It's been too long.

Another season likely will have come and gone by the time this evening ends. Another champion will have lifted the prize that the skaters of Cornell University covet and view appropriately, at least from a historical lens, as their birthright. This time, it may even be a first-time winner. It would be the second of such an order of winner since the Red won its last Eastern title.

Back in this writer's day, a day that was not that long ago relative to the eras of others, Cornell made the final weekend of ECAC Hockey. It was as guaranteed as the fact that those last tickets in the most important arsenal of the Lynah Faithful would be used on the second weekend in March. Back in the day of most alumni, Cornell won this thing.

​Cornell missed ECAC Hockey's championship weekend in consecutive years for the first time since Coach Schafer revitalized the program at his alma mater. Coach Schafer missed getting to championship weekend in 1999, 2004, 2007, and 2013. He rebounded respectively with a semifinal appearance, Whitelaw Cup, semifinal appearance, and semifinal appearance. Schafer's team missed the 2015 ECAC Hockey Quarterfinal. This season, it broke the Big Red's redemptive streak.

The greatest cause for alarm is experiential. Three complete graduating classes, the Classes of 2014, 2015, and 2016, never won the Whitelaw Cup. For most programs, this is normal. At Cornell, it should not be. Three-quarters of all players who draped themselves in carnelian and white during the coldest months of the year have claimed Eastern glory at least once during their careers in Central New York. This establishes a birthright among players in their recruiting pitch and a haughtiness among the Lynah Faithful that grates the less decorated programs of ECAC Hockey.

The Big Red averages winning another Whitelaw Cup approximately every three to four seasons since it won its first at Boston Garden on March 11, 1967. This writer should not need to remind you of the following. Next season, when the contributors of Where Angels Fear to Tread return to Lake Placid, hopefully with Cornell accompanying them, it will have been seven long years since a team from New York's land-grant university won the Whitelaw Cup; a time more than twice to which the Lynah Faithful are conditioned.

The alarm associated with a gap in experience grows all the louder. No player on last season's team, this season's team, or next season's team will have played in a title game for the Whitelaw Cup. Five years currently separates Cornell from its last appearance in that deciding chapter. Cornell has appeared in 21 of ECAC Hockey's 55 title games, 38.2%, but not one of those appearances has come in the last half-decade. Will this team know how to win when it returns next time?

Even Harvard that ended its own nine-year title drought last season had players who earned berths to the Eastern championship match during their freshman seasons. Next season, Cornell would enjoy no similar luxury if it makes. Oh, how it pains one of this writer's era to make that sentence conditional.

This is not a diatribe to be strewn among the refuse about the need for a coaching change. Cornell's playoff run this season was admirable and redeemed this program. Game two of the 2016 ECAC Hockey Quarterfinal will be one long-lived in the annals of Cornell hockey untainted by the team's lack of claiming ultimate glory in Lake Placid. Coaches Knisley, Scott, Syer, and Schafer knew which puts to press and which strategies to exploit. A five-game, three-win playoff run proves that.

The hunger is back. The juniors who will become seniors exhibit a need to win that few classes in recent memory have. Their class contributed 69.2% of Cornell's post-season goals. They are ready to roll up their sleeves. The last four years have taught the importance of having a healthy palate cleanser of a first-round bye.

Earning of that bye must be paramount again. In the rhetoric of this team, it has fallen too easily by the wayside. Such ambiguity in mission or season goals, something Casey Jones when an assistant coach at Cornell attested Coach Schafer always avoided, might explain the Big Red's bad January that required its playing in the first weekend of March.

The juniors may be ready to roll up their sleeves, but are they ready to sit at the table? Does the Red still have the manners to win? Cornellians are known for being too direct, especially among its Ivy brethren; a product of being the blue-collar Ivy, one assumes. Can a team of unseasoned players with not a game of title-game experience among them possibly end what will be tied as Cornell's second-longest Whitelaw-Cup drought next March?

Coach Schafer led a similarly "uncouth" group of Cornellians into the 1996 ECAC Hockey Final. They left with the Whitelaw Cup. Where did they do it? Lake Placid.

