Last night at Thompson Arena, Cornell pulled out a 4-1 victory over Dartmouth. Once again, the Red started slow; their passing, which was crisp even in the low points of the Harvard and Dartmouth games last weekend, looked atrocious. Most of the night was spent dumping and chasing, usually losing the race to the puck. And the defense seemed to be lacking hustle, even from senior co-captain Jason Dailey. Cornell's one good attack in the first came on a power play, but the Big Green opened the scoring shortly thereafter with a goal by Bob Cancelli. (I'm sorry I don't have notes on the goals; in the race to the rink--a three-hour trip from Kingston to Dartmouth took almost six in the snow and ice--I left my microcassette in the car.) (Cornell had an apparent goal early, but it was clearly kicked in from the crease.) Even after the intermission, the Red looked flat, but managed to gain life after Jeff Burgoyne knotted the score early in the period. Two minutes later, Doug Steinstra teamed up with newly dressed freshman Tyler Sutherland and Darren Tymchyschyn for the eventual gamewinner. But the second period proved to be costly, as co-captain Kyle Knopp went hard into the boards with an apparent right knee injury. The loss is a big one, as top-line forward Knopp has been filling in on the blue-line--especially during the power play--due to Cornell's injuries on defense. The reconstituted first line of Vinnie Auger, Ryan Moynihan and Jeff Oates was kept off the boeard, and much of the third period was spent in the Cornell end with the Red icing the puck every minute or two. For a while it looked like Cornell would try to ride out the game like they did the 1997 ECAC championship game against Clarkson, but youngsters Dan Svoboda and Keith Peach gave the Red breathing room with five minutes two go. (This led to a spontaneous cheer of "Good Peach...Bad Peach" in reference to Dartmouth Junior forward Scott Peach, who had been on the ice for one of Peach's recent shifts--don't know if he got the '-' for the goal.) Dartmouth went on the power play with three minutes remaining and first year coach Bob Gaudet pulled netminder Eric Almon for the 5-on-4, and Smart put the game away a minute later when he and a linemate got behind the Dartmouth defense and skated in for the empty-netter. Thompson had a reasonable-sized crowd, although they seemed unsure what to make of these boisterous red-clad folks in their midst. There were some kids in front of us who were inspired to raise their voices in support of the home side, although that mostly consisted of yelling "Let's Go Green" whenever we said "Let's Go Red". But I went up to them after the game and told them to come to the game at Cornell on Valentine's Day. (The more noisy fans we can breed at other ECAC schools, the more fun it'll be for everyone. I know, be careful what you wish for...) Interesting doings in the ECAC this weekend, as the news of Colgate's 7-0 rout of Vermont was well-received by both Red and Green. Tonight Cornell faces an 0-3 Catamount team; the frustrated Cats could be a dangerous opponent for the banged-up Red. The SLU-Clarkson battle will also be an interesting one to watch, with the defending regular season champion Knights going 0-3-1 in their last two weekends. John Whelan, Cornell '91 <[log in to unmask]> <http://www.cc.utah.edu/~jtw16960/jshock.html> Cornell Men's Ice Hockey: Back-to-back ECAC and Ivy League Champions HOCKEY-L is for discussion of college ice hockey; send information to [log in to unmask], The College Hockey Information List.