially Mitchell, from getting the ball from up top or from behind. Normally, you'd expect Cornell's dodgemeisters, Boulukos and Seibald, to take advantage, but they couldn't shake their men more than a handful of times. Even on those rare occasions when Cornell guys found space by moving without the ball -- as Romero always seems to do, for example -- lazy passes gave possession right back to the Quakers. So many unforced errors, especially in transition. So much undisciplined play, including from Cornell's usually ship-shape d-middies (Marchant clearly is in the doghouse). Peterg was yelling for Cornell to shoot at the Penn goalie's feet -- and he was right, as usual (he called the Penn goalie "a statue").

The game also showed why Cornell fans should be terrified by the lack of a reliable faceoff game. It's fine when you're way in front. It's deadly when you're trying to come from behind.

The only thing that gave me hope was seeing the team file out of Franklin Field in neat rows of two -- a relatively new Cornell lax tradition. If anyone can get this team's focus back, it's this coaching staff.

Although the game sucked, the socializing was A+, thanks as usual to the warmth and generosity of the parents. A ton of former players showed up, and many regulars from various message boards.