The Lynah Faithful are restless. Current students at Cornell University are gradually allowing a culture of low expectations to seep into their mindset. Winning games, not winning trophies, has become expected to them. That rust of low expectations needs to be shaken like the rust of the mind to which Cornell University's founder, Ezra Cornell, refers to in this piece's opening passage.

Maybe, just maybe, this writer is tired of coming to Lake Placid and not seeing his alma mater's team play.

I love this event, I love this conference, but when will Cornell return to its rightful place within both? It's been too long.

Has Cornell forgotten how to win this thing?

Cornell has been too idle during the big game of March's penultimate weekend for too many Marches. Will next season's team be able to stop this drought as the second-longest in Cornell history? It may need to. The Faithful grow as ravenous as do the current juniors. The seniors have made them have more faith in the greatness that can come. Winning needs to follow.

Historical calamity was averted. The hockey program of Union College, as deserving of historical distinction as it is, will not be able to claim any primacy in the annals of Cornell hockey history. The Dutchmen did not eliminate Cornell for a record-setting third consecutive season. The tenacity of this team stanched a three-game playoff losing streak.

The series victory was not preordained. Union dominated the opening period of the weekend. Cornell inched its way back into the initial contest. Strong goaltending from Mitch Gillam gave his team a chance to find its post-season confidence. It was unclear exactly when it arrived. Its presence was far from convoluted. The Big Red defended its home ice with a partially poised, sometimes improvised brilliance. Its crescendo was Matt Buckle's overtime winner.

The recent returner to the line-up, Buckles, bullied his way to the front of the net. Determined tower Christian Hilbrich delivered the puck. The junior forward slid the puck past Union's Alex Sakellaropoulos to send his team to parts as-of-then unknown. The goal that gave Cornell an extra day's rest headed into the 2016 ECAC Hockey Quarterfinal was equal parts grit and finesse. Its production was completely teamwork. It is the way Cornell hockey wins. It is the only way this team wins.

The next opponent on the docket? Quinnipiac. The Bobcats of Hamden. Rand Pecknold's g...gang.

This writer billed the first-round series as Hell in a Cell. He thinks that the series lived up to its marquee. What does he have to offer you in the way of lens for this coming weekend's series at High Point Solutions Arena?

​Quinnipiac is neither Brock Lesnar nor The Undertaker. Were the Bobcats anyone from the WWE Universe, they would be the 21st victim of The Streak, not its conqueror. C. M. Punk of the overhyped, undeservedly confident, and bloated gimmick more accurately represents the hockey program of Quinnipiac. Always looking to bolt for a "better" promotion (Hockey East?). Whose fans would hit the road (say, Whitney Avenue) at the slightest sign of downturn, but still profess absolute loyalty.

Yeah, Quinnipiac is most closely C. M. Punk. The "C. M." may need to be redefined if Cornellians or Yalies are at Toad's. Even Punk has five titles in his promotion. For those reasons, this contributor offers a different lens for a different round.

Adversity is a touchstone of this Cornell hockey team. In interviews, several of the team's leaders state that Coach Schafer has taken them out onto the ice surface of Lynah Rink to scan the carnelian-and-white canopy of banners. The Red's bench boss reminds them that each win, each season, and each championship that raised those banner conquered adversity.

​Uncommon success is banal for Cornell hockey. Cornell hockey counts two perfect seasons that led to national titles. No team ever will equal the achievement of the 1969-70 team that gave our sport its last perfect team. A total of 30 wins has belonged to no program of the Ivy League other than the 2002-03 team from East Hill. The inspiration of the 1910-11, 1969-70, and 2002-03 teams are not best suited for this team. The "1980 ECAC Champions" banner should hang in this team's mind.

​The 1979-80 team did not enter the playoffs with an 8-8-6 record. It effectively did. Those Red skaters earned a 0.500 record, 11-11-0, over the course of the regular season. The eighth seed of the 1980 ECAC Hockey tournament was theirs.

