EAST LANSING, Mich. — The Cornell men's hockey team will look to get its season started with a weekend sweep of Michigan State when the teams square off in a rematch at 7 p.m. Saturday at Munn Ice Arena. In his 16th season on play-by-play for Cornell, Jason Weinstein's call of the game can be heard on WHCU (870 AM, 97.7 FM) and worldwide via the station's website. The game will also be broadcast through a BTN+ subscription.

Game Information:

#4 Cornell at Michigan State
7 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 2, 2019
PLACE: Munn Ice Arena  •  East Lansing, Mich.
RECORDS: Cornell 1-0, 0-0 ECAC Hockey
                    Michigan State 2-3, 0-0 Big Ten
BROADCAST: BTN+
RADIO: WHCU (870 AM, 97.7 FM)
LIVE STATS: MSUspartans.com
TICKETS: MSUspartans.com
GAME NOTES (PDF): Cornell | Michigan State

Friday Night Redux:

•  Cornell won the opening game of the non-league series, 3-2, on Friday. The Big Red shook off the rust from its annual Ivy League-mandated late start to the season to overcome a pair of one-goal deficits before getting the winner from sophomore forward Max Andreev late in the second period.
•  Freshman forward Jack Malone opened Cornell's side of the scoring with a power-play strike in the first period. It marked the second straight year that a newcomer scored the Big Red's first goal of the season after Andreev did it last year against Michigan State in Ithaca.
•  Senior defenseman Yanni Kaldis scored the only even-strength goal of the night, tying the game at 2 early in the second period. Junior forward Morgan Barron drew his first of two primary assists on the goal.
•  Junior goaltender Matthew Galajda made 10 of his 26 stops on the penalty kill for the Big Red. In earning the victory, Galajda avenged two starts against the Spartans last year in which he was pulled.
•  The Big Red dressed eight freshmen in its opener for the first time since 1992, making it the first time under 25th-year head coach Mike Schafer '86.
•  Friday marked the first time in four tries that Cornell has won a game at Michigan State. Before a 2004 series in which the Big Red mustered a tie before a shutout loss, the team's first game at Munn was also Schafer's first in the head coaching ranks. The Anson Carter-led Spartans won that game, 6-2, on Nov. 3, 1995.

About The Big Red:

•  After earning an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament for a third straight year, Cornell enters this season as the media and coaches favorite in ECAC Hockey and ranked in the top five in both of the national polls.
•  The Big Red also won its second straight Cleary Cup (ECAC Hockey regular season championship) and the 10th in program history last year.
•  Mike Schafer '86 returns for his 25th season as the Jay R. Bloom '77 Head Coach of Men's Hockey at Cornell. He has won ECAC Hockey Tim Taylor Coach of the Year honors four times, and his 458 career victories are the most in Cornell hockey history and currently ranks fifth among active head coaches in the Division I ranks.
•  Cornell has ascended back to being one of the nation's elite programs with an average Pairwise ranking over the last three years of 8.3. That's fourth-highest in the nation (Denver 4.7, Minn.-Dulth 5.3, St. Cloud 7.3) and highest in ECAC Hockey (Cornell 8.3, Clarkson 13.0, Harvard 14.7, Union 16.0, Quinnipiac 20.0).
•  The Big Red returns the bulk of its key forwards and the entirety of its goaltending corps. Cornell boasts three Preseason All-ECAC Hockey selections — senior defenseman Yanni Kaldis, junior forward Morgan Barron and junior goaltender Matthew Galajda.

The Big Red Rewind:

•  Cornell tuned up by sweeping a pair of exhibition games in convincing fashion. The Big Red defeated Ontario-based Nipissing University, 6-2, on Oct. 20 before blanking the U.S. National Team Development Program Under-18 Team, 3-0, last Saturday at Lynah Rink. 
•  The Big Red scored four power-play goals and had six different goal-scorers while deploying a limited lineup and all three of its goaltenders against the Lakers. Junior defenseman Matt Cairns and sophomore Max Andreev led the way offensively with a goal and two assists apiece.


•  Juniors Matthew Galajda and Austin McGrath then combined on a 13-save shutout against the NTDP, with the offense getting one goal per period from Andreev (first period), Brenden Locke (second) and Tristan Mullin (third).
•  A photo gallery from the NTDP game is available here (Eldon Lindsay/Cornell Athletics).

