#13/13 CORNELL at #5/6 QUINNIPIAC
TIME: 7 p.m.
DATE: Friday, February 21
PLACE: High Point Solutions Arena · Hamden, Conn.
RECORDS: Cornell 12-7-5, 8-6-4 ECAC Hockey · Quinnipiac 21-6-5, 11-4-3 ECAC Hockey
TV: New England Sports Network
LIVE VIDEO: www.quinnipiacbobcats.com/links/kc6aso
AUDIO: www.ivyleaguedigitalnetwork.com/cornell/schedule?date=2014-02-23
RADIO: WHCU-AM (870)
LIVE STATS: www.quinnipiacbobcats.com/links/sot4je
 
#13/13 CORNELL at PRINCETON
TIME: 7 p.m.
DATE: Saturday, February 22
PLACE: Hobey Baker Rink · Princeton, N.J.
RECORDS: Cornell 12-7-5, 8-6-4 ECAC Hockey · Princeton 5-20, 4-14 ECAC Hockey
LIVE VIDEO: www.ivyleaguedigitalnetwork.com/cornell/schedule?date=2014-02-23
AUDIO: www.ivyleaguedigitalnetwork.com/cornell/schedule?date=2014-02-23
RADIO: WHCU-AM (870)
LIVE STATS: www.goprincetontigers.com
 
Cornell game notes (PDF)
Quinnipiac game notes (coming soon)
Princeton game notes (coming soon)
 
ABOUT THE BIG RED
Cornell had lost just once at home this season prior to last weekend's disappointing sweep at the hands of Union and Rensselaer. The Big Red has never led and scored just once in each of the last three games, which come on the heels of a nine-game unbeaten streak. Freshman forward Jake Weidner scored his first collegiate goal on a breakaway in the first period to tie the game against Union before the Dutchmen countered less than a minute later and skated away with a 4-1 victory. Rensselaer then scored twice in the first period Saturday and outlasted the Big Red, 3-1, with junior captain John McCarron (5-14–19) scoring Cornell's lone goal early in the third period. ... Junior Brian Ferlin (10 goals-12 assists–22 points; 5 PPGs) leads the team in goals and points. Senior Dustin Mowrey (6-14–20) had a six-game scoring streak in January, and Christian Hilbrich (8-5–13) is now second on the team in goals. Both Mowrey and Hilbrich were out of the lineup last weekend. ... Junior defenseman Joakim Ryan (5-14–19) is ninth in the nation in points per game for blueliners (0.79). ... Junior Joel Lowry (6-13–19) is tied with Ryan for third in team scoring. ... Senior Andy Iles (11-7-5, 2.37 goals-against average, .914 save percentage) is in his third season as the Big Red's undisputed starting goaltender.
 
ABOUT QUINNIPIAC
National runners-up last season, the Bobcats have established themselves as a force again this season. After winning 12 of its first 14 games, Quinnipiac suffered a shocking home loss to Princeton and is now 3-3 in its last six games. After an impressive 4-0 win last Friday at Yale, the Bobcats dropped a 4-2 decision Saturday at Brown. ... Freshman Sam Anas (18-19–37; 8 PPGs) is tied with senior Kellen Jones (16-21–37; 4 SHGs) for the team lead in scoring. They typically play on a line with Jones' twin brother, Connor (11-19–30; 5 PPGs) at center. ... Sophomore Michael Garteig (21-6-5, 1.92, .910, 5 SO) has started all 32 of the team's games in goal.
 
ABOUT PRINCETON
The Tigers are 2-13 over their last 15, but one of those victories came Friday at Brown, 3-2, followed by a 7-5 loss the next night at Yale. Senior Andrew Ammon (10-10–20) factored in all eight of the team's goals on the trip, including two goals and six assists. Senior linemate Andrew Calof (2-14–16) is second in team scoring despite missing 10 games earlier this season due to injury. Freshman Ryan Siiro (5-7–12; 4 PPGs) leads the team in power-play goals. ... Senior Sean Bonar (2-10, 4.12, .882) and freshman Colton Phinney (3-10, 3.61, .900) have been alternating starts in goal.
 
THE SERIES WITH QUINNIPIAC
Cornell holds a 15-10-2 lead in the all-time series against the Bobcats, who joined the Division I ranks in 1998 with Rand Pecknold at the helm. Quinnipiac won four of five games against the Big Red last season en route to an appearance in the national championship game. The Bobcats won both regular-season meetings by identical 4-1 scores. The teams then met in an ECAC Hockey quarterfinal series in Hamden, Conn. with the upstart Big Red topping the nation's No. 1 team, 3-2, in the opening game. Quinnipiac won Game 2 to force a third and final game to the series, which was decided by a Kevin Bui double-overtime goal. The Bobcats then won this season's first meeting between the teams, 3-0, on Nov. 2 at Lynah Rink.
 
