Cornell 2023

[ICGrad]

Who cares about Kirst vs. Mackesey? It's Cornell vs. Princeton that I care about.

This is such a huge game.

Win and Cornell is a lock for the NCAA tournament, with an inside track on getting a seed and a home game.

Lose, and suddenly that first round ILT game becomes much more critical. Close out the season with two losses, and Cornell really puts their fate in the hands of the committee, and everyone knows that rarely end well for Cornell.

Here's hoping for another Yale/Penn level performance from the Big Red. Like Yale, Princeton has largely righted the ship after a tough early stretch. Should be a great game...

These are always great games. The last great one I remember I believe may have been 2019.
Sowers for Princeton and Teat for Cornell put on a show all day, and I think Sowers went for like 7,1 and Teat like 5,3. Cornell won the game but it was incredible Lax back and forth all game.
Gobigred
Joewillie78

Last year was pretty epic, too, with a trip to the ILT on the line. Cornell sprints out to a 13-5 lead, Princeton storms back to within one @ 14-13, Cornell closes it out on a 4-2 to seal the deal. Kirst and Long both had huge days, especially Long.

Going into the game, there was every reason to believe that an ILT and NCAA bid were on the line. As it turned out, Princeton lost and got invited anyway, but I think most thought they were on a pretty precarious bubble having missed the ILT.

[MoralTerpitude]

This is one of those random pieces of analysis where I believe that my calculations are correct...

Both Cornell and Princeton have strong contenders for both Ivy POY and First Team All-Ivy goaltender. Some statistics going into next Saturday's game:

POY: CJ Kirst vs Coulter Mackesy:

Mackesy:

vs Ivy Goals: 24
vs Ivy Assists: 11
vs Ivy Points: 35

Kirst:

vs Ivy Goals: 27
vs Ivy Assists: 5
vs Ivy Points: 32

First Team Goalie: Chayse Ierlan vs Michael Gianforcaro

Gianforcaro:

vs Ivy saves: 76
vs Ivy Goals Allowed: 43
Save % vs Ivy: 64%

Ierlan:

vs Ivy saves: 65
vs Ivy Goals Allowed: 41
Save % vs Ivy: 61%

These numbers are vey close. I believe that the All-Ivy team is picked based on the regular season (I am happy to be corrected). This coming game will most likely tip the scales one way or another.

Do they only take Ivy games into account, or the entire regular season? If the latter, I would think Kirst is the easy pick.

As noted by Enterprise, they only look at Ivy games, and I'm pretty sure that it's a coaches' vote as opposed to the SID process that chooses Player of the Week. Mackesy has won more Player of the Weeks than Kirst. A few of these were "coin flips" where I thought that Kirst was a legitimate candidate. This history of the POW decisions leads me to believe that this Saturday's upcoming game will help to solidify the candidacy of one versus the other. My hope for Kirst is that the Coaches use more of an "eyeball" test than simply pure statistics, but I don't know.

Thanks, I missed Enterprise’s post. It would be interesting if Mackesy won the Ivy POY, and Kirst won the Tewy. Kind of like when Duke’s Jason Williams won the National POY in basketball in 2002, and the Terps’ Juan Dixon won ACC POY.

I’m with the snake. Would love to see Cornell win it all, if it meant Kirst not winning the Tewy (this year…).

[faircornell]

This is one of those random pieces of analysis where I believe that my calculations are correct...

Both Cornell and Princeton have strong contenders for both Ivy POY and First Team All-Ivy goaltender. Some statistics going into next Saturday's game:

POY: CJ Kirst vs Coulter Mackesy:

Mackesy:

vs Ivy Goals: 24
vs Ivy Assists: 11
vs Ivy Points: 35

Kirst:

vs Ivy Goals: 27
vs Ivy Assists: 5
vs Ivy Points: 32

First Team Goalie: Chayse Ierlan vs Michael Gianforcaro

Gianforcaro:

vs Ivy saves: 76
vs Ivy Goals Allowed: 43
Save % vs Ivy: 64%

Ierlan:

vs Ivy saves: 65
vs Ivy Goals Allowed: 41
Save % vs Ivy: 61%

These numbers are vey close. I believe that the All-Ivy team is picked based on the regular season (I am happy to be corrected). This coming game will most likely tip the scales one way or another.

Do they only take Ivy games into account, or the entire regular season? If the latter, I would think Kirst is the easy pick.