What did that team get for its trouble? What many believed was a one-way ticket to test its timber at McHugh Forum.

First-seeded Boston College played host to playoff-decorated Cornell in the 1980 ECAC Hockey Quarterfinal. The Eagles were an overwhelming favorite, especially after the humbling that they perpetrated against the Lynah Faithful in their haven. Len Ceglarski's pupils catapulted themselves to a one-goal victory with a four-goal outburst. Over 35 years later another eventual first seed of the East used a four-goal run to secure a one-goal victory at Lynah Rink. In the East's tournament, the Eagles of 1980 were no less favored than these Bobcats of 2016.

One goal was the distance separating Cornell from its elusive ninth berth to the Frozen Four Semifinals. The 2012-13 season was one of great promise. No broken stick snapped the national-title hopes of that team. A seven-game winless streak did.

​​For the first time during the tenure of Coach Schafer, Cornell tumbled to a seed that would not have earned his Ithacans a berth to ECAC Hockey's postseason in its original eight-team format. The Big Red began its pursuit of a second Whitelaw Cup for the Class of 2013 from the ninth seed. Those Cornellians righted the wrong of a regular-season sweep at the hands of Princeton in a road-series sweep in New Jersey. Cornell was the lone upset in the first round. It went to Quinnipiac.

Cornell fell behind early. Brian Ferlin's two goals and Madison Dias's game-tying tally allowed Cornell to cling to a 3-2 victory in the series opener. The second game unraveled quickly as the Big Red surrendered the first goal again. It would surrender a second unanswered tally by the end of the first period. Then, poor play and bad luck led to a Bobcat victory in what became a vicious display of poor sportsmanship and brutality. Game three was necessary.

Victory in the series's third game would have sent Cornell to its sixth consecutive championship weekend. The senior class took it upon itself to carry the carnelian banner to Atlantic City. Legacy was at stake.

Braden Birch scored four goals in his 127 games before the final game of the 2013 ECAC Hockey Quarterfinal. The stay-at-home defender corralled the puck off the third game's opening face-off. He charged in on an unsuspecting and unprepared Eric Hartzell. It took 48 seconds for Birch to break the deadlock. The intentions of these seniors were known. This season's seniors will need to be equally clear in their efforts if Cornell wishes to be successful in Hamden.

Cornell and Quinnipiac exchanged blows in the second period. The Bobcats scored. Brian Ferlin for the Big Red responded just over a minute later. Then, a regrettable rewrite was enacted. The most hackneyed and worst executed of all rewrites that not even the greatest of fan-fora heroes can defend. Cornell buckled down. It was determined to defend a 2-1 lead all the way to Atlantic City rather than try to balloon its margin. Such a tactic is always risky. It is all but damning against Quinnipiac.

Polls and rankings do not matter. It is a truism of Cornell hockey. They represent hollow hype when winning is what matters. Winning in March and April is paramount not the unproven opinions of onlookers. That is, when the polls relate to perceptions of Cornell. Polls and rankings both sweeten the pleasure of defeating opponents. There is no denying that.

The victory over Providence in December felt so good for the Lynah Faithful, coaching staff, and team because the Friars were the top-ranked team in the nation and undefeated. Opportunity for a statement ripened in the heat of Florida. Similar opportunity wilted in Upstate New York in November when the highly ranked Bobcats visited Lynah Rink.

​Quinnipiac had not allowed a power-play goal through its first one-fifth of the regular season. The video scouting skills of Topher Scott saw to the end of that. It took the Big Red's power-play unit just 27 seconds to deconstruct the previously unblemished. Then, it did it again. And again. Three power-play goals gave Cornell a lead that historically has proven insurmountable for opponents of Cornell's championship teams. Of championship quality, this team was not yet.

​The Bobcats scored. Mitch Vanderlaan responded with help from Anthony Angello and Jeff Kubiak. It seemed safe to try to defend a restored three-goal lead with less than half the game remaining. It wasn't.

