DavidNardolillo
Member
Re: RPI Hockey 2019 - 2020 Part II: Moving on with 2020 Vision!
Too funny.
Too funny.
Seconded.
I may be late.
Sorry - just did it. Wasn't up to speed on the protocol![]()
Here's how the last two regular season weekends shape up in the race for RPI, Colgate, Yale and Dartmouth:
RPI 5th place with 19 points
hosting Quinnipiac and Princeton, visiting Harvard and Dartmouth
Colgate 6th place with 19 points
visiting Brown and Yale, hosting Clarkson and St. Lawrence
Yale 7th place with 18 points
hosting Cornell and Colgate, visiting Princeton and Quinnipiac
Dartmouth 8th place with 18 points
visiting St. Lawrence and Clarkson, hosting Union and RPI
Buckle up those seat belts, it's going to be quite a ride!
It would appear from this that Dartmouth has the easiest schedule left of the 4 teams. Colgate almost the same. Yale and RPI the most difficult. I would guess that if we get anything more than 4 points in the last 4 games we are on fairly sound footing for 5th or 6th. 4 points could be testy but might work for 6th. Anything less and we would need considerable help not to fall to 7th or even 8th. the good news is that we are in this kind of position for the first time in several years, fighting for a high first round spot. the bad news, and I knew this was going to be the case, that lost point, a sure victory snatched from us and only getting a tie in Princeton, has come back to haunt us. That single point would have made so much of a difference in trying to maintain 5th (or even in a late season surge for 4th).
Virtually every team loses points it should have gotten (even in 84-85, we lost vs. SLU), and we have also gotten points when we were overmatched.
Anything can happen on any given night. I'm sure we all expected Harvard to come away with 4 points; they got 2. Were those "taken away"?
At the end of the day, we must play 60 minutes every night. Not 20, not 40, not 50, not 59, but 60. Anything short of that, and we leave points vulnerable on the table. Can we end up taking them when it's all said and done? Perhaps. Is it possible to play a hard 60 minute game and come away empty? Yes. However, chance favors the prepared mind. Let's do everything we can to better ourselves, no matter how the effects around us play out.
All this talk about the Princeton game reminds me about the Brown game at HFH. We were 2 seconds away from earning no points in that game and came out of it with 2 points. We don’t score in those final seconds, and we’re at 17 points looking up at the other 3 teams and trying to stay ahead of Brown for the final home ice spot.
Not exactly my point. it is one thing to lose a game. It is a bit different for me when we lose a point or a game not because of poor play but due to intervention from officials. this is not to say that we have not benefited from this type of thing at times in the past. i am merely pointing out how we felt walking out of Baker Rink this year. We lost a point, surely. But we FELT that the 5 consecutive penalties call upon us, 3 in the third period, for offenses like closing a hand on the puck or holding the stick were a bit unusual given the calling of the game previously. playing short handed for 6 minutes in the third period certainly led to one goal and lost opportunities for us to score. As it turns out we are one of the least penalized teams in the nation and certainly a bit out of character for us to take 10 minutes of penalties in the last 30+ minutes against a team that we held a 2-0 lead.
i am in no way indicating that we win or tie some games in which we have had fortunate calls. Just saying how we felt leaving that one game this year. hopefully, in the scheme of things, it will mean nothing but as of right now, it sort of looms a bit large. (end of rant)
This sort of swallowing the whistle until the 3rd period thing is something I've heard since I started following RPI hockey. You would think if this were the case, by now, teams would have adjusted to it and played a bit tighter down the stretch. So even if your complaint is true, and I'll give you the benefit of the doubt since I didn't even listen to that game, we have no one to blame but ourselves. If they're going to want to make those calls, give them no reason to do so.
One thing I've seen, when compared to previous years, is that the officiating has actually been a heck of a lot better than in recent years. I don't know if it's a new crop of staff, perceptions of our team changing given some animosity that seemed to occur between the league and our previous coaching staff, or maybe I'm just looking at games from a less biased standpoint. One thing I do know, based on the expectations I have for officiating in this league, they've been above average across the year.
Also, one thing I'll also mention after taking a look at the box score of the aforementioned Princeton game: We had a power play in overtime. Something which you rarely see at any level of hockey unless it's egregious. And it's not like it was one of those even-up things we've seen in years past where it's only about 15 seconds; it was a minute and a half. Sure it's not the full two, but that's more than enough time to set something up to get a goal, especially if the PPGA that was previously cited happened at the one minute mark of the penalty. Based on that, if the refs were out to screw anyone, it was Princeton. Moral of the story: Let's quit pointing fingers and focus on our play. This help or hinder means nothing if we can't get the job done.