RPI 2024–25: Come for the Hockey, Stay for the Football

[engineerhockeyfan]

You know at the beginning of the year heck before that a former player reached out to the AD and told Her if she was operating on the premise that this can't get any worse She is making a big mistake she ignored his advise and here we are. This program needs a total make over the product on the ice is not only bad but the recruiting has been abysmal and for all intense purposes non existent so the light at the end of the tunnel is an oncoming train ! Both the Coach and the AD need to move on. SU football is a perfect test case it was DOA couldn't recruit because of location and facilities, went thru several coach's, losing players in the portal and hadn't went to a Bowl in several years then the AD put his big boy pants on started asking the right people the right questions and came up with a LEADER to take over the program and turned it around quicker than anyone imagined. We passed on 2 opportunities BB and KM this program isn't dead yet but it is on life support and we probably won't survive a 3rd strike so Schmidt needs to get this right and going on past performance I'm scared to death he won't.

I agree with almost everything you said. But the AD should stay long enough to recruit her own coaching staff.
Being a new AD, I don't believe she had the backing to just get rid of these coaches. If they don't allow her to replace these guys now, then we are in big trouble.
She deserves a chance to put her own team (coaches and players) on the ice next year.

[Wicked Slappaahs]

56 seconds into the game lee takes a penalty. UNH scores lol

Yup. "It's either coaching or its tolerated..." I'm quoting Rex Ryan who was on the radio this morning talking about the Jets and their 16 (?) penalty performance vs. the Bills. But the point remains that Smith has had this issue all season (all career for Lee) and has chosen to ignore it. And that's how you end up getting drilled 3-0 in the first period en route to a 7-4 blowout.

In the old days, the AD would've met the coach in the tunnel between periods and had a very short, one sided conversation with the coach.... I doubt that happens these days, at least not at RPI.

[Wicked Slappaahs]

I agree with almost everything you said. But the AD should stay long enough to recruit her own coaching staff.
Being a new AD, I don't believe she had the backing to just get rid of these coaches. If they don't allow her to replace these guys now, then we are in big trouble.
She deserves a chance to put her own team (coaches and players) on the ice next year.

I agree with this. Clearly nothing is going to happen in-season. If nothing happens in the off-season, then I will likely be taking in the shiny confines of Union's new rink next fall...and I'm not even joking. This has gone on for too long without anything resembling progress.

[DrDemento]

Granted Lee has taken a lot of penalties and many were unnecessary. However, we saw this game and that first penalty taken early was his attempt to stop a dead on shot from the slot from about 12 feet out. All game long UNH was getting totally clear free shots from that same distance and location. You cannot allow that and if you do, there is a good chance you will get run out of the building since from that location, the shoot has quite an advantage over the goalie. Unfortunately we did not want to start the game with an early penalty but I would excuse his aggression for this one (but not for others during the season). Even taking this kind of penalty trying to prevent a clean shot would not be necessary if our overall team defense was not allowing them all game long. Add to that the fact if we could even mount some semblance of defense when we were defending short handed, these penalties would not be so devastating for us on the score board.
We did not get run out of our own building because of a little aggressive play from #18. We got run out by allowing a team to take 22 shots in the first period, most of them from scoring locations and from having a porous weak defensive posture from an entire team effort.

[Wicked Slappaahs]

...We did not get run out of our own building because of a little aggressive play from #18. We got run out by allowing a team to take 22 shots in the first period, most of them from scoring locations and from having a porous weak defensive posture from an entire team effort.

Not ready to play. Period.

[Wicked Slappaahs]

TU preview of UNH game (no paywall, I think): https://www.timesunion.com/sports/ar...count=MA%3D%3D

Some brief injury news contained within. Coach Smith says that Muzzatti is "out a while" with an undisclosed injury. Tonelli and Borgault are mentioned as not having played this season due to injury, but no further details given. Also, team will only practice 2 days before game after returning from break.

I heard the interview with Smitty on Wyland's show. From the tone of his voice, there was zero indication the we'll see Sutter back anytime soon....I hope I'm wrong, but that's the vibe I got from Smitty.

[vicious]

We did not get run out of our own building because of a little aggressive play from #18. We got run out by allowing a team to take 22 shots in the first period, most of them from scoring locations and from having a porous weak defensive posture from an entire team effort.

The slot was wide open most of the first period (and again in the 3rd). UNH was given ample time and space in that area to skate, pass, and set up plays.

From what I saw, the team wearing Cherry and White was not prepared to play when they stepped onto the ice.