Three unanswered goals from Lynah Rink's visitors and a scoreless third period followed. A psychological miscue, a penalty that carried over into overtime, fed the Bobcats. The penalty was killed. The damage was done. Connor Clifton chose the doubtful punctuation mark to Cornell's query: Are we better?

Six games. Six games without a win. Such was the trajectory of the Red when it entered High Point Solutions Arena on February 5. In the parlance of Ken Dryden's writings on identity politics, what Cornell wanted was a win but what Cornell needed was a good showing. The schneid was shunned a day later. The game of the weekend was played in Connecticut.

​​Custom dictates that games between Cornell and Quinnipiac are stalemates with intermittent action. The contest of November may be the lone exception to that rule in recent memory. The February contest was true to this mold.

The better part of a period expired before the riddle of either goaltender was solved. The Bobcats took the lead off of a power-play tally from Landon Smith. Jeff Kubiak yeomanly maneuvered around the net positioned at the opposite end of the ice a period later to tighten the knot of the Bobcats's noose. The opportunism of the Big Red's first goal was striking.

Quinnipiac retrenched to a defensive shell. This was not the Bobcats team that controlled play and relentlessly attacked its way to 20 victories. Whether it was because Quinnipiac viewed genuine conservatism as the best tactic when facing a disciplined game plan, or Hamden skaters and fans loathe only Yale more than Cornell (true story, read their fora), Rand Pecknold's team resolved to defend a 1-0 lead for more than three-quarters of an hour. Ithaca's hard-working forward from the Land of Lincoln wheeled and dealt with the space afforded him against a team only half-heartedly executing a trap.

​Sam Anas did what one would expect Sam Anas to do when given a two-man advantage. Quinnipiac did not slumber after it upped the ante at the contest's midpoint as it had when it gained a 1-0 lead. Cornell was undeterred.

Generation of the Red's second goal resembled that of the first. Patrick McCarron served as the conduit instead of a break-out play. The junior defender with a scorer's touch dumped the puck onto the stick of Jeff Kubiak. Kubiak did what the Lynah Faithful have come to expect of him this season. He took the puck to the net. Instead of depositing it himself, he flipped a pass up ice to Mitch Vanderlaan who converted for the game-tying goal.

​Overtime was even. Quinnipiac outshot Cornell by one shot in the extra five minutes. Cornell's quality chances were ever-so-slightly better. The game was a fitting deadlock.

Cornell rifled 33.3% more shots on Michael Garteig than it had in its own building. Stalwart defense kept the chances for the Bobcats to perimeter opportunities in Hamden. It was of little import that Quinnipiac directed eight more shots toward Mitch Gillam. Solid defense reduced the Bobcats' scoring efficiency by 67.8% from the teams's meeting in Ithaca.

Quinnipiac converted on only 4.88% of its shots on its home ice against the skater's of New York's land-grant university. The Bobcats average a shooting efficiency of 10.7%. Yes, a Cornell team then-lacking confidence from a seven-game slide managed to reduce the lethality of the Bobcats' shots by more than 50%. This success allowed the Big Red to leave Hamden as one of only five teams that did so not licking wounds of defeat. Cornell was one of only two teams to take the ice of High Point Solutions Arena after the midpoint of the season and leave with a point. It did this while insecure.

It remains to be seen if the confidence of a sweep in the first round will give this team the boost that it needs to finish the job ​twice in Hamden or inspire hubris that may cause a dip in defensive effort that will make this weekend its last.

Andy Iles kept the hopes of his seniors alive. The junior netminder from Upstate New York battled for the hopes of his team. Three-quarters of the shots generated in the third period were leveled at him. Cornell's lead hung precariously.

Rand Pecknold hailed Eric Hartzell to the bench. The netminder listened. One minute and four seconds were what separated the 2012-13 edition of Cornell hockey from an appearance in ECAC Hockey's championship weekend. 1:04. 64 seconds.

Quinnipiac found the equalizer. The Bobcats outshot their forlorn challengers by more than three to one in the overtime periods. Yes, Andy Iles continued to give his team a chance to win. He registered 60 saves before the evening was complete. Nearly half of them, 28 saves, came in less than 35 minutes of overtime.

