Sports
Third time’s a charm: Hamilton looks to overthrow top-seeded Lord Jeffs
By Dave Meisel '13, Sports Staff Writer
February 23, 2012
Once you’re in the dance, it doesn’t matter how you got there. The only thing that matters is where you go from there.
As history shows, teams who don’t get it done in the regular season could still make an impact in the playoffs. Hamilton’s men’s hockey team hopes to experience some postseason success after a very disappointing regular season.
The Continentals started the season off with a 2-0 loss at Amherst, who they will face on Feb. 25 in the NESCAC Championship Quarterfinals. They rebounded by knocking off SUNY Cortland on Nov. 22 and winning the Skidmore Invitational. During the Invitational on Nov. 26 and 27, the Continentals skated to a 5-5 tie with SUNY Brockport and beat Skidmore 4-3 on an Anthony Scarpino ’12 goal with 1:14 to go to win the tournament.
The Continentals continued their solid play through winter break, but hit the skids once the semester started. After beating Connecticut College on Jan. 13, the Continentals have won just one game, a 6-0 victory against Tufts on Feb. 12. In total they are 1-8-2 since then.
Nonetheless, Hamilton (8-13-3, 4-12-2 NESCAC) finds itself as the eighth seed in the NESCAC playoffs. Hamilton lost both its games this past weekend, 2-1 at Middlebury on Feb. 19 and 5-1 to Williams on Feb. 20. They couldn’t capitalize on a chance to give themselves a higher seed, but they snuck into the playoffs.
Hamilton and Conn both headed into the weekend at 4-10-2 in the NESCAC. Neither team won a game, but Hamilton got the final spot because of its better record against the top four teams in the conference.
The low seed may be working in Hamilton’s favor, however. The Conts are 6-2 overall as the lower seed in NESCAC tournament matchups. They know the feeling of an upset loss, having been knocked off by eighth-seeded Wesleyan in the NESCAC playoffs last year, and would surely love to share that feeling with Amherst (20-3-1, 17-0 NESCAC). Amherst is 6-0-1 in their last seven matchups against Hamilton including two wins this season.
The Continentals have been ineffective in most phases of the game this season. They finished eighth in the NESCAC in both goals for and goals against. They finished fifth in penalty minutes, had the fifth-best power play offense and the eighth-best power play defense. Against an Amherst team that was far better in every phase of the game this season, Hamilton will need to pull off a huge upset. But stranger things have happened, and as the cliché goes, that’s why they play the game.