Fellow pundits, If Cornell "squeaked" in, then I suggest that any team which did not get an automatic bid by winning their regular season or tournament "backed" in. The object of the sport is to win the championship. Cornell did. That more than offsets *any* difference in an abstract measure like a power rating, whose constituent factors and their relative weights are ultimately arbitrary. The elevation of a statistical measure over a concrete result is ludicrous, and reflects a greater respect for the creators of ratings indices than for the players who got the job done. Congratulations to all the teams who earned their way into the tournament by winning their regular season title or their tournament title. They are, after all, the champions. Greg Berge Let's Go Red! p.s. Bonus points to the first post received identifying the subject line quote and its relevance to this post. Brought to you by the Committee for the Preservation of the Liberal Arts through Appeals to Naked Self Interest. (Not affiliated with the Committee for the Preservation of the Liberal Arts through Appeals to Naked Prurient Interest) HOCKEY-L is for discussion of college ice hockey; send information to [log in to unmask], The College Hockey Information List.