The regional rivalry between Cornell and Colgate always brings a lot to the table, but this season's second matchup between the Central New York teams on Saturday has even more significance with both teams battling for one of the coveted top four spots in ECAC Hockey. Jason Weinstein will handle the play-by-play, which can be heard in the Ithaca area on WHCU-AM (870) or worldwide  on the Ivy League Digital Network.
 
#8/9 CORNELL at COLGATE
TIME: 7 p.m.
DATE: Saturday, February 8
PLACE: Starr Rink · Hamilton, N.Y.
RECORDS: Cornell 12-4-5, 8-3-4 ECAC Hockey · Colgate 13-11-3, 9-5-1 ECAC Hockey
LIVE VIDEO: www.gocolgateraiders.com/sports/2013/8/30/GEN_0830134405.aspx
AUDIO: www.ivyleaguedigitalnetwork.com/cornell/schedule?date=2014-02-09
RADIO: WHCU-AM (870)
LIVE STATS: www.sidearmstats.com/colgate/mhockey
 
Cornell game notes (PDF)
Colgate game notes (PDF)
 
ABOUT THE BIG RED
Cornell has the third-longest unbeaten streak in the country, using a pair of road victories last weekend at Yale and Brown to extend that stretch to nine games (5-0-4). The Big Red rallied to beat the Bulldogs in a thrilling overtime game between nationally ranked teams in front of a sold-out Ingalls Rink crowd on Friday, 3-2. John Knisley scored early on, then set up Jeff Kubiak's goal in the second period to tie the game. Brian Ferlin then scored his team-leading 10th goal of the season on a breakaway with 17.1 seconds left in overtime to lift Cornell to the victory. Andy Iles then made 33 saves the following night, and Matt Buckles and Cole Bardreau scored goals in a 2-1 victory at Brown. ... The Big Red penalty kill has been outstanding of late, killing off 31 of its opponents' last 33 power-play opportunities (93.9 percent). ... Ferlin (10 goals-12 assists–22 points; 5 PPGs) leads the team in goals and points. Linemate Dustin Mowrey (5-14–19) had a six-game scoring streak snapped last weekend, and Christian Hilbrich (8-5–13) is now second on the team in goals after scoring five times in the last seven games. ... Junior defenseman Joakim Ryan (5-14–19) is third in the nation in points per game for blueliners (0.90). ... Junior Joel Lowry (6-12–18) created Bardreau's winner on Saturday, and junior captain John McCarron (4-13–17) is fifth in team scoring. ... Senior Andy Iles (11-4-5, 2.15 goals-against average, .923 save percentage) is in his third season as the Big Red's undisputed starting goaltender. Since the semester break, he is 5-0-3 with a 1.80 GAA and .941 save percentage.
 
ABOUT COLGATE
Riding a six-game winning streak, the Raiders were one of the hottest teams in the nation before getting swept on the road last weekend at Brown and Yale. After not surrendering more than three goals in a game for 11 straight, Colgate fell to the Bears, 5-2, then lost to the Bulldogs, 4-1. ... Sophomore forward Tyson Spink (5-19–24) is the team's leading scorer and has an eight-game scoring streak. He typically plays on a line centered by twin brother Tylor Spink (11-9–20; 5 PPGs), who is tied for the team lead in goals with Darcy Murphy (11-5–16). Mike Borkowski (7-16–23) is second on the team in scoring and has four GWGs, and Kyle Baun (10-10–20; 6 PPGs) leads the team in power-play strikes. All five of them are sophomores. ... Freshman Charlie Finn (10-5-2, 2.71, .907) made eight straight starts in goal before senior Eric Mihalik (3-5-1, 2.60, .909) got the nod against Yale. ... Seven of the Raiders' 11 losses have come by at least three goals.
 
THE SERIES WITH COLGATE
Saturday's game will mark the 147th all-time meeting between the two Central New York rivals dating back to 1921. The Big Red holds a 76-56-14 lead in the series after the teams played to a 2-2 draw on Dec. 7 at Lynah Rink. The Raiders scored a pair of goals in the first four minutes of the second period to take a 2-0 lead, but ran into penalty trouble. Cornell countered with a pair of five-on-three goals from Joakim Ryan and Cole Bardreau to lead each team to a point in the ECAC Hockey standings. The Big Red had a victory and tie against the Raiders last season, which marked the first time the schools opened up their league schedules against each other. Andy Iles made 44 saves in the Big Red's 3-1 victory Nov. 2, 2012 at Starr Rink in Hamilton. Cornell head coach Mike Schafer holds a 26-12-9 lead over the Raiders during his tenure behind the bench.
 
AND THE WINNER IS ...
The Big Red has two of the three ECAC Hockey weekly award winners following its sweep of Yale and Brown last weekend. 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 three 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 moved up three spots to eighth in the USA Today/USA Hockey Magazine poll and two spots to ninth in the USCHO.com poll this week, marking a new season high for Cornell in both polls. More importantly, the Big Red has moved up to sixth in the PairWise Rankings, which are used to help determine which teams qualify for the NCAA tournament. That would place Cornell as a second seed in one of the four regionals, if the season ended today.
 
NOT JUST A DEFENSEMAN
As of Monday, junior blueliner Joakim Ryan is third in the nation in points per game for defensemen (0.90). 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 six games, and it still ranks 11th in the nation with a 21.6 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-16 over its last seven 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 20 games into his final season on East Hill, Iles has now accumulated 2,740 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).
 
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 last Saturday.
 
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).
 
SITTING ATOP THE IVY
After sweeping Yale and Brown last weekend, the Big Red has put itself in the driver's seat in the hunt for the program's eighth Ivy League under Mike Schafer's watch and the second in the last three years. At 6-0-1 for 13 points in Ancient Eight play, the Big Red is five points clear of Brown (4-3) and six points ahead of Dartmouth (3-2-1). Cornell can clinch at least a share of the title with a win in its next Ivy League game Saturday, Feb. 22 at Princeton – but the Big Red can also clinch at least a share of the title before then if Harvard beats Dartmouth on Friday and Princeton tops Brown on Feb. 14.
 
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.
 
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.
 
NOW THAT'S A STREAK
It has been 1,534 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.
 
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. 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.
 
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.
 
UP NEXT
The Big Red returns home for four of its final six games of the regular season, starting Feb. 14 against Union and Feb. 15 vs. Rensselaer. The following weekend will feature a trip to Quinnipiac and Princeton.