(Long) Thoughts on Cornell/Waterloo
 
Thanks to Greg for his box scores, line-ups and commentary.  It was hard to
follow Cornell on Saturday because there were no names on the uniforms.
My two cents on the game:
 
Goaltending:
Andy Bandurski looked shaky at first.  I believed his knee was still bothering
him a bit so he was not quite 100% physically.  It was also a case of nerves,
as reported in today's Cornell Daily Sun.  We chatted with Andy's parents
during the first intermission.  Marilyn showed little sign of worrying, but she
did think Andy was slightly off his usual mark.  Dad Vince said Andy probably
would go into the locker room, sit down, and collect himself.  The kid had a
tough mental attitude.  Sure enough, he settled down in the second period and
made some very good saves.  (The third Waterloo goal was probably a fluke goal;
it hit the ice in the crease and seemingly took a 90-degree turn toward the
net)
One obvious thing was that Andy played very differently in style compared to
Parris Duffus:  Andy liked to play the puck and would come out to challenge the
puck.  At times that was not a good thing, but he generally was able to poke
the puck away.  I did not think the coaching staff at any point considered
pulling Andy, for there really was not much depth in the goaltending
department.  After the game, all players skated out to Andy and patted him on
his helmet or on his back, a clear sign that they held him in high regard and
affection, and were congratulating him for the win.  Coach McCutcheon and
assistant coach Taylor also shook Andy's hand prior to joining the rest of the
team to shake hands with Waterloo.
 
Offense:
When Cornell quickly answered  back with two goals to even the game, many of us
began to sense that the high scoring in the Red and White scrimmage might not
have been an accident.  Greg was right that these lines seemed to be able to
bring the puck into the Waterloo zone and take quality shots.  I did not recall
any "garbage" goal.  Several goals were scored with good set-ups or passing,
such as the Scollan drop to Hannah, who scored on the open side of the net.
Ryan Hughes's blistering shot from the top of the left face-off circle got past
Shane Murphy's pad and found the inside of the goal post.  The
Drouin-Hughes-McManus line also boasted size and heft for the offense, in
addition to fire power.  And how about Shawn Hannah?  Is he back to his
freshman form?  Possibly.  He certainly showed speed and mobility.  He
consistently played with a lot of heart.  His hat trick also came about because
of team work.  I was very impressed by the passing skill of this new Cornell
team.  Players seemed very unselfish in dishing out the pucks to create scoring
opportunities.  They still played some dump-and-chase, but I saw some cross-ice
passings that were not seen much last season.
 
Defense:
This defense is so young that I don't think we can really judge it by one game.
 I happened to think that the freshmen played adequately.  There were mistakes
that led to a few 2-on-1 or 3-on-2's, but let's face it, like Vince Bandurski
said, this was a game that you could afford to make mistakes.
 
I also thought Cornell's penalty killing was fairly effective, but maybe
Waterloo did not pose too much threat to make me feel otherwise.  I did notice
a ton of penalties issued by the two refs.  Do you think the two-ref system has
resulted in more penalty calls in this young season?  By the way, three or four
times the Waterloo players and Cornell players got physically and nearly ended
up in fights (one instance in the 2nd period, behind the Cornell net, players
from both teams were pushing one another against the board, while Bandurski
skated away from the scene.  A smart move.).
 
My future borther-in-law, who is from S. Carolina (a Clemson grad), drove from
Buffalo to make this game (he's consulting in Niagara), his first ever
collegiate hockey game.  He got to Lynah at the top of the 2nd period, and
really enjoyed the rest of the game.  I do hope that this exhibition game was
indicative of the season to come (hey, one can always hope!).
 
Tom Y. Tseng
Cornell '87  MEng '94?