It did not matter that three bad calls went the home team's way. Two tips off of high sticks and a disallowed goal for Cornell were of no consequence. Any correct call advanced Cornell. It gave no solace. Cornell's season ended on Hamden's ice.

​The careers of legends ended there.

Leave nothing to chance. That is the clear message of the 2013 ECAC Hockey Quarterfinal. The mantra is the same as that of Christian Hilbrich from November. When the opportunities to win or insure is present, one must take them. This team will have to shrug off cosmic misfortune at some point if it wants to leave the town near New Haven with two wins.

Again, turn to the sage words of Christian Hilbrich, "that team always finds a way to score on us in the last minute of the game." Cornell has gone 1-4-1 against the Bobcats since the 2013 post-season. The Red succumbed to defeat in either the last two minutes of regulation or overtime in three of those losses. Half of the contests have gone to overtime.

Hilbrich is right. Last-ditch pushes and what seems like ill-gotten good luck to outsiders will need mitigation.

Eighth seeds met first seeds. It was the way of the world. No team had ever won the East's tournament as its last entrant. The eighth seed's elimination was assumed. Its participation was a mere formality. It was the warm-up act for the top-seeded team in the tournament. That was until Dick Bertrand led his Cornell squad onto the ice of McHugh Forum in March 1980.

This was Cornell hockey. This was the time when Cornell hockey won. The Heights of Boston College on the topic of the series lamented, "it's about this time of year that the frigid onshore winds from the water of Lake Cayuga breathe a demand upon Big Red icemen to uphold the glorious Cornell hockey tradition." The call was sounded. It was answered.

​Underclassmen took it upon themselves to lead the team on that night in Chestnut Hill. Credit was given for 12 Cornell points. Only two of those points were attributed to a senior. Brian Marrett was that senior. His two second-period goals were crucial not in retrospect but in the moment. The Big Red needed a buffer against a four-goal run from Boston College like it unleashed at Lynah Rink. Cornell had that buffer in a five-goal lead with 18:41 unexpired in the contest. Cornell opened that lead early.

Cornell made better of early four-on-four play. The Big Red cycled and found sophomore defenseman Joe Gallant perched atop the left point. Gallant put ECAC Hockey's eighth seed on top for good in the 1980 ECAC Hockey Quarterfinal. That late-game rally that Cornell feared from Boston College never materialized.

Dependable star Brock Tredway doubled the Red's lead before the first intermission. Months later he became Cornell's all-time leading goal scorer. The star of that day was another underclassman. Freshman netminder Darren Eliot cohered with his defense. They were unbeatably in sync. Team victory was all that matter.

Darren Eliot, familiar with the NHL's large scale and big victories, recalls the 1980 ECAC Hockey Quarterfinal as the best game of which he was part. He was no small part of Cornell's upset over highly ranked, first-seeded Boston College. He begs to differ. He recalls today that the Eagles's lone goal in the last 13 seconds deprived not him, but his team, of their shutout.

This character is the essence of Cornell hockey. Cornell continued its run to the 1980 Whitelaw Cup through the next two rounds. The feat is unequaled. Cornell is the only program where an eighth seed has won the Eastern championship. That season's triumph began with defeating 25-win Boston College on the road in the quarterfinals.

This season's Cornell team faces another 25-win ensemble. Cornellians are uniquely able to draw from the "1980 ECAC Champions" banner tales of inspiration and adversity overcome. The 1980 ECAC Hockey Quarterfinal is immortal to those who played it and the alumni who experienced it. Is immortality on the horizon?

This coming series is linked to the past. There are numerous loops that guided the elements of this weekend back into previous games, series, and seasons. Some cycles need to be broken. Others need to be merged.

Most recently, Quinnipiac would not have defeated Cornell without the benefit of the power play. Those power-play opportunities were deserved. The Bobcats did not convert on any opportunities outside of those generated with the man advantage when the teams last met.

