Coming off a stretch in which it played five of six games at home, the Big Red will take to the road for a pivotal Ivy League trip this weekend. Cornell opens up the trek at 7 p.m. Friday against Dartmouth, one of the league's hottest teams, before continuing on for a 4 p.m. Saturday contest at nationally ranked Harvard. The game against the Crimson will be available on ESPN3, while both games will be streamed on the subscription-based Ivy League Digital Network. Jason Weinstein's play-by-play will also be available for free through Ivy League Digital Network, and his call can also be heard in the Ithaca area on WHCU-AM (870).
 
CORNELL at DARTMOUTH
TIME: 7 p.m.
DATE: Friday, February 13, 2015
PLACE: Thompson Arena · Hanover, N.H.
RECORDS: Cornell 10-10-3, 8-7-1 ECAC Hockey, 4-2 Ivy League · Dartmouth 11-8-4, 8-6-2 ECAC Hockey, 5-2-1 Ivy League
LIVE VIDEO ($): Big Red Digital
AUDIO (free): Big Red Digital
RADIO: WHCU-AM (870)
LIVE STATS: www.DartmouthSports.com
 
CORNELL at #13/14 HARVARD
TIME: 4 p.m.
DATE: Saturday, February 14, 2015
PLACE: Bright-Landry Hockey Center · Cambridge, Mass.
RECORDS*: Cornell 10-10-3, 8-7-1 ECAC Hockey, 4-2 Ivy League · Harvard 12-8-2, 8-6-2 ECAC Hockey, 3-4-1 Ivy League
TV: ESPN3
LIVE VIDEO ($): Big Red Digital
AUDIO (free): Big Red Digital
RADIO: WHCU-AM (870)
LIVE STATS: GoCrimson.com
 (*—records do not include Friday's results)
 
Cornell game notes (PDF)
Dartmouth game notes (coming soon)
Harvard game notes (PDF)

TIME CHANGE
Due to an ominous forecast with a possible blizzard in store for the metro Boston area from mid-afternoon Saturday through Sunday, the game time for the Cornell-Harvard on Saturday has been moved up to 4 p.m. The game will still be broadcast on the Ivy League Digital Netowrk and ESPN3.

LAST TIME OUT
Cornell enters the weekend in seventh place in the ECAC Hockey standings with six games to play for all of the circuit's 12 teams. The Big Red has split four of its last five weekends, including last weekend. Cornell played well Friday against league-leading Quinnipiac, but ultimately lost in overtime, 1-0. The Big Red had an apparent goal waved off in the second period. On Saturday, Cornell scored a pair of early goals against Princeton. Sophomore defenseman Holden Anderson then scored the winner with his first collegiate goal early in the third period.
 
GOALIE UNIVERSITY
Cornell has produced nine First-Team All-American goaltenders in its history and 20th-year Jay R. Bloom '77 Head Coach of Men's Hockey Mike Schafer is widely regarded as one of the top defensive minds in the game, so it should come as no surprise that the Big Red enters this weekend surrendering the second-fewest goals per game in the nation (1.78). Sophomore goalie Mitch Gillam (8-6-3, 1.46 GAA, .945 SV%, SO) leads the nation in both goals-against average and save percentage, and freshman goalie Hayden Stewart (2-4-0, 2.10, .931, 2 SO) has been named ECAC Hockey Rookie of the Week after each of his shutouts.
 
WHO'S WHO
With 10 points over his last nine games, senior Cole Bardreau (3-12–15) has taken the team scoring lead. ... Typically on Bardreau's left wing is junior Christian Hilbrich (8-3–11), who leads the team in goals by two over sophomore Matt Buckles (6-1–7; 4 PPG). ... Sophomore Jake Weidner (3-8–11) is tied with Hilbrich for second in team scoring after scoring the empty-netter to clinch Saturday's 4-2 win over Princeton. He is also the team's top faceoff man, winning 59.3 percent of his draws on the season. ... Offense has been generally hard to come by for the Big Red this season, with the squad's average of 1.87 goals per game ranking 54th of 59 teams in the nation. Injuries have played a role, with senior defenseman Joakim Ryan — an All-ECAC Hockey Preseason selection by both the coaches and media — missing eight games due to injury and senior Joel Lowry (4-4–8), the leading scorer at the time, expected to miss the remainder of the season.
 
PARITY PARTY
A whopping six of ECAC Hockey's 12 teams have either 17 or 18 points, including all four teams involved in this weekend's games at Dartmouth and Harvard. Cornell and Colgate enter the weekend trailing the host teams by one point apiece.
 