As noted by Enterprise, they only look at Ivy games, and I'm pretty sure that it's a coaches' vote as opposed to the SID process that chooses Player of the Week. Mackesy has won more Player of the Weeks than Kirst. A few of these were "coin flips" where I thought that Kirst was a legitimate candidate. This history of the POW decisions leads me to believe that this Saturday's upcoming game will help to solidify the candidacy of one versus the other. My hope for Kirst is that the Coaches use more of an "eyeball" test than simply pure statistics, but I don't know.

Thanks, I missed Enterprise’s post. It would be interesting if Mackesy won the Ivy POY, and Kirst won the Tewy. Kind of like when Duke’s Jason Williams won the National POY in basketball in 2002, and the Terps’ Juan Dixon won ACC POY.

I’m with the snake. Would love to see Cornell win it all, if it meant Kirst not winning the Tewy (this year…).

Anything is possible. What I left out of my original post is that I think that the POY/First Team Ivy goalie are linked to whoever walks away with the win. If Kirst and Ierlan both have good days, it's pretty likely that Cornell will win, and awards will follow. As with the Cornell/Army game, a team can hold Kirst to a low production day, and Cornell's other offensive threats should be enough to carry the day. If Mackesy and Gianforcaro both have good days, Cornell's chances of winning decrease. I'd argue that shutting down Mackesy hurts Princeton more than shutting down Kirst hurts Cornell.

As noted by many above, lacrosse is a team game, and the tempo and flow of both offense and defense are difficult to describe in this chat room format. My assumption is that Princeton will try to employ the game plan that worked for Penn State and Harvard against Cornell, which was strong defensive effort aimed at controlling game tempo, and pushing Cornell's precision offense off it's rhythm. The awards noted are imperfect proxies for excellent team performance.

As a final note, at 10:00AM a plaque honoring Richie Moran will be unveiled. I hope that this provides the Cornell players with a bit of extra spirit going into the contest.

[joewillie78]

This is one of those random pieces of analysis where I believe that my calculations are correct...

Both Cornell and Princeton have strong contenders for both Ivy POY and First Team All-Ivy goaltender. Some statistics going into next Saturday's game:

POY: CJ Kirst vs Coulter Mackesy:

Mackesy:

vs Ivy Goals: 24
vs Ivy Assists: 11
vs Ivy Points: 35

Kirst:

vs Ivy Goals: 27
vs Ivy Assists: 5
vs Ivy Points: 32

First Team Goalie: Chayse Ierlan vs Michael Gianforcaro

Gianforcaro:

vs Ivy saves: 76
vs Ivy Goals Allowed: 43
Save % vs Ivy: 64%

Ierlan:

vs Ivy saves: 65
vs Ivy Goals Allowed: 41
Save % vs Ivy: 61%

These numbers are vey close. I believe that the All-Ivy team is picked based on the regular season (I am happy to be corrected). This coming game will most likely tip the scales one way or another.

Do they only take Ivy games into account, or the entire regular season? If the latter, I would think Kirst is the easy pick.

As noted by Enterprise, they only look at Ivy games, and I'm pretty sure that it's a coaches' vote as opposed to the SID process that chooses Player of the Week. Mackesy has won more Player of the Weeks than Kirst. A few of these were "coin flips" where I thought that Kirst was a legitimate candidate. This history of the POW decisions leads me to believe that this Saturday's upcoming game will help to solidify the candidacy of one versus the other. My hope for Kirst is that the Coaches use more of an "eyeball" test than simply pure statistics, but I don't know.

Thanks, I missed Enterprise’s post. It would be interesting if Mackesy won the Ivy POY, and Kirst won the Tewy. Kind of like when Duke’s Jason Williams won the National POY in basketball in 2002, and the Terps’ Juan Dixon won ACC POY.

I’m with the snake. Would love to see Cornell win it all, if it meant Kirst not winning the Tewy (this year…).

Anything is possible. What I left out of my original post is that I think that the POY/First Team Ivy goalie are linked to whoever walks away with the win. If Kirst and Ierlan both have good days, it's pretty likely that Cornell will win, and awards will follow. As with the Cornell/Army game, a team can hold Kirst to a low production day, and Cornell's other offensive threats should be enough to carry the day. If Mackesy and Gianforcaro both have good days, Cornell's chances of winning decrease. I'd argue that shutting down Mackesy hurts Princeton more than shutting down Kirst hurts Cornell.

As noted by many above, lacrosse is a team game, and the tempo and flow of both offense and defense are difficult to describe in this chat room format. My assumption is that Princeton will try to employ the game plan that worked for Penn State and Harvard against Cornell, which was strong defensive effort aimed at controlling game tempo, and pushing Cornell's precision offense off it's rhythm. The awards noted are imperfect proxies for excellent team performance.