THE SERIES WITH PRINCETON
The Big Red holds a commanding 84-50-8 lead all-time, including a 4-2 victory Nov. 1 at Lynah Rink in the team's home opener. John McCarron had a goal and two assists for Cornell, which built a four-goal lead after 40 minutes. Last season, the Big Red registered a two-game sweep of the Tigers in an ECAC Hockey first-round series last season. Defenseman Joakim Ryan, a New Jersey native, had three points in the series. Princeton won both games of the 2012-13 regular season series between the teams, including a 5-3 victory at Hobey Baker Rink.
 
IVY WATCH
The Big Red has already earned at least a share of the Ivy League title for the second time in the last three years, and it will have a chance to win the crown outright this weekend. At 6-0-1 for 13 points in Ancient Eight play, the Big Red is six points clear of both Dartmouth and Harvard (3-3-1) with three games to play. Cornell can clinch the title outright Friday if Harvard and Dartmouth both lose or tie their respective games. If both teams do win Friday, the same scenario would apply to Saturday, plus Cornell could win the title outright with a tie or victory at Princeton. This is the program's eighth Ivy League title under Mike Schafer's watch and the second in the last three years. The last time Cornell won the Ivy title was in 2012 on its way to the quarterfinals of the NCAA tournament. For full Ivy League standings, see Page 9.
 
AND THE WINNER IS ...
The Big Red had two of the three ECAC Hockey weekly award winners following its sweep of Yale and Brown on Jan. 31 and Feb. 1. Freshman forward Jeff Kubiak was named the Rookie of the Week after scoring his first collegiate goal against the Bulldogs, also adding an assist on John Knisley's goal earlier in the night. Kubiak then set up Matt Buckles' goal the following night to get Cornell on the board against Brown. His four points over the last six games is highest on the team over that span. Senior Andy Iles was also named Goaltender of the Week after stopping 71 of 74 shots he faced over the weekend. It's the second time this season Iles has earned the honor. The first time was also after games against Brown and Yale, when he had 55 saves Nov. 22-23.
 
POLLS PROSE
The Big Red have fallen to 13th in the USA Today/USA Hockey Magazine and in the USCHO.com polls this week – its lowest ranking in either poll in 2014. More importantly, the Big Red is also 13th in the PairWise Rankings, which are used to help determine which teams qualify for the NCAA tournament. That would place Cornell as a fourth seed in one of the four regionals, if the season ended today. The Big Red has been ranked as high as eighth in the USA Today/USA Magazine poll, ninth in the USCHO.com poll and sixth in the PairWise Rakings.
 
NOT JUST A DEFENSEMAN
As of Monday, junior blueliner Joakim Ryan is ninth in the nation in points per game for defensemen (0.79). 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.
 
POWERFUL STUFF
How good was the Cornell power play in the first half of the season? The Big Red hasn't scored on the man advantage in its last nine games, and it still ranks 20th in the nation with a 19.4 percent conversion rate. The Big Red scored seven goals on the power play in two games Oct. 25-26 at Nebraska Omaha. 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). Cornell's power play is now 0-for-26 over its last 10 games.
 
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. Now 23 games into his final season on East Hill, Iles has now accumulated 2,800 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 on opposite page).
 
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 season 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. The Big Red is still seeking its first shutout of this season after Brown scratched out an extra-attacker goal with less than two minutes remaining in Cornell's 2-1 victory over the Bears on Feb. 1.
 
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 the last two seasons, 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.
 
NOW THAT'S A STREAK
It has been 1,536 games since the Big Red has been shutout in back-to-back contests. The streak dates back December 1963 with games vs. Clarkson and St. Lawrence.
 
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.
 
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).
 
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).
 
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 14 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. Junior 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.
 
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.
 
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.
 
LET'S GET IT STARTED
Cornell has an all-time record of 57-34-6 in season openers, claiming its third straight win in a season debut with a 5-3 victory Friday at Nebraska Omaha. Last season, Cornell secured a 2-0 victory against visiting Colorado College behind a 19-save shutout from Andy Iles. Both of the Big Red's goals were scored on the power play by John Esposito, who has since graduated and now plays professionally in Austria. Under current head coach Mike Schafer, the Big Red is 12-6-1 in season openers.
 
EXHIBITIONS IN NAME ONLY
Cornell is now 18-1-3 in exhibitions since 2000, including a 6-0 thrashing of the Russian Red Stars last Friday. It was Cornell's first midseason exhibition since a 4-0 victory over the U.S. National Team Development Program on Dec. 8, 2002, and the Big Red used the game to give ice time to four players who haven't yet appeared in regular-season play. Freshman Matt Buckles scored twice, and freshman Jeff Kubiak and senior Craig Esposito also scored goals in the rout.
 
UP NEXT
The Big Red has just one week remaining in its regular season. Cornell returns home for a game against Dartmouth on Feb. 28 before a Senior Night clash with Harvard on March 1. The team will then learn its seeding for the ECAC Hockey playoffs, and then – perhaps – the NCAA tournament.