Cornell beat Union tonight, 6-0, in Schenectady.  Cornell scored two
in the opening minutes and there was never any question about who
would win.  The Big Red showed why they're ranked among the top teams
in the nation.  Union didn't help themselves much, either.  They
looked slow and sloppy all night.  Most of Cornell's goals weren't
pretty, but just a result of being down low in the offensive zone a
lot.  Stay down there enough and some pucks will go in the net.  In
the post game interview on WTMM, Union coach Kevin Sneddon said
something like "we didn't bring our A game, I think it was our Q game
or somthing."

As poorly as Union played, it might not have been enough to overcome
Cornell even if they played their best.  Cornell is very impressive,
and easily the best team I've seen this season so far.  Somehow they
always had plenty of men back on defense, but still seemed to have 4
men up front on every offensive rush.  And if you can somehow manage a
decent scoring chance on their defense, there's an excellent
goaltender waiting there in LeNeveu.  I'm really looking forward to
seeing Cornell at tournament time, when they're not clobbering my
team, so I can enjoy watching them play.

With single-digit temperatures outside, it would have been a lot
easier to make ice outside than it was inside at Achilles.  A patch of
the ice surface just inside the south blue line required extra
attention before each period.  I learned on the radio postgame that
there are sections of the refrigeration system that just don't work
anymore, and that patch doesn't freeze solid.  Kevin Sneddon didn't
sound happy about the ice situation, and acknowledged that it is a
dangerous situation for the players.  I wonder what will happen if
this gets worse, especially if and when the weather warms up.  They
can't play or even practice on ice with a big slushy patch.

Union is now 3-5-2 in the ECAC, 7-11-4 overall.  They'll try to pick
up 2 points on the weekend when Colgate visits on Saturday night.
Colgate is coming off a 3-0 shutout of RPI in Troy.  Cornell takes on
RPI in the "way too much red" game on Saturday.

--
Jim Teresco - [log in to unmask]
http://www.teresco.org