As we prepare for Cornell in a little while (or perhaps longer given the tightness of the Colgate/Quinny game), one stat jumped out at me this week. Matthew Coronato has only one goal in his last six games. Not that it matters or is reason for panic but I found it unusual that he has been shut down so effectively. Hoping it changes tonight!
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Harvard Crimson 2022-2023
- Thread starter Veritas
- Start date
Last night was the best defensive effort of the year. Tonight may look more like the two regular season Harvard Colgate tilts with a few more goals. Colgate seemed to match up well in the season split but Harvard has gotten better over the last month, especially on defense. It is tough to know what to expect tonight but it should be a good game.
Agree. It was the Crimson's best defensive performance by a country mile. Colgate did a number on Quinnipiac defensively so we may be in for another one goal game, be it 2-1 or 3-2.
True to form, Mike Schaefer decided he didn't want to skate with Harvard, so he turned the game into a tractor pull. And for the better part of regulation, it worked. The problem with that strategy is that you need the other team to be careless with the puck in their own end to generate scoring chances to give your team a shot to win. Harvard was very careful with the puck (only one glaring turnover - Bar's coughing up the puck in front of Gibson) and played their best defensive game of the year. And it was only a matter of time before they broke down Cornell's neutral zone trap and forced the Big Red to abandon their defensive scheme. You could see it coming in the latter stages of the third period and definitely in OT.
Baker Shore's pass was a thing of beauty. Great fake to freeze Shane and feed Laferriere for the winner. If Alex scores again tonight and the Crimson finish the job, he should get tournament MVP.
Cornell now plays the waiting game. They caught a break when BU beat Providence. I see them heading west if they get in.
Harvard has most assuredly wrapped up a second seed and should be in Bridgeport or Manchester. First things first, let's bring home the Whitelaw.
Did anyone else notice that Alex Gaffney was wearing #11?? What happened to his jersey #8? Forget to pack it? I was scanning the Crimson roster trying to find out who this new player was suiting up in the most important game of the season.
Baker Shore's pass was a thing of beauty. Great fake to freeze Shane and feed Laferriere for the winner. If Alex scores again tonight and the Crimson finish the job, he should get tournament MVP.
Cornell now plays the waiting game. They caught a break when BU beat Providence. I see them heading west if they get in.
Harvard has most assuredly wrapped up a second seed and should be in Bridgeport or Manchester. First things first, let's bring home the Whitelaw.
Did anyone else notice that Alex Gaffney was wearing #11?? What happened to his jersey #8? Forget to pack it? I was scanning the Crimson roster trying to find out who this new player was suiting up in the most important game of the season.
Lynah Rink
New member
Not this again. Schafer (not “Schaefer”) found a way to shut down the most talented offensive team on the entire East Coast. I’m very sorry for you that he reduced Harvard’s graceful form of hockey to a pejorative “tractor pull.” Also, Harvard never “broke down Cornell's neutral zone trap and forced the Big Red to abandon their defensive scheme.” What actually happened on the winning goal is that a Cornell defender fell over, giving Harvard numbers in transition.
Harvard deserved the win. They have the most talented team in the ECAC by far. You can talk all you want about draft picks not mattering, but they do matter—they are an imperfect signal of talent but still strongly correlated with talent. The best six teams in hockey this year include Minnesota, Denver, Michigan, BU, and Harvard for a reason—they are loaded with future NHL talent. (The exception is Quinnipiac with seven graduate students.) For a team like Cornell to ever compete with Harvard’s talent, Cornell is going to have to have to take away time and space and slow Harvard down in the neutral zone. Sorry if that strategy offends you.
Please. Cry me a river. I recall a time when Cornell had their pick of Canadian youngsters, several of whom went on to play in the NHL well before Harvard began sending its grads to the pros. And yeah, I saw a different game and we did start to break down your trap, whether you like it or not. Your D lost Laferriere when Shore took the pass from Miller. You paid the price. Schafer did what he had to do to win. I don't begrudge him but the quality and pace of play suffers when you trap. That's a fact. It's why the NHL altered their rules to take away that advantage from the Devils who sucked the life out of a hockey game.
I never said draft picks are not correlated with talent. I just got tired of everyone leaning on it as an excuse for why Harvard is so much better or why Harvard should win every game they play. Our '89 team was loaded and yet we lost to Yale at the Whale that year. Should Yale have complained about all of those future pros? They didn't seem to mind.
Lynah Rink
New member
Harvard made a great play on the winning goal. Not denying that. By the way, Cornell had the 8th most goals per game in all of college hockey this season. Such boring hockey! P.S. I’m also a Devils fan.
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Well technically if you go by the rakings you'd get SCSU but there are some options.
Super disappointed by last night's result but not entirely surprised. We didn't show up until it was too late. As Teddy said postgame, we were chasing the puck from the opening faceoff and Laferriere's penalty gave Colgate the opening they needed to build momentum. The second and third Colgate goals were killers off mistakes that should not have happened. You can't make those mistakes in a championship game. Especially the third goal as we were starting to make a comeback with Thrun's goal. Might not have mattered in the end.
Hoping we end up in Manchester. I don't like the fact that Quinnipiac which didn't make the conference final gets to practically 'host' the quarterfinal in Bridgeport and that we may end up there. But wouldn't it be sweet to beat them there and head to the Frozen Four? It would take some of the sting out of losing last night.
Onward and upward...
Hoping we end up in Manchester. I don't like the fact that Quinnipiac which didn't make the conference final gets to practically 'host' the quarterfinal in Bridgeport and that we may end up there. But wouldn't it be sweet to beat them there and head to the Frozen Four? It would take some of the sting out of losing last night.
Onward and upward...
I hope that isn't true because that would make two years in a row facing you in the opening round game. The NCAA should opt for another matchup.
MarkEagleUSA
C'mon Q!
Colgate fan here...good question ! It essentially ended Harvard's chances, think there were about fifteen seconds left. I'll go watch the replay of the game on ESPN+ and get back to you.
It looked like the defender knocked puck on to the net and then hovered over it. I don't know what the rule is just seems odd that that would mean the faceoff comes out of the zone.
I'm not a pairwise expert. I admit it. Okay by you??
MarkEagleUSA
C'mon Q!
Fine with me but there's so much written here about the subject that it's not hard to follow how it all works out. The seeding and placement is very objective and nobody gets to choose where they should play, but most fans seem to think differently.
Also looked like a strange call to me.
BigRedBeer
Member
I'm pretty sure you could pick a five year span where we may have totaled 13 drafted players, never on one team, ever. But Cornell doesn't have the strict admissions process to get into one of the most prestigious universities in the world either. <cough><cough>