[ Well, SOME of us have to work today ]
This was the last fractured week for the ECAC, as except for Harvard's
participation in the Beanpot, all games will take place on Friday or Satur-
day from now until the end of the regular season. Over the next two weeks,
the rest of the ECAC will catch up to the Crimson, at least in number of
games played (Harvard has played 13, at least two more than anyone else in
the league).
Probably the biggest surprise of the weekend was Clarkson's 4-4 tie with #1-
ranked Maine (although this only served to make Maine an angry team for the
rematch the next night). I kind of wish I'd been gutsy enough to post this,
but I had a feeling the Golden Knights might be able to steal one of these
games. (To whoever laughed at me when I mentioned that to them, nyaah! :-)
Also getting votes for "upset of the week" would be Div. II Alabama-Hunts-
ville's 5-5 tie Saturday night at RPI.
And hey, looky here -- Dartmouth is tied for sixth!
Results from last week:
Tuesday, January 12:
Boston College 2, YALE 1
Wednesday, January 13:
Colgate 4, CORNELL 3
Friday, January 15:
BROWN 5, Dartmouth 4
Harvard 3, UNION 2
Clarkson 4, MAINE 4 (OT)
CORNELL 7, Air Force 2
PROVIDENCE 6, St. Lawrence 1
RPI 4, Alabama-Huntsville 1
Saturday, January 16:
Air Force 5, COLGATE 3
Alabama-Huntsville 5, RPI 5 (OT)
MAINE 6, Clarkson 0
St. Lawrence 6, PROVIDENCE 5
Sunday, January 17:
Dartmouth 2, UNION 1
ECAC standings as of 1/18/93:
League Overall
Team W L T Pts GF GA W L T Pts GF GA
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Harvard 12 0 1 25 64 33 13 1 1 27 72 39
Yale 7 1 2 16 48 30 8 5 2 18 64 52
Brown 5 4 2 12 48 43 6 7 2 14 65 71
RPI 5 3 1 11 34 26 8 5 4 20 65 52
St. Lawrence 5 4 1 11 37 31 10 6 2 22 77 62
Vermont 4 5 0 8 28 29 6 9 2 14 51 60
Dartmouth 4 6 0 8 29 39 6 8 0 12 42 60
Cornell 3 5 1 7 25 34 4 8 1 9 39 54
Princeton 3 6 1 7 33 46 5 8 1 11 48 57
Clarkson 2 5 3 7 39 35 6 8 4 16 76 56
Union 2 8 0 4 20 41 2 11 0 4 29 54
Colgate 2 7 0 4 32 50 4 10 3 11 72 80
Cornell 7, Air Force 2
You could say that Cornell pulled together and played hard after their
ugly loss to Colgate two nights before, and that's true to a point.
However, the story of this game was Air Force goaltender Darec Liebel,
who put up what must be the stat line of the season: 9:02 played, six
shots faced, one save. This works out to a GAA for the game of 33.21.
To be fair, Liebel was getting practically no help from his defensemen,
as Cornell was skating at will through the Air Force zone early on.
A pair of two-minute spurts for the Big Red were what put the game out
of reach for Air Force and put Liebel on the bench. Early on, Geoff
Bumstead took a hard shot that Liebel kicked aside (that was the save),
but Shaun Hannah got to the loose puck and centered it for "Bummer" so
he could try again. His second shot found the top of the net 1:22 into
the first period. Forty-eight seconds later, the Big Red was on the
board again, as Brad Chartrand got hold of a bad Falcon pass near the
Air Force blue line, blew through the defense, and beat Liebel from
deep to the left side.
Cornell continued to hustle in the Air Force zone, while the Falcons
were still back on their heels. Bumstead forced a turnover by the Air
Force defense, and that led to John DeHart's first collegiate goal, at
the 7:06 mark, when the puck rolled over to him from the left side and
he swatted it home. Bill Holowatiuk followed this up at 8:33 with his
first collegiate goal, on a blast from the left point that eluded a
screened, out-of-position Liebel. Finally, at the 9:02 mark, Russ Ham-
mond got the goal that put Liebel out of the game. Once again it was
Holowatiuk from the left point, with Liebel coming out of the crease to
cut the angle down. Liebel did get a piece of the shot, but the puck
wound up in the crease for Hammond to bat into the open net.
Liebel was replaced by Mike Benson, and Air Force was finally able to
get on the board at 13:25 of the first period. When the puck was
dropped for a faceoff in the Cornell end, Terry Courtney fired it
toward the Big Red goal; the shot was blocked by goaltender Andy Ban-
durski, but the rebound came out to Deron Christy, and with Bandurski
to the right side of the net after making the save, Christy wristed a
shot past him. Cornell came up with a couple of big chances after
that. With under five minutes to go, Jake Karam got control of the
puck in his own end and spotted P.C. Drouin at the Falcon blue line
behind the defense. Karam's pass hit Drouin right on the stick, and
Drouin steamed in on the breakaway, but Benson was equal to the task.
Then with 1:15 left, Chartrand and Mark Scollan (back in the lineup
after being out for several weeks) came in on a 2-on-1 break, with
Chartrand sending the puck over to Scollan, but Chartrand misplayed the
return pass and the threat was defused. Air Force was not without some
opportunities of their own, as Matt Tramonte got by Holowatiuk and came
in unmolested, but Bandurski played the angle nicely, and Tramonte's
shot went high and to the right of the net.