Any lack of discipline that gives Quinnipiac gratuitous power-play chances will send the Bobcats to Lake Placid. A focused effort with few mental lapses that commits infractions only when necessary will give Cornell an ample chance to win. The Big Red's penalty killing against Union was confident and composed. This will need to continue against a team that scored statistically about 60%, defensibly 71.4%, of its regular-season goals against Cornell on the power play.

Game two of the first round tested Cornell's ability to deal with cosmic injustice, a necessary component of surviving a playoff series in Hamden. Questionable calls about goals went both ways in the series at Lynah Rink. Cornell and Union both had goals waived. The Red showed that it was ready for rapier-like execution with scoring what looked like a second goal 31 seconds after its first on Saturday. The goal was waived. This team was undaunted. Psychological endurance is a necessity.

Christian Hilbrich, John Knisley, Teemu Tiitinen, and Reece Willcox have the chance to finish something started that was never resolved properly. The first season of their careers in carnelian and white ended on the ice of High Point Solutions Arena. It was an end. It was also a beginning. This team and its seniors can help write a better ending than the one that these four seniors who just gave an entire graduating class back senior night endured in their first quarterfinal series.

The loop of Quinnipiac's beating Cornell late or in overtime is what begs for severance in the Red's favor. Two images from last weekend illustrate the character of this Cornell team. They came courtesy of Ryan Bliss and Jake Weidner.

In the opening game of the series, Cornell had the puck pinned deep in Union's zone. The rubber disc bounced out to the left face-off circle. A Union forward charged directly at Ryan Bliss. Bliss was determined dually to prevent a break-out play and to keep the Dutchmen hemmed into their end. The sophomore blueliner conceded size to the Union skater. Bliss was unmoved. The collision showed like few first-period plays of the series: This is Cornell's house. The Red will not be pushed around.

Jake Weidner was Cornell's best penalty killer last weekend. It was not that any of Cornell's other mainstays got worse. Trust this writer, they did not. What was impressive was how great Weidner was in crucial moments.

Seconds remained on Union's critical power play in the waning minutes of game two. Jake Weidner slid to the ice to block a passing lane. He just missed the puck, his intended target. Almost prone, the junior forward telescoped his stick. Sheer determination alone jettisoned the puck from the zone for regulation's final clear. A situation was defused.

If these hallmarks of sacrifice and hard work continue, the bad tracks of the past with Quinnipiac will be disjointed. The series in Hamden comes at the confluence of four distinct moments in Cornell hockey history. On March 11, 2016, 36 years to the day after eighth-seeded Cornell grounded the first-seeded Eagles of Boston College in another New-England community, Cornell will show the world on which loop it is.

The final weekend of the regular season wrapped on Saturday evening. The teams considered most likely to lock up a first-round bye did. Teams hoping to climb a band to obtain home ice in the first round failed to do so (sorry, Union). As this writer predicted, "your program [] most likely [] end[ed] the weekend exactly in the same place where it began it."

The inset graphic for standing changes illustrates how little changed over the regular season's final weekend. Only four programs either moved up or down relative to all other programs in the conference. The standing of so many programs remained constant that for the first week, this writer decided to remove those that remained stagnant and provide representation of movement for only those programs that did move.

Four programs moved. Eight programs held constant. All shuffling and apparent shifts had everything to do with tie-breaking procedures and nearly nothing to do with last-ditch efforts in final pushes to the playoffs this season. That is except for Clarkson. The Golden Knights made good on a big weekend. They registered the largest single-weekend movement for any program in the ultimate week of the regular season. Clarkson climbed three spots over two games. More on that later.

Harvard, Quinnipiac, St. Lawrence, and Yale rest this coming weekend. Two of those programs with coveted home ice heated over the course of February while the other half chilled. It is worth noting that dominance-penalized Quinnipiac by the end of the month managed to return its rate of earning conference points to the level that it opened February. The Bobcats are not as hot as they were in November as Rand Pecknold even concedes. They are far from dead yet. They slumber this week.

