#13/15 CORNELL vs. NEW HAMPSHIRE
TIME: 7:35 p.m.
DATE: Saturday, December 28
PLACE: Germain Arena · Estero, Fla.
RECORDS: Cornell 7-4-2, 4-3-2 ECAC Hockey · New Hampshire 9-9-1, 5-5 Hockey East
VIDEO: http://www.americaonesports.com/partner_members.asp?id=219
RADIO: WHCU-AM (870)
AUDIO: www.ivyleaguedigitalnetwork.com/cornell/schedule?date=2013-12-29
LIVE STATS: TBD
 
#13/15 CORNELL vs. MAINE or PRINCETON
TIME: 4:05 or 7:35 p.m.
DATE: Sunday, December 29
PLACE: Germain Arena · Estero, Fla.
RECORDS: Cornell 7-4-2, 4-3-2 ECAC Hockey · Maine 9-6-1, 4-2-1 Hockey East · Princeton 3-12, 2-8 ECAC Hockey
VIDEO: http://www.americaonesports.com/partner_members.asp?id=219
RADIO: WHCU-AM (870)
AUDIO: www.ivyleaguedigitalnetwork.com/cornell/schedule?date=2013-12-29
LIVE STATS: TBD
 
Cornell game notes (PDF)
 
WHAT'S ON TAP
The Big Red will make the long trip to Estero, Fla. for the 14th annual Florida College Hockey College this weekend, where it will round out a field featuring New Hampshire, Maine and Princeton at the four-game event at Germain Arena, home of the ECHL's Florida Everblades. The Big Red opens with a first-round game at 7:35 p.m. Saturday against New Hampshire, then it will play either Maine or Princeton at 4:05 p.m. or 7:35 p.m. Sunday in the consolation or championship game. Jason Weinstein will handle the play-by-play, which can be heard in the Ithaca area on WHCU-AM (870) or worldwide via the new Ivy League Digital Network subscription service.
 
ABOUT THE BIG RED
Cornell is coming off a three-week hiatus for final exams and the holidays. It's last game was a 2-2 tie against Colgate on Dec. 7 at Lynah Rink in Ithaca. The Big Red rallied from a two-goal deficit thanks to two goals on five-on-three power plays. Juniors Joakim Ryan and Cole Bardreau had a goal and an assist apiece, and senior Andy Iles made 20 saves for his program-record 14th career tie. ... The Big Red is 4-1-1 over its last six games, which included a wild 4-2 victory over Niagara on Nov. 26. Freshman goalie Mitch Gillam not only earned the victory with 24 saves in his first collegiate start, but he also became just the eighth goalie in NCAA Division I history to score a goal. ... The Big Red has the second-most effective power play in the nation with a 26.9 percent conversion rate. Cornell has nine goals on the power play over the last seven games. ... Junior John McCarron (3 goals, 12 assists – 15 points) is tied for the team lead in scoring with classmate and linemate Joel Lowry (6-9–15). Junior forward Brian Ferlin (7-7–14) has five goals over his last seven games to take the team lead in that category, and Lowry now has nine points over the same seven-game span. ... Junior Joakim Ryan (4-10–14) is second in the nation in points per game for defensemen (1.08), trailing only Bentley's Steve Weinstein. He was an All-ECAC Hockey Preseason Team selection by the league's coaches. ... Senior goaltender Andy Iles (6-4-2, 2.39 goals-against average, .909 save percentage) had his streak of 80 consecutive starts snapped with Gillam's start on Nov. 26, but he has started both of the Big Red's games since.
 
ABOUT NEW HAMPSHIRE
The Wildcats have endured a streaky start to their season, answering a 1-5-1 start with a six-game winning streak in November. Most recently, New Hampshire swept Colorado College in two road games, then returned to Hockey East play in early December with a pair of losses in a home-and-home with Boston College. ... Senior forwards Nick Sorkin (11-9–20; 4 PPGs) and Kevin Goumas (7-13–20) are tied for the team lead in scoring, one point ahead of defenseman Trevor van Riemsdyk (4-15–19). Defensemen Eric Knodel (Toronto) and Brett Pesce (Carolina) are the only two NHL draft picks on the team. ... Junior Casey DeSmith (7-7, 2.13, .922) has seen the bulk of the action in goal, though senior Jeff Wyer (2-2-1, 2.89, .883) has also earned five starts. ... Seven of UNH's nine wins have come by three or more goals. The Wildcats are 2-7 in games decided by one or two goals.
 
