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I have never seen a team play up to the competition AND play down to the competition like the Cornell Big Red men’s hockey team. Or have I?

No disrespect to the Super Bowl Champions, but the men’s hockey team’s ups and downs are actually quite similar to the New York Giants during the regular season.

The comparisons are interesting- the Giants during the regular season had huge emotional wins over the Cardinals, Patriots, and Cowboys. On the flip side, they had hugely disappointing losses against lesser teams like the Seahawks and the Redskins, not once, but twice!

Much like the Giants, the Cornell men’s hockey team is a chronic sufferer of the emotional letdown loss as well as the “how the heck did we lose to THAT team?” loss. Going over their schedule, Cornell has had plenty of losses and ties this year that should have been wins. The team started its regular season on a horrible note, losing to a pitiful Mercyhurst team 5-4 at Lynah Rink. In addition to that lackluster performance, the team has had less-than-ideal results against many other teams that they should easily beat, including a loss to Brown earlier this year, two ties against Clarkson, a tie against Harvard, two bad losses to Colgate, and, of course, a tie and an OT loss to RPI.

I don't want to totally rag on this team. A second-place finish in the ECAC with a first round bye in the conference tournament is nothing to frown at. But when the Lynah Faithful buy their season tickets and dedicate their weekend nights to this team, they expect the team that beat Colorado College, the team that absolutely dominated Yale twice this year, and the team that beat Union to control its own destiny Friday night. When a team wins such important games during the season, the fans expect the team to play at that level every night. And the occasional letdown is understandable- it happens in every sport all the time. But, as coach Mike Schafer pointed out, there is no way you can lose a game that will win you a regular season title, at home, on Senior Night, against a sub-par opponent controlling your own destiny. That is inexcusable.