Now, on to the teams that hope to become that one-in-four team that on average makes championship weekend, the teams that play this weekend in the first episodes of the best hockey of the season. Three of the four hosts of first-round series chilled over the course of February. The single exception? Clarkson.

Now, before this writer drags you through the process of predicting from this model which hosts should be put on upset alert and which are safe, let's take a look at how well this model would have predicted last season.

Followers of ECAC Hockey, Cornell hockey, and Where Angels Fear to Tread know the result of last season's chase for the Whitelaw Cup. Harvard won the East's most coveted prize at Lake Placid from the outer reaches of the first round. The victory inched the Crimson's ECAC Hockey championship haul ever closer to the 12 glinting Cups of Cornell (the banner image atop this page serves as an able refresher). Harvard presently has nine postseason accolades. St. Lawrence's third place is six.

​​Which team was hottest in February relative to its performances from November through January last season? Another way, which teams would have been predicted to win each playoff contest if this heating-and-chilling model were predictive?

The answer would not have been Harvard.

The team heating most when the regular season met its end last season was Brown. The Providential bruins improved over the course of the last month of last regular season by an astounding 584% (no, that is not a typo). Brendan Whittet's team earned points in February's contests at nearly six times the rate that it was earlier in the season.

Harvard? Well, Harvard was third-worst in the month of February in terms of its chilling. Only the engineering duo of Clarkson and RPI were feeling more left out in the cold than was the ultimately victorious Crimson. The tournament is played in discrete episodes, not holistically. Using the lens of which games occurred, how accurately would comparing heating and chilling figures of opponents predict which team emerged victorious?

Hockey lore says that those teams playing their best hockey at the right time will emerge victorious in the postseason when legacy is on the line. This aphorism gave rise to this very model. A team that was heating in February, or at least warmer, should unseat a team that was chilling in February, or at least colder, if the two meet in the ECAC Hockey tournament.

This heating-and-chilling model would have predicted 36.4% of the 11 eliminations in the 2015 Whitelaw-Cup playoffs. The team warming or warmer in February defeated the team chilling or colder in February in only about four of ten rounds. A closer look at the data yields a more promising and sensical understanding.

The ability of this model to predict results over the entire tournament is clearly limited. Reader, consider that the proverbial coin-flip with its even odds provides better prognostication in choosing winners. However, if one looks at first-round match-ups alone, the games played without a weekend of rest between them and the regular season, one observes a marked improvement in the model's ability. The heating-and-chilling paradigm is 27.2% more accurate in predicting first-round results.

No single upset happened in the first round for which the model would not have put the home team on upset notice with the home team's facing a warming or warmer opponent. In fact, in an entire month of the tournament, the only upsets that occurred for which the model would not have put the higher seed on notice involved Harvard. The model anticipates which series likely may yield an upset even if it cannot predict faithfully those upsets's occurence. This is not entirely devoid of value even if it is not as probative as myth may imply.

One other interesting truism emerges from last season's tournament. A chilling team, one whose play in February produced a rate of earning points less than 100% of its rate in the first three months of the season, lost every contest to a warming team, teams on the other side of the 100% demarcator, except for one circumstance. That circumstance was Harvard. The Crimson in its four-round run thrice beat teams on the opposite side of the warming/chilling divide. No other team did.

​​The heightened applicability of the heating-and-chilling model in the playoff's earliest rounds makes sense. Teams whose play directly abuts the month of February without a hiatus are those most likely to begin playing in the playoffs in ways most similar to their end-of-the-regular season form. The further a team's play gets from February by either a deeper playoff run or rest, the less able the model is at predicting results. Two trends guide any below predictions.

Colder teams's hosting warmer teams should place the former on upset notice. Warming teams beat chilling teams even if warmer does not necessarily beat colder. What of the Harvard exception? Perhaps, history matters. The general conclusion is that the cliché about best hockey-and-right time may be hackneyed or in need of retooling. This season will provide new data.

The chase for the 2016 Cup o' Scotty begins with match-ups of Princeton at Clarkson, Brown at RPI, Colgate at Dartmouth, and Union at Cornell. These match-ups see only one decidedly warming team as host. The Golden Knights of Clarkson (see, told ya they'd be back) compromise that team.