It looked like the score would remain 5-1 going into the intermission,
but with several players scrambling around to the left of the Air Force
net, Jason Vogel backhanded the puck toward the goal. Benson blocked
the shot with his chest and thought he had control of it, but he
dropped the puck and it rolled into the net behind him with 15 seconds
to go in the first.
A minute into the second period, there was a scary moment in front of
the Falcon goal when DeHart, in trying to bat the puck down to the ice,
caught Air Force defenseman John Giusto full in the face with the blade
of his stick. Giusto crumpled to the ice but, thank goodness, he was
wearing the full face shield and was OK. The hit was accidental, but
DeHart was correctly called for high-sticking. Which brings me to the
obligatory comment on the officiating. The referees for the night were
Tim MacConaghy and Harry Ammian, and while I disagreed with their offi-
ciating style (they established early on that they were going to let a
lot go), they were at least consistent -- which, considering MacCon-
aghy's reputation, is a victory in itself. The ECAC has had a bit of
trouble with the two-ref system, but MacConaghy and Ammian looked to me
like a good pairing.
Well anyway, Cornell came very close to scoring on the Air Force power
play, when pest extraordinaire Hannah stole a pass near the Falcon blue
line and uncorked one from the right circle that bounced off the under-
side of the crossbar. After the first period, however, Cornell seemed
to slack off on offense, and they never were able to mount the kind of
pressure that had seen them score six goals in the first period -- in
fact, after having a respectable ten shots on goal in the opening
period, the Big Red mustered just 12 the rest of the way. With such a
big lead, this may be understandable, but Cornell has done the same
kind of thing all year regardless of the score, and it has cost them in
more than a few games this season.
With about five minutes gone in the second period, some pushing and
shoving near the Air Force net developed into some punching and holding
and nearly became a full-scale brawl before MacConaghy and Ammian
finally got in there and pulled the players apart. Only one call was
made, on Air Force's Anthony Retka for interference -- which was a pen-
alty I felt was very one-sided, since it meant that Chartrand and Blair
Ettles for Cornell had gotten away with a lot. When Andy Veneri was
subsequently called for cross-checking, it gave the Big Red a 1:29
5-on-3 power play. Despite that, Cornell had their usual difficulty in
getting the puck in front of the net (they seemed to spend an inor-
dinate amount of time looking for the perfect pass), but finally, Holo-
watiuk's shot from the blue line bounced off the boards behind the net
and came out to Tyler McManus, who flipped the puck over Benson and
into the top of the net at the 7:14 mark.
Air Force still had some opportunities, as the Cornell defense, while
playing better than they had in previous games, was still not com-
pletely cohesive. A couple minutes after McManus' goal, Beau Bilek
rang one off the post from the blue line. Several minutes after that,
with the Big Red on the power play, Eric Rice got control of the puck
in his own end and raced up the ice, looking for sure like he was going
to have a short-handed breakaway. However, he stopped in front of the
Air Force bench (he must have lost the handle on the puck, otherwise
there wasn't any reason to stop skating), fumbled a bit, and then with
the Cornell forwards closing in, he blindly passed backward. The puck
was intercepted by a Big Red player.
Both teams had a few breakdowns in their own end in the third period,
but other than that, not a great deal happened. McManus took a stupid
slashing penalty 11:15 into the third, when he ran into an Air Force
player near center ice, and when they both had gotten up, he whacked
the guy in the ankle. Another penalty 24 seconds later gave the Fal-
cons a 5-on-3 power play, but despite some heavy pressure in the
Cornell zone, Bandurski was able to keep Air Force off the board with
several great pad saves, until a penalty on the Falcons wiped out the
power play.
At this point, I'll have to agree with Bill Sangrey and say I was dis-
appointed that backup goaltender Geoff Raynak was not given a chance to
play late in the game. When the teams returned to even strength, there
were about five minutes left, and even though Raynak is not much more
than a JV goalie, it would be tough to blow a six-goal lead in five
minutes against the worst team in Division I (according to the three
rating systems, anyway). Bandurski could have used a little rest, and
he was not working on a shutout, so why not let the backup see a little
action? Knowing that Raynak is not as good as Bandurski might have
made the Cornell defense shape up and play a little better also. On
top of that, something happened earlier in the period that could have
served as a warning. Seven minutes into the third, a Cornell player
ran into Benson, and he was down on the ice for a few minutes. He was
able to continue, but with Air Force crashing the net late in the
period, there was a real possibility that Bandurski could have been
injured. Raynak is not a good goaltender, but he has worked very hard
to acquire the goaltending skills he does have, and I'm sure a little
ice time with the varsity would have meant a lot to him.
At any rate, Christy got the Falcons' second goal with 4:21 remaining,
when he intercepted a bad pass in the Cornell zone and fired one from
the left circle that Bandurski couldn't get his skate on. And that was
pretty much it. "Bando" finished with 27 saves, and Benson stopped 13
shots.
P.S. Hey, George T, did you get your car washed yet? :-)
Next weekend's abbreviated schedule:
Friday, January 22:
RPI at Colgate
Union at Cornell
Air Force at Yale (NC)
Saturday, January 23:
Clarkson at St. Lawrence
RPI at Cornell
Union at Colgate
Vermont at Brown
Air Force at Yale (NC)
--
Bill Fenwick | Send your HOCKEY-L poll responses to:
Cornell '86 and probably '94 | [log in to unmask]
LET'S GO RED!!
"Come on, you've known me long enough to know how to spell my name."
-- Yogi Berra, to a television interviewer after being paid for an interview
with a check made out to "Bearer"
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