THE SERIES WITH NEW HAMPSHIRE
The Wildcats hold a slim 12-13 lead in the all-time series, which started in 1941 with a 8-5 Cornell victory at the Lake Placid Invitational Tournament. Three of the six meetings between the teams during the tenure of Cornell head coach Mike Schafer have come in the NCAA tournament, with New Hampshire emerging victorious in each game. ... The teams have met once before at the Florida College Hockey Classic, with Cornell winning a 5-2 affair on Dec. 29, 2006. ... None of the 25 meetings between the teams have gone to overtime. ... Schafer is 2-4 all-time against the Wildcats.
 
ABOUT MAINE
The Black Bears enter the weekend on a three-game winning streak. After improving to 4-2-1 in Hockey East with a 4-2 victory over UMass-Lowell on Dec. 8, Maine easily swept a two-game non-conference series at home against American International. The Black Bears are 9-1 at home and 0-5-1 away from home. ... Sophomore forward Devin Shore (7-12–19) leads the team in scoring and is tied for the goal-scoring lead with defenseman Ben Hutton (7-7–14; 4 PPGs). ... Senior Martin Ouellette (8-6-1, 2.06, .929, 2 SO), a Columbus Blue Jackets draft pick, has started 15 of Maine's 16 games. He was pulled after surrendering three goals in 10:33 against Cornell last year. ... Maine has surrendered eight goals in the first period of their 16 games so far. ... Red Gendron is in his season as the head coach at Maine after previously serving as an associate head coach at Yale, which won the national championship last year.
 
THE SERIES WITH MAINE
Though the Black Bears have never led the all-time series, they have pulled back even at 7-7-2 by winning the last three meetings. Cornell has particularly struggled against Maine at the Florida College Classic, with the Black Bears posting a 5-1 record against the Big Red at Germain Arena — which also marks the last six meetings between the teams. The most recent clash came on Dec. 29, 2012, when Maine rallied from a three-goal deficit for a 6-4 victory in the championship game.
 
ABOUT PRINCETON
The Tigers have been blitzed with injuries in the first half of their season, with none bigger than the one suffered by three-time leading scorer Andrew Calof, an All-ECAC Hockey Preseason Team selection by both the coaches and the media. In his absence, junior forward Tucker Brockett (2-9–11) has assumed the team's scoring lead, while senior forward Andrew Ammon (6-2–8) leads the team in goals. ... Princeton enters the weekend on a four-game losing streak after a shocking 4-3 victory at then-No. 4 Quinnipiac on Nov. 23. The Tigers' other two victories this season have come in overtime against Dartmouth, the second-to-last Division I team to win its first game this season. ... Senior Sean Bonar (2-6, 3.89, .877) and freshman Colon Phinney (1-6, 4.03, .876) have alternated starts in goal over the last six games. ... The Tigers have been outscored 21-5 in the first period so far. ... Princeton hasn't yet surrendered fewer than two goals in a game.
 
THE SERIES WITH PRINCETON
The Big Red holds a commanding 84-50-8 lead all-time, including a 4-2 victory over the Tigers on Nov. 1 in the teams' ECAC Hockey opener at Lynah Rink. Last season, Cornell completed a two-game sweep of the Tigers in an ECAC Hockey first-round series. Defenseman Joakim Ryan, a New Jersey native, had three points in the series. Princeton won both games of the regular-season series last season. The teams have met just once before at the Florida College Hockey Classic, with Princeton recording a 3-2 victory on Dec. 30, 2009 in the consolation game.
 
POWERFUL STUFF
With a 2-for-6 performance in its last outing, Cornell's power play now ranks second in the nation with a 26.9 percent conversion rate. The Big Red has nine power-play goals over its last seven games and also scored seven goals on the man advantage in two games Oct. 25-26 at Nebraska Omaha. All four of the Big Red's goals in the second game came against the Mavericks on the power play. It marked the first time the Big Red has scored four power-play goals in a game since Nov. 6, 2009 against Dartmouth (a 5-1 victory).
 
NOT JUST A DEFENSEMAN
Entering this weekend, junior blueliner Joakim Ryan is second in the nation in points per game for defensemen (1.08). Just six games into the season, Ryan had already equaled his goal total from all of last year with three. Two of his strikes came in a 3-3 tie Nov. 8 at Rensselaer. He led the team with 20 assists last season and was tied for third in points with 23. He was also on the ice for 41 of the team's 83 goals, which ranked second on the team to only leading scorer Greg Miller (43). The production was nothing new for the San Jose Sharks draft pick, who set a program record for goals by a freshman defenseman in 2011-12 with seven. He then started off this season with three points in his first two games, including a power-play goal in the Oct. 25 opener at Nebraska Omaha.
 