As a final note, at 10:00AM a plaque honoring Richie Moran will be unveiled. I hope that this provides the Cornell players with a bit of extra spirit going into the contest.

The gameplan that Harvard and Penn State employed was against a Cornell team that was MINUS Micheal Long.

They are undefeated this year when Long plays, and unless something has changed, I believe Long will play on Saturday.

Gobigred
Joewillie78

[MoralTerpitude]

Long did play against Army, and it was a very close game. Obviously the chances of a team holding Kirst to zero goals is not great, but there is a recipe there.

Princeton gets a lot of respect, but I wonder how much of it is based on last year. They did not look great against Maryland, or in the game against Penn. And they have not beaten any very good teams this year - their best win is against Yale. If Cornell is able to play their game, and Psyllos/Cascadden/Petrakis can win around 50% of the face-offs, I think they win by at least four or five goals.

BTW is Princeton still switching goalies at half? Rakower was playing out of his mind against Maryland, then Gianforcaro got thrown in for the second half and saved like under 40%. Didn't understand that move at all.

[faircornell]

Based on the number of saves in the past several games, it looks like Gianfranco is getting the bulk of the playing time.

[MoralTerpitude]

Based on the number of saves in the past several games, it looks like Gianfranco is getting the bulk of the playing time.

Yeah, looks like it. Actually, looking at his stats, Gianforcaro has been quite impressive - Maryland was by far his worst game. He has several games in the 60’s for save percentage.

[faircornell]

Based on the number of saves in the past several games, it looks like Gianfranco is getting the bulk of the playing time.

Yeah, looks like it. Actually, looking at his stats, Gianforcaro has been quite impressive - Maryland was by far his worst game. He has several games in the 60’s for save percentage.

That's another reason that I thought that the All-Ivy First Team goalie discussion was of some interest. In reading the general lacrosse news, one does not hear or read about Gianforcaro very much. In fact, his statistics are extremely impressive. Whether his results are from Princeton's team defensive strategy, or driven mostly by personal talent will be interesting to see.

[Laxfanatic2022]

This is one of those random pieces of analysis where I believe that my calculations are correct...

Both Cornell and Princeton have strong contenders for both Ivy POY and First Team All-Ivy goaltender. Some statistics going into next Saturday's game:

POY: CJ Kirst vs Coulter Mackesy:

Mackesy:

vs Ivy Goals: 24
vs Ivy Assists: 11
vs Ivy Points: 35

Kirst:

vs Ivy Goals: 27
vs Ivy Assists: 5
vs Ivy Points: 32

First Team Goalie: Chayse Ierlan vs Michael Gianforcaro

Gianforcaro:

vs Ivy saves: 76
vs Ivy Goals Allowed: 43
Save % vs Ivy: 64%

Ierlan:

vs Ivy saves: 65
vs Ivy Goals Allowed: 41
Save % vs Ivy: 61%

These numbers are vey close. I believe that the All-Ivy team is picked based on the regular season (I am happy to be corrected). This coming game will most likely tip the scales one way or another.

Do they only take Ivy games into account, or the entire regular season? If the latter, I would think Kirst is the easy pick.

As noted by Enterprise, they only look at Ivy games, and I'm pretty sure that it's a coaches' vote as opposed to the SID process that chooses Player of the Week. Mackesy has won more Player of the Weeks than Kirst. A few of these were "coin flips" where I thought that Kirst was a legitimate candidate. This history of the POW decisions leads me to believe that this Saturday's upcoming game will help to solidify the candidacy of one versus the other. My hope for Kirst is that the Coaches use more of an "eyeball" test than simply pure statistics, but I don't know.

Thanks, I missed Enterprise’s post. It would be interesting if Mackesy won the Ivy POY, and Kirst won the Tewy. Kind of like when Duke’s Jason Williams won the National POY in basketball in 2002, and the Terps’ Juan Dixon won ACC POY.

I’m with the snake. Would love to see Cornell win it all, if it meant Kirst not winning the Tewy (this year…).

Anything is possible. What I left out of my original post is that I think that the POY/First Team Ivy goalie are linked to whoever walks away with the win. If Kirst and Ierlan both have good days, it's pretty likely that Cornell will win, and awards will follow. As with the Cornell/Army game, a team can hold Kirst to a low production day, and Cornell's other offensive threats should be enough to carry the day. If Mackesy and Gianforcaro both have good days, Cornell's chances of winning decrease. I'd argue that shutting down Mackesy hurts Princeton more than shutting down Kirst hurts Cornell.