Clarkson made huge moves, a three-slat climb, in the last weekend of the regular season. Additionally, the North Countrymen spent each week of February as one of ECAC Hockey's warming teams. Trust me, this writer has tremendous respect for the way that Ron Fogarty's teams play, but out of deference to the model, one conclusion is unavoidable. Anyone who pencils in a Princeton upset either is playing the odds or knows something that mere statistics cannot bear. Clarkson wins.

The other match-ups all place the home teams on upset notice to varying degrees. The greatest disadvantageous disparity of the three is between Brown and RPI. The Bears are 105 percent-degrees warmer than are the Engineers. RPI had twice as many wins as did Brown in February. The Bears avoided defeat in one more contest over the same span. Seth Appert in four attempts never has escaped Houston Field House. Considerable weight is on the side of an upset in this series.

Colgate accumulated two-thirds of its February wins in the last weekend of the regular season. Dartmouth ended the regular season getting swept. The model is no kinder to the Big Green than was the regular season's last weekend. A 95.2 percent-degrees differential that crosses the warming/chilling line means that in accord with this model, Colgate upsets.

The Cornell-Union series presents interesting quandaries. Cornell ended February earning points at exactly the same rate that it had during the regular season's first three months. This is largely a product of the law of averages's dragging down the Big Red's phenomenal start with a zero-conference win January. However, only Quinnipiac and Yale avoided defeat better than did Cornell in the warm-up season's last month. Cornell may not have won like it, but it did not lose like a top-four team.

Avoiding defeat and not losing are insufficient in the playoffs when there must be a winner. The carnelian-garnet clash is the only first-round series in which teams on the same side-ish of the warming/chilling measure meet. Cornell is reported as cold in the above graphic because of its trajectory, a one-point weekend at Lynah Rink, during the regular season's last weekend. It is more accurately room temperature. What remains to be seen is whether its temperature resembles that of a corpse or a slightly cooled ready-to-consume feast.

40 percent-degrees separate Cornell and Union with the latter's warming being greater. The other three first-round series average a percent-degrees spread of 104%. The series's parity is obvious. Upset is likely. As opposed to the series at Houston Field House and Thompson Arena, the model gives Cornell a fighting chance. One who uses last season as a guide may predict a Cornell victory. Home-ice advantage held sway each time a warming team hosted a warming team.

This writer is not as optimistic. Hopeful? Yes. Certain? No. Last season gave this Lynah Faithful a crisis of playoff faith.

In the spirit of the heating-and-chilling model, assume that Cornell advances. The whole point of this is to predict what the field will look like as the East's best programs race toward picturesque Lake Placid. Clarkson's next round would not put it far on the road as the Golden Knights would head down Route 11 to the barn of the Saints. Colgate would try to find a cavity in the defense of Alex Lyon and Keith Allain at Ingalls Rink. Hamden would host a reenactment of the 2013 ECAC Hockey Semifinal between Brown and Quinnipiac. Well, the heart wants what the heart wants.

Cornell and Harvard would have their first postseason meeting in what seems like an eternity (just four seasons). The Red would challenge the Crimson at Bright-Landry Hockey Center in both teams's times of year for the first time in 22 years. Before the Faithful can worry about return trips to Lynah East, the carnelian and white need to blot out garnet.

Does this writer think this model is predictive? Probably not. Its purpose was to test a truism. The value of that truism will be adjudged over the next three weeks of great hockey. History (Harvard's eight Whitelaw Cups before last season) and time (the tournament may grow unpredictable as time passes because of a mix of playoff experience and rest) confound using play in February to quantify the best hockey-right time metric used in this model.

Will rest save a chilling Quinnipiac team? Can bulletin-board material and history propel Cornell to an encore victory from the first round that rivals Harvard's Whitelaw-Cup win last season? What this model may make clear over the course of the season's best month is the tautology that it will not be apparent which team is playing its best hockey until the first playoff pucks bounce off the East's frozen battlefields.