ABOUT DARTMOUTH
The Big Green is riding a five-game winning streak, which started with a 5-2 victory over Cornell on Jan. 24 at Lynah Rink. An influx of offense has powered the surge, including a 12-goal outburst in last weekend's road sweep of Brown and Yale. ... Senior center Eric Neiley (11-12–23) has taken over the team scoring lead. He has five goals and five assists for 10 points over Dartmouth's five-game winning streak, including a four-point night against Cornell. ... Senior center Tyler Sikura (7-12–19) is second on the team in scoring. He generally plays with senior right wing Eric Robinson (7-11–18), who has a team-best plus-12 rating. ... Junior James Kruger (7-7-3, 2.13, .924, 2 SO) has been the primary goaltender, though junior Charles Grant (4-1, 2.83, .886) has made four of his five appearances on the season over the last four weeks. ... Dartmouth's power play has scored five times over its last five games.
 
THE SERIES WITH DARTMOUTH
Cornell holds a 79-45-5 lead in the all-time series against Dartmouth, a series that dates back to a Dartmouth win on Feb. 2, 1909, in Hanover, N.H. Cornell is 13-5-3 against Dartmouth over the last eight seasons and had a 10-game unbeaten streak ended Feb. 28, 2014. The Big Green won this season's first meeting, 5-2, on Jan. 24 at Lynah Rink. Senior Cole Bardreau and sophomore Matt Buckles scored third-period goals for Cornell. In their last meeting at Thompson Arena, the teams played to a 1-1 tie last season. Head coach Mike Schafer is 22-18-5 against the Big Green during his tenure behind the Cornell bench.
 
ABOUT HARVARD
The Crimson were the media darlings of ECAC Hockey after starting off the season 10-1-2 and ascending into the top five of both national polls, but the team has struggled to a 2-7 in the 2015 portion of the schedule entering Friday's game against Colgate. Though defensive struggles have led to Harvard's recent slide, the team still ranks 10th in the country with an average of 3.41 goals per game. Most of that can be attributed to maturation from young talent, including junior left wing Jimmy Vesey (18-17–35; 5 PPGs). He ranks second in the country in points per game (1.59) and goals per game (0.82). Sophomore center Alexander Kerfoot (5-11–16), who recently returned from injury, and junior right wing Kyle Criscuolo (12-18–30) are Vesey's linemates. ... Senior Steve Michalek (12-8-2, 2.30, .928, 2 SO) has started all 22 of Harvard's games in goal. ... Harvard's power play ranks 11th in the nation with a 21.8 percent success rate, though it is 0-for-9 over the last four games.
 
THE SERIES WITH HARVARD
One of the best rivalries in all of college hockey, Cornell holds a 74-61-9 lead in the all-time series with the Crimson after a thrilling 3-2 victory on Jan. 23 at Lynah Rink. Sophomore Eric Freschi scored the winning goal with 41 seconds left in the third period. Senior Cole Bardreau and sophomore Christian Hilbrich scored goals less than two minutes apart in the second period for the Big Red. The Big Red has been particularly successful in the series of late, sweeping the series last season and boasting a 10-4-2 advantage in the teams' 16 meetings since the 2008-09 season began. That includes a 3-2 victory for Cornell in its last trip to Bright-Landry Hockey Center on Jan. 17, 2014. Senior Joakim Ryan assisted on first-period goals by Madison Dias and Christian Hilbrich. Cornell head coach Mike Schafer holds a 34-14-4 career mark against Harvard.
 
THIS IS YOUR CAPTAIN SCORING
Senior forward John McCarron, a second-year captain for the Big Red, scored his first goal of the season in a 2-2 tie with Colgate on Jan. 31. McCarron has made a habit of finishing seasons strong over his four-year career at Cornell. Of his 21 career goals, 18 have come after the December holiday break.
 
KILLIN' IT
The Big Red is tied for second in the nation with a 90.0 percent success rate on the penalty kill. Within that number is an impressive streak against two-man disadvantages. Cornell is a perfect 20-for-20 killing off three-on-five scenarios over the last three seasons, spanning a total of 18 minutes, 25 seconds. The last time Cornell surrendered a five-on-three goal was against Yale on Feb. 11, 2012.
 
SURGES AND OUTAGES
The Big Red power play sits in the middle of the pack nationally, mainly due to inconsistency. As of Nov. 9, the Big Red power play was converting at a clip of just 5.3 percent, mired in an 0-for-17 slump and scoring just four goals in its last 80 opportunities dating back to Dec. 28, 2013. The Big Red was then 7-for-18 on the power play over its next four games before going on another 0-for-17 slide. The power play has scored six goals in the nine games since, including two by sophomore forward Jake Weidner.
 
WIN, NOT LOSE, ON DRAWS
Sophomore forward Jake Weidner has emerged as a terrific faceoff man this season. After spending most of his freshman year on the wing, he's split time on the wing and at center this year. One of the results is his 59.3 percent success rate on faceoffs entering the weekend, which ranks third among ECAC Hockey players who have taken at least 100 draws this season. Jeff Kubiak has also been solid on draws with a 53.8 percent success rate.
 