[Engineers]

I agree with almost everything you said. But the AD should stay long enough to recruit her own coaching staff.
Being a new AD, I don't believe she had the backing to just get rid of these coaches. If they don't allow her to replace these guys now, then we are in big trouble.
She deserves a chance to put her own team (coaches and players) on the ice next year.

Agreed

[Engineers]

[QUOTE=vicious;n3914378]

The slot was wide open most of the first period (and again in the 3rd). UNH was given ample time and space in that area to skate, pass, and set up plays.

From what I saw, the team wearing Cherry and White was not prepared to play when they stepped onto the ice.

[/QUOTE
Boggles the mind how you’re not prepared to play. At this level how is this possible? This happens all the time with Dave’s teams. He needs to go. Don’t go away mad just go away. Who’s holding this coaching staff accountable? Looking at the remaining schedule I see 4-5 wins at most. Looking at another 10-11 win season. Which is fitting considering Dave averages 10 wins a season for the past 8 seasons. Our pk is 68.5
we are going backwards

[engineerhockeyfan]

Happy New Year to all.
I would love to see this team get back to basics in 2025.
When you have a shot, take it. Get the puck out of the defensive zone. Stop trying to make blind passes. Charge the net when the shot is taken.
And learn how to kill a penalty.
LGR

[DrDemento]

Happy New Year to all.
I would love to see this team get back to basics in 2025.
When you have a shot, take it. Get the puck out of the defensive zone. Stop trying to make blind passes. Charge the net when the shot is taken.
And learn how to kill a penalty.
LGR

Some good points - my list is quite a bit longer. With almost all of it focusing on defensive play.

[engineerhockeyfan]

Some good points - my list is quite a bit longer. With almost all of it focusing on defensive play.

Baby steps Doc.

[vicious]

Some good points - my list is quite a bit longer. With almost all of it focusing on defensive play.

In no particular order:

1. stay out of the box.
2. minimize turnovers in the neutral and defensive zones.
3. tighten up D. Block more shots. Break up passing lane. Crowd the front of the net and force opponents to the outside.
4. #3 should help the goaltenders see fewer shots. This is key right now, especially with the G struggling as of late.

in other words, as EHF said, get back to basics. There are seven league games between now and February 1. Time to execute.

On a side note: should we consider changing thread title to "stay for the basketball?" Just a shout out to the men who are currently 9-1 and the women are currently 8-1 and riding a 5-game winning streak.

[Waite21]

For those who might still be thinking about football, I can mention a couple of things.

The Division III championship game, which always used to be played before Christmas, hasn't taken place yet. It will be played this Sunday night, Jan. 5, in Houston at 8 PM and will be televised on ESPN. The participants are depressingly familiar names - Mt. Union and North Central. The Liberty League champs, Hobart, lost by a touchdown in the first round to Susquehanna. Susquehanna went all the way to the national semifinals, but were then pulverized by North Central.

Something to think about next year - the Centennial Conference adopted the use of instant replay for conference games this year. I saw it used once, in a game between Dickinson and McDaniel. The referee took five minutes to review the replay - long enough for even the most casual observer to conclude that the limitations of Dickinson's video equipment would make it impossible for him to find conclusive evidence that the call on the field was wrong - but he finally announced that, in fact, he had decided to reverse the call on the field. The team that benefitted from the reversal was trailing 24-0 at the time and ended up losing 24-0, so the reversal had no effect on the game, other than to delay the ending by five minutes.

I've always felt that one of the charms of Division III football was the absence of instant replay, which I feel disrupts the flow of the game. But I have a feeling that we may be seeing it used universally at all levels of college football in the not-too-distant future.

[bgtrpi]

Jordan Tonelli will never play for RPI. He is finished playing college hockey due to injury and is now a volunteer assistant coach for RPI. According to Coach Smith, Muzzatti is probably finished for the season. Strom and Bourgault are out for the season. Jagger Tapper is back and contributed a goal and 3 assists this weekend, a road sweep of Yale and Brown. Watson didn’t dress this weekend due to a minor injury with no time given for his return.

For those who missed the Yale win, RPI put the puck in the net at 0:35 of the first period and was awarded a goal. Yale requested a review and the goal was disallowed due to goalie interference and RPI was also assessed a 2-minute penalty. I don’t recall ever seeing a 2-minute penalty called as a result of a video review. It had been my understanding that 2-minute penalties can only be called on the ice and only 5-minute penalties can be called as a result of video review. I tried (nicely) to ask one of the refs about it after the game and he refused to answer and quickly walked away. Instead of getting the early lead, RPI was forced to kill an early penalty. The referee’s error, if it indeed was an error, could have had a bearing on the outcome. Luckily it didn’t.