Exhibitions In Name Only:

•  Cornell is 16-0-2 in exhibitions in this decade after last weekend's victories. 
•  The average margin of victory for Cornell's exhibition wins over that stretch is 3.81 with just four of the 16 victories decided by one or two goals.

On Offense:

•  Cornell not only returns 11 forwards from a season ago, it's added five talented freshmen to the mix to help fill a variety of roles.
•  Junior Morgan Barron headlines the incumbents after breaking through to lead the team in scoring last season with 15 goals and 19 assists. The 34 points for the 2019 All-ECAC Hockey first-team pick were the most for a Cornellian since 2010.
•  Jeff Malott (6-8–14) and Noah Bauld (3-8–11, including a team-leading seven points in the postseason) are the lone seniors among forwards. 
•  Junior Cam Donaldson (12-13–25) gives the Big Red another returning all-ECAC Hockey pick (third team), having played the second half of the season on a line with Barron on the opposite wing and classmate Brenden Locke (7-11–18) at center.
•  Two of the Big Red's freshman forwards were selected in the 2019 NHL Entry Draft — Matt Stienburg (third round, Colorado Avalanche) and Jack Malone (sixth round, Vancouver Canucks).

On Defense:

•  Cornell graduated three of its top four defensemen last year, but it returns a Preseason All-ECAC Hockey first-team selection and three-time All-Ivy League first-teamer senior Yanni Kaldis (4-24–28). 
•  Juniors Alex Green (1-3–4) and Cody Haiskanen (1-5–6) give the Big Red two more seasoned options on the blue line, though injuries truncated their respective campaigns a year ago.
•  Three of the Big Red's 10 defensemen are NHL draft picks — juniors Green and Matt Cairns (Edmonton Oilers), and sophomore Misha Song (N.Y. Islanders).

In Goal:

•  The Big Red has the rare claim of two all-league goaltenders from a season ago in juniors Matthew Galajda and Austin McGrath. Sophomore Nate McDonald also returns to keep Cornell's goaltending corps intact.
•  Galajda (16-8-3, 1.85, .921, 5 SO) was an All-ECAC Hockey third-team pick last year despite two significant stints on the shelf with injuries.
•  Cornell didn't miss a beat with its 2018 All-American unable to play thanks to McGrath (5-3-1, 2.12, .919), who earned All-Ivy League first-team honors.

No Sophomore Slump Here:

•  An all-sophomore line headlined the Big Red attack last year, with Brenden Locke centering Morgan Barron and Cam Donaldson. But the class' contributions didn't stop there — the group averaged 1.36 goals per game for the season, which is highest in ECAC Hockey and fourth-highest in the nation.

More Than Just Defense:

•  With 19 assists in his last 22 games, senior defenseman Yanni Kaldis (4-24–28) led the team in assists and blueliners in overall scoring last year. His 24 assists were the most for a Big Red defenseman since Steve Wilson '97 had 26 during the 1995-96 campaign. Kaldis was named to the All-Ivy League first team for a third time — a first for a Cornellian since Matt Moulson '06 from 2004-06 — and also earned a spot on the All-ECAC Hockey second team.

About Michigan State:

•  The Spartans are 2-3 to start their year after a pair of splits in two-game road series against Northern Michigan (Oct. 11-12) and Colorado College (last weekend).
•  The Spartans also have a pair of exhibition victories under their belt, having topped Western Ontario, 6-1, on Oct. 7, and the U.S. National Team Development Program Under-18 Team, 2-1, on Oct. 18.
•  Senior center Patrick Khoderenko (1-5–6) keep the team lead in scoring after notching a goal and an assist last night. He led the team in goals (18) and power-play goals (nine), and finished second in points (37) last year.
•  The offense has a different look to it without the vaunted KHL Line, which featured the team's top three scorers in each of the last two seasons. Khodorenko was the center and had junior Mitchell Lewandowski (1-1–2) on the right wing, but 2019 Hobey Baker Memorial Award finalist Taro Hirose departed a year early and now plies his trade with the Detroit Red Wings.
•  Michigan State started this season with Khodorenko still paired with Lewandowski, but the latter shifted back to his natural left wing to slot freshman Nicolas Müller (1-1–2) on the right side. But that combination was broken up last Saturday in the team's 5-1 win at Colorado College.
•  The Spartans only lost four players from last year's team, including just one defenseman. Sophomore Dennis Cesana (2-1–3) was the team's leading scorer among blueliners last year, and Jerad Rosburg (1-3–4) and Butrus Ghafari (0-0–0) are the two seniors in the bunch. The Krygier twins, sophomores Cole (2-0–2) and Christian (0-1–1), are both NHL draft picks.
•  Senior John Lethemon (2-1, 2.34, .934) and sophomore Drew DeRidder (0-2, 2.54, .900) have split starts in goal so far after doing so for the lion's share of last season.

