By wpengine November 20, 2001
The men’s soccer team (9-4-3, 1-3-3 Ivy) gathered at the Ithaca Sports Club yesterday afternoon to watch the NCAA tournament selection show, hoping to see itself in the bracket as an at-large bid. Instead, it had to leave the restaurant knowing that its 2001 season was over. “They’re pretty disappointed — crushed is probably a better word,” head coach Bryan Scales said of his players. “They put everything they could into the games this year.” The Red certainly made a strong case for its selection to the 48-team field. After falling to a 4-4-2 record on October 26, Scales’s troops finished their final six games of the season undefeated. The run included wins over key regional opponents Columbia (6-6-3, 3-3-1 Ivy) and Hartwick (12-8, 3-3 ASC). Cornell, ranked second in the New York region, also toppled regional foes Adelphi (8-8-1, 3-3 ASC) and Hofstra (9-9-1, 6-5 America East) earlier in the year. When asked if the team deserved to be in the tournament, Scales answered with an unequivocal “Yes.” Twenty-eight teams received at-large bids to the tournament. Despite its ranking of 21st in the country, the Red didn’t get the call to the big dance. Cornell’s chances were perhaps hurt by the Red’s fifth-place Ivy League finish. “It’s tough to say. It’s something that I can’t answer,” Scales responded to the question of why his team was omitted. “When it comes to putting together a national tournament, there’s always teams that will be left out.” Penn State (13-4-1, 5-2-1 Big Ten), whom Cornell defeated earlier in the year, claimed an at-large bid and even received one of 16 first-round byes. Two other teams from the Red’s schedule will be making an appearance in the tourney. Ivy enemies Princeton (10-2-5, 5-1-1 Ivy) and Harvard (10-4-1, 5-2 Ivy), who beat Cornell during the regular season, will be in the bracket. The Tigers, who received an automatic bid due to their Ivy title, have a bye in the first round and will be hosting a pair of games. The Crimson, who finished third in the league, will take on Rutgers (13-6-3, 7-4-1 Big East) in Round One. The winner of the contest between Harvard and the Scarlet Knights will go on to face defending NCAA champion Connecticut (15-4-2, 11-2-0 Big East). Brown (7-7-2, 5-1-1 Ivy), who finished the season tied for first in the Ivies, missed out on the automatic Ivy bid and will not be seen in the tournament. The Bears lost the tiebreaker by virtue of a loss to Princeton in the regular season. The Ivy League is ranked as the fifth-best conference in the country, and the selection of just two Ancient Eight schools shocked Scales. “We were surprised to see that they took some teams from other leagues,” he said. “There’s probably five or six teams that we were surprised [were selected].” St. John’s (14-2-3, 9-1-3 Big East), the number one team from Cornell’s region, is seeded eighth in the tournament and is the only team representing New York in the draw. The Red Storm earned its bid after becoming Big East champions. Southern Methodist (19-0-0, 12-0-0 MVC), the nation’s only untied and undefeated team, took the top overall seed, and Virginia (17-1-1, 6-0-0 ACC), Stanford (16-1-1, 6-1-1 Pac-10), and Indiana (14-3-3, 8-0 Big Ten) round out the top four. “If I had to pick one or two teams [as champion], I would say Virginia or Indiana,” Scales predicted. The final four teams will compete in Columbus, Ohio, on December 14 and 16 for the Men’s College Cup. Despite the sudden end to the season, Scales was happy with the team’s performance, especially in the second half of the campaign. “We couldn’t ask anything else from our guys,” the coach expressed. “They’ve been terrific all season.”Archived article by Alex Fineman
By wpengine November 20, 2001
The women’s hockey team posted its first win of the season Saturday, defeating the Findlay Oilers 3-0, but couldn’t make it two in a row, falling 2-1 in Sunday’s contest. The weekend split puts the Red at 1-5-0 overall, 0-2-0 ECAC, and brings Findlay to 4-6-0. The Saturday afternoon win saw the Red put in its first goal of the season, a power play score by junior Lindsay Murao with less than eight seconds to go in the first period. Senior Sarah Olivier and junior Brooke Bestwick earned the assists after Olivier found an open Bestwick for a left-side slapshot that rebounded off Oiler goalie Erin Blair’s pads and found its way onto Murao’s stick for the follow-up score. The momentum from this initial strike carried into the second period, as the Red dominated play and again found the back of the net. Murao was in on this goal too, earning an assist this time for her dish to senior Jenel Bode, who circled behind the goal and curled one in at 5:26 in the period. Findlay had several close calls during the remainder of the second, but these breakaways and man-up attacks were thwarted by excellent goaltending by junior Liz Connelly, who had 33 saves in the win and picked up her third career shutout. Things really heated up in the third period, with nearly every Findlay attack resulting in a pile-up in the Cornell goal. In the game, Findlay had 33 shots to the Red’s 18, 15 of which came in the final period. The offensive intensity of the Oilers was matched by an aggressive Red defense that stopped every attack, and it looked as though the 2-0 score would stand. With two minutes to go, however, Findlay looked to score by pulling its goalie, a move that resulted in a second score for Bode, who put in the empty-net goal with seven seconds remaining in the game. Murao, who had two goals and an assist on the weekend, cited balanced play as the key to the Red’s first win this season, noting, “All of our lines put in a solid effort–everyone was hustling and doing their job.” Right from the first drop of the puck, Sunday’s contest saw much more physical and aggressive play from both teams. It looked as though the Red would dominate, however, as Murao once again started off the scoring, finding the back of the net just 30 seconds into the first. Seniors Olivier and Bode picked up the assists on the goal, and the Red looked off to a fine start. With 41 seconds to go in the first, however, the Oilers got their first score against the Red, a slapshot from the blue line that flew past Connelly’s left shoulder and into the net. Just 2 minutes into the second period, a quick shot that found its way between the legs of Cornell’s netminder put Findlay up for good, 2-1. Connelly, who had 25 saves in the game, kept the Oilers scoreless for the remaining 59:30 of the game, but Cornell’s offense couldn’t tie it up. The game saw the Oilers take more shots on goal than Cornell once again–27 to the Red’s 21–giving them 21 more opportunities on the weekend. Murao points to this deficit as a significant contributor to the Red’s loss, adding, “A lot of times we use stick handling or try to make the perfect move when we should just take shots and have people rush the net.” Sunday’s loss was a disappointing one for the Red, who had hoped to see a repeat performance of the prolific offense and solid defense of the day before. Cornell will look to get back to Saturday’s balanced play and its winning ways next weekend when it hits the road for the first time to take on Mercyhurst, in Erie, Penn. Archived article by Sarah Spain