As noted by many above, lacrosse is a team game, and the tempo and flow of both offense and defense are difficult to describe in this chat room format. My assumption is that Princeton will try to employ the game plan that worked for Penn State and Harvard against Cornell, which was strong defensive effort aimed at controlling game tempo, and pushing Cornell's precision offense off it's rhythm. The awards noted are imperfect proxies for excellent team performance.

As a final note, at 10:00AM a plaque honoring Richie Moran will be unveiled. I hope that this provides the Cornell players with a bit of extra spirit going into the contest.

It’s a weird argument here because Mackesy has to go up against the best defenseman in the country in Gavin Adler. Let’s not forget that Adler would win IVY POY if Kirst wasn’t producing at such an insane level. I expect the matchup to be great but Mackesy finds goals off ball a ton while Kirst is way more of a dodging threat. Really looking forward to seeing the game Saturday. Final score prediction Cornell 15 Princeton 11

[another fan]

For those with time and interest, Hill plays Brunswick at 4:00 pm today. Stream is at: https://events.locallive.tv/school/brunswick

Looking forward to checking out Firth against a top team. Jaden Ciappara is also a recruit from Hill. Small, quick mid who plays on their first line, but I'm not sure where he fits.

As for the game-- I've seen Brunswick a couple times on stream, and though they have lost a couple this year, they are very strong and have a number of players who will have impact at the next level. Their fogo is excellent, and should dominate. I think this will be a very difficult game for Hill.

[The Orfling]

Gianforcaro and Rakower are both quite good, making it more impressive that Gianforcaro has emerged with the starting job and they’ve gone away from the platoon. Hard to call this game. When Princeton and Cornell are “on” they look awesome, but both have stubbed toes (Princeton against ‘Cuse and Cornell against Harvard, although they were missing Michael Long) and both have goalies capable of careering it.

I think Cornell should have the edge at faceoff (although Princeton’s first-year has come on strong), and I think with Michael Long as the offensive “X factor,” Cornell should come away with the win. But looking forward to a great game with undisputed claim to the Ivy title on the line. Hoping both teams play well and emerge healthy.

[joewillie78]

Gianforcaro and Rakower are both quite good, making it more impressive that Gianforcaro has emerged with the starting job and they’ve gone away from the platoon. Hard to call this game. When Princeton and Cornell are “on” they look awesome, but both have stubbed toes (Princeton against ‘Cuse and Cornell against Harvard, although they were missing Michael Long) and both have goalies capable of careering it.

I think Cornell should have the edge at faceoff (although Princeton’s first-year has come on strong), and I think with Michael Long as the offensive “X factor,” Cornell should come away with the win. But looking forward to a great game with undisputed claim to the Ivy title on the line. Hoping both teams play well and emerge healthy.

Weather is now becoming a factor, as the forecast for Saturday is not good, as rain looks probable.
We have been lucky the past few games as the weather has been great but Saturday looks miserable.
Maybe if we are lucky and get another home game, the weather will be better for that game.

Gobigred
Joewillie78

[10stone5]

Free Stream,
Hill Academy against Brunswick School,
4pm est,

https://events.locallive.tv/events/104236

[CU77]

Hill Academy in white, Cornell commit Firth is #14

[Gobigred]

Hill down 10-4 at the half.

[joatmon]

Hill down 10-4 at the half.

The camera work is putting all of the schools on ESPN+ to shame

[Ezra White]

...

This is one of those random pieces of analysis where I believe that my calculations are correct...

Both Cornell and Princeton have strong contenders for both Ivy POY and First Team All-Ivy goaltender. Some statistics going into next Saturday's game:

POY: CJ Kirst vs Coulter Mackesy:

Mackesy:

vs Ivy Goals: 24
vs Ivy Assists: 11
vs Ivy Points: 35

Kirst:

vs Ivy Goals: 27
vs Ivy Assists: 5
vs Ivy Points: 32

First Team Goalie: Chayse Ierlan vs Michael Gianforcaro

Gianforcaro:

vs Ivy saves: 76
vs Ivy Goals Allowed: 43
Save % vs Ivy: 64%

Ierlan:

vs Ivy saves: 65
vs Ivy Goals Allowed: 41
Save % vs Ivy: 61%

These numbers are vey close. I believe that the All-Ivy team is picked based on the regular season (I am happy to be corrected). This coming game will most likely tip the scales one way or another.

...

It’s a weird argument here because Mackesy has to go up against the best defenseman in the country in Gavin Adler. Let’s not forget that Adler would win IVY POY if Kirst wasn’t producing at such an insane level. I expect the matchup to be great but Mackesy finds goals off ball a ton while Kirst is way more of a dodging threat. Really looking forward to seeing the game Saturday. Final score prediction Cornell 15 Princeton 11

Here's a way of possibly estimating the "Adler Factor."