POLLS PROSE
Since the Big Red was last in action on Dec. 7, it has moved up two spots to 13th in the most recent USA Today/USA Hockey Magazine poll and held steady at 15th in both the USCHO.com poll. The No. 13 ranking is the highest Cornell has held in either poll this season. More importantly, the Big Red is also currently 13th in the Ratings Percentage Index, which is used to help determine which teams qualify for the NCAA tournament. The Big Red appeared in the USA Today/USA Hockey Magazine poll a league-high 14 weeks during the 2012-13 regular season.
 
THE 35th TO 350
Already the winningest coach in program history, Mike Schafer hit 350 victories for his career — all of which have come from behind the Big Red's bench — with a 4-2 win over Princeton on Nov. 1. He became the 35th coach all-time to rack up 350 victories across all NCAA divisions, with four of them passing the milestone last season (Ferris State's Bob Daniels, Connecticut's Bruce Marshall, Notre Dame's Jeff Jackson and Quinnipiac's Rand Pecknold). Schafer is also just the third coach to pass 350 victories with Ivy League tenure, joining Ned Harkness (Cornell, Union and Rensselaer) and Tim Taylor (Yale).
 
THE PUCK STOPS HERE
With 30 saves in a Nov. 23 victory over Yale, senior  goaltender Andy Iles moved up to second on the program's all-time list in saves. Just 11 games into his final season on East Hill, Iles has now accumulated an even 2,500 saves over his collegiate career. He passed Jason Elliott (2,462) for second on the all-time list, and now trails only current Los Angeles Kings starting goalie Ben Scrivens (2,873) (see chart above). For his 55-save effort over two games against Brown and Yale from Nov. 22-23, Iles was named the ECAC Hockey Goaltender of the Week.
 
IRON MAN
Andy Iles started 80 consecutive games in goal for the Big Red, spanning all of the last two seasons and the final game of his freshman campaign, before the streak came to an end Nov. 26 with Mitch Gillam getting the nod against Niagara. Iles' 80 consecutive starts are tied for fifth in NCAA Division I history, leaving him 24 games a familiar leader. Cornell's Ben Scrivens holds the current record of 104 consecutive starts from 2006-10. Iles was one of just two goalies to be used exclusively by his team in 2011-12, with Minnesota's Kent Patterson being the other. By starting and finishing all of the Big Red's games that season, Iles became the first goalie at Cornell to accomplish that feat since Darren Eliot in 1982-83, and the first Cornell sophomore to do so since Laing Kennedy in 1960-61 — when the season was just 19 games long.
 
FIVE-ON-THREE PROWESS
There are few situations in hockey more dire than when a team is facing a two-man disadvantage, but the Big Red has made a habit of rising to the occasion in those scenarios. Cornell is a perfect 14-for-14 killing off a two-man disadvantage over last season and the beginning of this season, spanning a total of 12 minutes, 4 seconds. The last time Cornell surrendered a five-on-three goal was against Yale on Feb. 11, 2012.
 
BLANK YOU VERY MUCH
Cornell has recorded at least one shutout in each of the last 18 seasons. The last time the Big Red went a full schedule without posting a shutout came during the 1994-95 season under former coach Brian McCutcheon, as Cornell finished that year 11-15-4. The following year marked the first season for current head coach Mike Schafer, and his clubs have never gone a full year without recording a shutout.
 
FEEL THE DRAFT?
Cornell has seven players on the roster who have been selected in the NHL Entry Draft, including one pick from last June. Freshman forward Matt Buckles became the first Cornellian to be selected by the Florida Panthers, when the NHL's southern-most team nabbed the Toronto native in the fourth round with the 98th overall selection. Other NHL draft picks on the team include defensemen Reece Willcox (Philadelphia Flyers), Joakim Ryan (San Jose Sharks) and Kirill Gotovets (Tampa Bay Lightning; has since been traded to the Chicago Blackhawks) and forwards John McCarron (Edmonton Oilers), Brian Ferlin (Boston Bruins) and Joel Lowry (Los Angeles Kings).
 
NOW THAT'S A STREAK
It has been 1,528 games since the Big Red has been shutout in back-to-back contests — a streak that stayed alive with the Big Red's two goals Nov. 15 at Clarkson. The streak dates back December 1963 with games vs. Clarkson and St. Lawrence.
 
