Let's get one thing straight: Dean Blais will bring his Mavericks into Lynah Rink on Friday and Saturday evening. They will be ready to play. His up-tempo style and the precision of his teams's execution cannot be underestimated. However, this weekend will be a microcosm of this season. Nebraska-Omaha will be good, very good even, but what matters most is Cornell.

Cornell hockey is what will be on the minds of those wearing carnelian and white. This is the way it should be. The Class of 2014 bade adieu to its tenure on East Hill without winning either a national championship or a Whitelaw Cup. This result places them among the slimmest of minorities of classes that have graduated from Cornell hockey in the modern era. No matter how conscious it may be, the Class of 2015, like some of its similarly situated predecessors, wants to avert a similar fate.

None of this is to say that the Class of 2014 did not contribute to the championship pedigree of Cornell hockey. The Class of 2014 became the first graduating class in seven years to bring more than one Ivy League Championship to East Hill. The seniors from that class became the 23rd class to claim more than one Hobey Baker Trophy. This current group of seniors is champions already in that regard. It stands as the 24th class to win more than one Ivy League Championship.

Fairly or not, it was not winning Ivy League Championships that etched the names of Stanowski, Tufford, Dryden, Lodboa, Marrett, Tredway, Nieuwendyk, Chartrand, Elliott, Paolini, Scott, and Scrivens into the collective mind of the Lynah Faithful. National and ECAC Hockey championships are the only instruments that strike with the requisite force. This team, and the senior class in particular, recognize this reality. They embrace it. John McCarron, The Captain, acknowledges semi-regularly the weight that the Lynah Faithful put on winning the Whitelaw Cup.

This season embodies this class' quest to reach its fullest potential. No matter what, their tales, including McCarron's and Ryan's leading Cornell to reinsert itself into a national tournament game against Michigan, will be told by those who witnessed them firsthand. However, will the next generation feel as though it witnessed the moments and have their names recalled with considerable ease like Lodboa's hat trick or Paolini's goal? 

Such recognition is what this senior class, one of the five elite classes from its recruiting year, seems all but preordained to bring. Yet, with one season remaining, it has not left its permanent mark on the program in a way that demands remembrance by the collected whole. Destiny against reality is the struggle and main storyline of this season.

The Class of 2015 is among the most talented classes to have played at Cornell. Talent in itself does not ensure success. The Classes of 1967, 1968, 1969, and 1970 fulfilled on their promises. What of the other years of talented greats of Cornell hockey? The members of the Classes of 1977, 1978, 1978, and 1991 constitute among the most talented offensive and defensive players in the history of the program. What percentage of the Faithful can recall their marks?

Of the 13 unique players that fill the ranks of the top 10 all-time goal scorers and point producers, five never won a championship. Vaughan, Nethery, Cullen, Andison, and Derraugh reside less in the forefront of minds than do Doug Ferguson and Joe Nieuwendyk. This category includes all-time leading point producer Lance Nethery of the Class of 1979 and all-time great defenseman Pete Shier of the Class of 1978. Shier is the second-most prolific goal-scoring and point-producing blueliner in the history of the program.

Cole Bardreau, Madison Dias, Joel Lowry, Jacob MacDonald, John McCarron, and Joakim Ryan want their legacies to be more than statistical and anomalous. This is their season. The guiding storyline is their deep understanding of the traditions of their program and their aspirations to pen more chapters than they have already within its annals.

The intrigue of this season penetrates far deeper than this overarching narrative. This team has the chance to be history-making in many regards. In Joakim Ryan, Cornell has the best two-way defenseman in the nation. He is as responsible on the back end as he is potent on the front. Will he challenge the legacy of the "Bobby Orr of college hockey," Dan Lodboa, as the only defenseman to lead Cornell in goals and points?

Schafer has remarked that Ryan's offensive game has improved during the off-season. The chance of Ryan reaching heights unseen in recent memory for an offensive defenseman at Cornell is a real possibility. However, will Joel Lowry enjoy an injury-free senior season in which he will be able to combine his flashes of skill and grit to lead the Big Red in scoring as many know he can? Even though the senior class will lead this squad, Ryan and Lowry will face offensive challenges from underclassmen.