NOT JUST A DEFENSEMAN
Senior blueliner Joakim Ryan ranked 11th in the nation in points per game for defensemen (0.75) last season. He was tied for second on the team in scoring with 24 points, and his eight goals ranked third on the team. During his sophomore and junior seasons, he was on the ice for 88 of the team's 160 goals (55 percent). 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. Named to both the media's and coaches' Preseason All-ECAC Hockey Teams, Ryan suffered an early-season injury that forced him to miss eight games in November. He has five assists over his last six games.
 
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, 2013. He became the 35th coach all-time to rack up 350 victories across all NCAA divisions. 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). His current total of 374 victories in Division I play are tops among current ECAC Hockey coaches.
 
FEEL THE DRAFT?
Cornell has seven players on the roster who have been selected in the NHL Entry Draft, including two picks from last June. Freshman forward Jared Fiegl was selected in the seventh round by the Arizona Coyotes, with the only other Big Red player selected by the organization being David LeNeveu in 2002. Freshman forward Dwyer Tschantz was then selected 11 picks later by the St. Louis Blues — the first time the organization has selected a Cornell product in 15 years. Other NHL draft picks on the team include defensemen Reece Willcox (Philadelphia Flyers) and Joakim Ryan (San Jose Sharks), forwards John McCarron (Edmonton Oilers), Joel Lowry (Los Angeles Kings) and Matt Buckles (Florida Panthers).
 
BLANK YOU VERY MUCH
Cornell has recorded at least one shutout in each of the last 20 seasons – a streak that has been continued this year with a 4-0 blanking of Brown on Nov. 22. Freshman Hayden Stewart made 26 saves for his first career shutout and subsequent ECAC Hockey Rookie of the Week honors. In the process, he became the first Cornell freshman to keep a clean sheet since Ben Scrivens '10 manned the crease in a 6-0 rout of Union on Dec. 2, 2006. Like Scrivens, an All-American his senior season, Stewart's first shutout came in his ECAC Hockey debut. 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. The following year marked the first season for current head coach Mike Schafer.
 
COMEBACK KIDS
Conventional wisdom suggests the first goal of the game is extremely important — especially for teams that typically play low-scoring games, like Cornell. But the Big Red has bucked that trend this season. With senior forward John Knisley scoring in the third period Jan. 30 at Colgate, and freshman defenseman Ryan Bliss supplying an overtime winner, Cornell won for the fifth this season when surrendering the first goal of the game — which is the same amount of wins it has when scoring first.
 
GOLDEN AGAIN
Senior 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. 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. Freshman forward Jared Fiegl also won gold in the same event in April 2014.
 
SITTING ATOP THE IVY
Cornell won the Ivy League championship outright in 2014. It's the second time in the last three years the Big Red claimed the Ivy crown, the 17th time it's done so outright and the 21st time overall in program history. Cornell came up just short of even more history when a 1-0 loss to Dartmouth on Feb. 28 proved to be the squad's only loss against the Ancient Eight last season. Just three times in program history has the Big Red completed the Ivy League schedule undefeated. The last time Cornell was unbeaten in Ivy games was 1996, when it was 9-0-1 in Mike Schafer's first season as the Big Red's head coach. The other two occasions were in 1969 and 1970.
 
DEPTH MATTERS
Injuries are a part of hockey, but the Big Red has endured a particularly challenging season in that department. Entering this weekend, the Big Red has racked up 67 man games lost to injury or illness, plus another three to supplemental league discipline.
 
GLOBAL INFLUENCE
The Big Red has 17 players on the roster born in the  United States. Cornell also now has players native to four 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 Denmark (Christian Hilbrich) and Finland (Teemu Tiitinen). Even within the United States, the Big Red has some untraditional hockey areas covered. Joel Lowry has lived in Florida, Tiitinen has lived in Georgia, John Knisley has lived in South Carolina, Cole Bardreau and Ryan Bliss were both born in North Carolina, and Dwyer Tschantz is the first-ever NHL draft pick born in Delaware.
 
TRENDING
The Big Red has welcomed two newcomers from the U.S. National Team Development Program this season in defenseman Ryan Bliss and forward Jared Fiegl. This marks the fifth consecutive season that at least one player from the U.S. Under-18s has joined the Big Red. The others were Clint Lewis (in 2013), Gavin Stoick (in 2012), Cole Bardreau (in 2011) and Andy Iles (in 2010).
 
UP NEXT
Cornell then returns to Ithaca next weekend for its final regular-season home games. The game against Rensselaer on Friday, Feb. 20 will serve at Pink At The Rink night, then the Saturday, Feb. 21 contest against Union will be Senior Night.