FOR THE RECORD
With three consecutive shutouts in November 2011, Andy Iles recorded the second-longest shutout streak in program history, spanning 213 minutes, 35 seconds over a five-game span. The only Cornell shutout streak that went longer was posted by Los Angeles Kings goalie Ben Scrivens, who held the opposition scoreless for 267:11 during the 2010 playoffs. But Iles wasn't done there — he posted back-to-back shutouts against St. Lawrence and Clarkson on Dec. 2 and Dec. 3, respectively, spurring a other lengthy shutout streak of 152:36 that ranks ninth all-time in Big Red history. His success has stretched into the postseason, as evidenced by a career-high 46 saves in a March 9 double-overtime victory against Dartmouth. Iles was third in the nation with six shutouts and 10th in goal-against average (2.12). He also set a record for longest streak in ECAC Hockey play of 286:54 from November 2011 to January 2012.
 
CLASS-Y GUY
Andy Iles is one of 20 national candidates for the Senior CLASS Award, which is presented annually to an NCAA Division I senior that has notable achievements in four areas of excellence — community, classroom, character and competition. Iles is continuing the program's tradition of highly decorated goaltenders, having been named the ECAC Hockey Rookie of the Year (2011) and an All-Ivy League First Team selection (2012). Outside of the rink, he has been involved in a service trip with the Portal De Belen Foundation to Don Juan, Dominican Republic, and is the organizer and planner of the Cornell Hockey Teddy Bear Toss, which donates proceeds to Cancer Resource Center of the Finger Lakes and the Franziska Racker Centers. He is also a five-time member of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences' Dean's List and carries a 3.78 cumulative grade point average.
 
GLOBAL INFLUENCE
The Big Red has 13 players on the roster born in the United States. Cornell also now has players native to seven different countries on its squad. Aside from the bulk of its roster hailing from the United States and Canada, Cornell also has a player from Belarus (Kirill Gotovets), Denmark (Christian Hilbrich), Finland (Teemu Tiitinen), Singapore (Dustin Mowrey) and South Africa (Armand de Swardt).
 
GOLDEN AGAIN
Junior forward Cole Bardreau won a gold medal while serving as an assistant captain for the United States at the 2013 International Ice Hockey Federation World Junior Championship in Ufa, Russia. He then scored a goal and added an assist in his first game back with the Big Red last weekend against Union. It wasn't the first time Bardreau's earned gold with the U.S. either — he also wore an "A" while capturing gold at the IIHF Under-18 World Championship in April 2011. Sophomore defenseman Joakim Ryan was also among the 45 players who started in camp for the United States before the roster was trimmed in advance of the World Junior championships.
 
COLLECTING HARDWARE
While forward Cole Bardreau became the first Cornell player to earn gold with the U.S. at the IIHF World Junior Championships, goalie Andy Iles was the first to earn a medal with Team USA. Iles claimed bronze at the 2011 tournament in Buffalo, N.Y., with the only player before him to compete with the United States being goaltender Jean-Marc Pelletier in 1998.
 
CLOSER TO HOME
Hometown fans of the Big Red got a rare treat when goalie Andy Iles became the first Ithaca native to play for the team since Mike Tallman in 1988-89. Forward Kevin Cole then made his collegiate debut in 2011, marking the first time in at least 50 years — and perhaps the first time in program history — that two Ithaca natives have played for the Big Red in the same season. Yet another Ithaca area connection came on board last season when the Big Red added 6-foot-4 defenseman Craig Esposito, who is also from Lansing and also competes on Cornell's men's golf team.
 
INTERNATIONAL EXPOSURE
Junior Kirill Gotovets got a taste of the big time when he was selected to represent his native Belarus in the 2010 IIHF World Championships — not an age group World Championships (though he did play for Belarus at the U20 World Championship as well) — playing against some of the best players the world has to offer. He played in three of Belarus' eight games at the World Championships.
 
UP NEXT
The Big Red returns home for a rare mid-season exhibition game against the Russian Red Stars on Friday, Jan. 3. It will be the first time Cornell has played host to the traveling squad of European junior-level all-stars. The Big Red will the wraps up non-league play with a home contest against Hockey East's Massachusetts on Friday, Jan. 10 before returning to the ECAC Hockey slate Jan. 17-18 with a road trip to Ivy League rivals Harvard and Dartmouth.