1. Identify each Ivy team's top scorer
2. Look up their goals, assists, and total points. Do this for both "all games" and "Ivy games."
3. If they've played Cornell already, look up their goals, assists, and total points for the Cornell game.
4. Adjust both their "all games" and "Ivy games" values by subtracting the Cornell values for goals, assists, and total points. These values will be the totals scored in games against teams other than Cornell.
5. Divide these totals by the number of non-Cornell games played. These will then be each top-scorer's average goals, assists, and points scored per game against teams other than Cornell. Call these the "adjusted averages."
6. Divide the corresponding values for goals, assists, and points for the Cornell game by the averages computed in the previous step.
7. While you're at it, total the number of goals, assists, and total points by the top scorers in their games against Cornell. Divide these totals by the number of games Cornell has played against other Ivies. For the record, as of today Cornell has played 5 games against other Ivies and had 11, 6, and 17 goals, assists, and points scored by the other team's top scorers. The top scorers have averaged 2.2 goals, 1.2 assists, and 3.4 points against Cornell.
8. Divide each top scorer's goals, assists, and total points in their game against Cornell by the corresponding values for their adjusted averages. This gives index numbers for each top scorer. Each index number represents the percent of their adjusted season averages the top scorer achieved in their game against Cornell.
9. For example, Penn's Sam Handley scored 3 goals and 1 assist against Cornell but averaged 1.9 goals, 2.0 assists, or 3.9 total points against all other teams; he also averaged 2.0 goals, 2.6 assists, and 4.6 total points against other Ivy teams. So his index numbers for goals, assists, and points are 158%, 50%, and 102.6% compared to his performance against all other teams and compared to his performance against just other Ivy teams, 150%, 385, and 87% against Cornell.
10. Overall, when they played against Cornell, the top scorers on other Ivy teams scored 59.2% of the average number of goals they scored against other Ivy teams, 64.9% of the number of assists, and 55.2% of the total number of points. The corresponding averages are 83.8%, 72.4%, and 79.8% for the top scorers' performance against Cornell relative to their performance in all other games.
11. Coulter Mackesy hasn't played Cornell yet, so we can't compute his index number. But we can repeat this exercise, removing Princeton from the totals the same way we removed Cornell. Then we compare his performance against the other Ivies versus the other top scorers'. This is left as an exercise for the reader.

Calling this an "Adler Factor" implies quite a few assumptions:

• Adler always guards the other team's top scorer. Besides slides, picks, etc., sometimes this is impossible. For example, Yale's Matt Brandau and Chris Lyons are tied with 52 total points during the season. Adler probably tried, but he couldn't guard them both simultaneously. I do believe he gave Brandau most of his attention, and Brandau scored only a goal and an assist against Cornell. Meanwhile, Lyons scored 3 goals. Brandau was held to 44% of his Ivy-only scoring, while Lyons achieved 63%. If Adler was primarily responsible for Brandau's subpar performance, and Adler achieves the same thing with Mackesy, we'd expect Mackesy to score about 4 points, most likely with 3 goals and 1 assist.
• Characteristics of opposing players and their teams' styles of play might cause Adler to be assigned to mark someone other than the other team's "top scorer."
• Game situations and coaching decisions affect these statistics. For example, in a 10-point blowout, coaches might decide to eat up the clock or clear the bench, in which case perhaps only data for the 1st 3 quarters should be used.
• The team might play zone or use a 5 + 1 defensive formation, in which case Adler would not necessarily be covering the other team's top scorer.
• A team's top scorer might change as the season progresses, due to injuries, younger players becoming acclimated to the college game, etc. A coach studying films from the first two games of the season might assign Adler to player X and then, at halftime, change the assignment to player Y.

[another fan]

Hill Academy in white, Cornell commit Firth is #14

Very quiet game for Firth. What surprises me is how few touches he got. Brunswick just a stronger team, and Hill faceoff woes did not help.

Speaking of faceoffs, Sam Ricci from Victor has won 76% of his faceoffs this year. It's hard to tell how HS prowess facing off will translate to D1, but it looks like our improved faceoff play should continue next year, even after losing Petrakis.

[MoralTerpitude]

Petrakis is below 50% for the year… and actually has a worse percentage than last year. Not sure if this is a trend, but Buczek has only played him in six faceoffs the last two games.

By contrast, Cascadden is at 63%. And to your point about HS faceoff skills translating to D1, Cascadden was the #23 overall recruit per IL.

As a side note… is Cascadilla still a dorm? I think of it every time I hear Cascadden’s name.

[enterprise]

Cascadilla Hall is still a dorm