The Series vs. Michigan State:

•  The Spartans own a 6-3-1 edge in the all-time series between the programs, fueled in part by a shocking two-game sweep in the first two games of the Big Red's 2018-19 season at Lynah Rink.
•  Michigan State scored four goals in a span of less than 12 minutes during the third period of last year's opener to skate away with a 5-1 victory after Max Andreev scored Cornell's first goal of the season. It was more of the same the next night, with the Spartans lead growing to three goals before strikes from Cam Donaldson and Matt Cairns capped the scoring in a 4-3 loss for Cornell.
•  This will mark Cornell's first visit to Munn Ice Arena since November 2004, when it mustered a 1-1 tie behind 36 saves from David McKee in the first game before suffering a 2-0 loss in the rematch despite outshooting the Spartans, 32-22.
•  Mike Schafer's first game as head coach at Cornell came at Michigan State, with the hosts emerging with a 6-2 victory on Nov. 3, 1995 in East Lansing.

Rare Territory:

•  Freshman forward Jack Malone will be doing something this season that no Cornell men's hockey player has done in more than 50 years — wear number 13. The perceived unluckiest of numbers has only been donned by five previous members of the Big Red, all in the first nine years of the program's resurrection in 1957. The last to wear 13 was James Wallace during the 1965-66 season.

The Twin Tradition:

•  The arrival of freshmen Ben and Zach Tupker give the Big Red its fourth pair of twins in Mike Schafer's 25-year tenure as the program's head coach. The others were the Devins (Joe and Mike, 2007-11), the Abbotts (Chris and Cam, 2001-06), and the McRaes (Mark and Matt, 1999-2003). 

Feel The Draft?:

•  Cornell has six players on the roster who have been selected in the NHL Entry Draft — at least one in each of the last five drafts. Freshman forward Matt Stienburg (Colorado Avalanche) was selected earliest in that group, having been taken in the third round with the 63rd overall pick in June.
•  Junior defenseman Matt Cairns (Edmonton Oilers) was also taken in the third round with the 84th overall pick in the 2016 draft. Classmate Alex Green was taken with an overaged selection by the Tampa Bay Lightning in the 2018 draft, and Misha Song (2015 sixth round, New York Islanders) gives the Big Red blue line three NHL picks.
•  Two sixth-round picks also give Cornell three NHL picks when joined by Stienburg. Junior Morgan Barron, a fellow St. Andrew's graduate, was snagged in the sixth round by the N.Y. Rangers in 2017. Freshman Jack Malone was taken by the Vancouver Canucks in the sixth round last summer.

First Ivy Coach To 400:

•  Already the winningest coach in program history and in Ivy League history, Mike Schafer ranks fifth among active coaches with 458 victories at the Division I level. He also leads all actives coaches of Cornell's 37 varsity teams in career victories.

Two Crowns Down:

•  Cornell won the program's 23rd Ivy League championship, marking the Big Red's second straight Ivy crown and its 19th outright title. Cornell is 17-2-3 in its last 22 Ivy League contests.
•  In winning the Cleary Cup for a second straight year (though shared this time around), the Big Red has won the ECAC Hockey's regular-season title in consecutive seasons for the first time since 2002 and 2003.

Up Next:

•  Cornell returns home to open its ECAC Hockey and Ivy League seasons when it hosts Brown on Friday, Nov. 8 and Yale on Saturday, Nov. 9 at Lynah Rink in Ithaca.