Jared Fiegl has done nothing short of dazzle crowds in preseason contests. His talents tease the possibility that he may be an immediate contributor and one of the most talented freshmen in the nation. Bar none. John Knisley showed considerable improvement in his offensive panache during the Big Red's swing through Europe. Expect the Pittsford native to fill some perceived offensive voids early, and often.

Freshman-sophomore maturation will serve well this team. Matt Buckles, Jeff Kubiak, and Patrick McCarron showed during the late goings last season that Cornell could count on them in their times of need. Buckles and Kubiak connected to rally against Cornell's archnemesis. Meanwhile, Patrick McCarron potted 16.7% of the Big Red's playoff goals as a freshman. The Faithful can expect Patrick McCarron to put at ease concerns that after Joakim Ryan's departure Cornell will have no premiere dual threat blueliners. This proud Red tradition is well guarded in the sophomore defenseman.

Goaltending, as the historic hallmark of Cornell hockey, may raise concerns for some this season. Navigating the early dynamics of a tenuous platoon and finding a go-to starter may be rocky, but in Mitch Gillam, who is the embodiment of calm consistency, and Hayden Stewart, who can extinguish an opposing team's chance with a flare of unorthodoxy, Cornell has the options to carry this team as far as this team and its senior class desire. The team appears to be negotiating this sometimes contentious situation amazingly well which makes ultimate success a more likely outcome.

Changing lines and special-teams combinations make it difficult to afford too much weight to preseason contests. Cornell's special teams will need to be, well, Cornell-like if this season is going to be a success. Nebraska-Omaha has allowed just two power-play goals in four games and 19 opportunities. Minnesota State scored both of those tallies. Those Mavericks of the Minnesota variety own the 21st-best power-play unit in the nation. The Mavericks of Omaha rely on their power play for less than one-third of their offensive output. A lot will be gleaned about Cornell's special teams during this series.

The goaltender whom Cornell likely will confront is Ryan Massa. The Big Red are familiar with him. He tended the pipes in Omaha during the second game of last season's series. Massa, however, is not familiar with Lynah Rink. Sustained pressure on the ice and in the stands will be imperative to chip away at Massa's impressive 0.939 save percentage. A netminder who has proven himself reliable this season is a worthy challenge for a roster loaded with talent that needs to prove last year's moribund offensive production is a thing of the past.

Gone are offensive threats Archibald, Montpetit, and Walters from Nebraska-Omaha's arsenal. Zombo remains and carries with him a letter. It is interesting to note that the stick of Ortega has directed half of Nebraska-Omaha's power-play goals. Guentzel rounds out the group of three that contributes 60% of the Mavericks's offense.

That is enough about the opposition. It is time for this team to take the ice and begin taking the respect it craves. The last two national postseasons have given rise to an anxiety of inaction. This weekend, Cornell needs to take strides, no matter how big or small, toward alleviating this uneasiness. Cornell has been one of the best teams in the nation over the last three seasons. Once over that span, it proved it. Twice, it has been denied the opportunity.

Will the end point be Boston? One cannot be certain. Nonetheless, the talent of this senior class and the team that it leads makes it seem a distinct possibility. Could there be a better stage than Boston on which to imagine John McCarron or Cole Bardreau proclaiming a definitive end to this wait and acknowledging the contributions of those players, championship-winning or too easily overlooked, as why Cornell could again reach complete greatness? Games, months, and changes of season remain between then and now, but as we think of the boundless potential of this team and the success and memories that we want to share with it over the coming months, we find ourselves wanting it for them as much as we want it for ourselves.

The results? Ghastly. The product on the ice? A mixed bag. 

Whether one likes it or not, as fans, one finds oneself making subconscious predictions about season openers. Firstly, which results would be jaw-droppingly good. Secondly, which results would be contenting. And, thirdly, with a certain level of reservation, which results would be utterly devastating to the point of causing a let's-burn-the-sweaters frenzy.

Losing a series by the combined margin of 12 goals allowed to four goals scored or getting outscored by a three-to-one margin while being swept, it does not matter how one chooses to put it, looks very, very far from good. That is putting it lightly. So, clearly, the experience that WAFT endured at Conte Forum this weekend was surely of the bonfire-inducing variety, right? Not so fast.

This will be far from an apologetic piece that forgives all the shortcomings the Lady Rouge manifested last weekend. However, it will be an honest analysis of how the carnelian and white did relative to what one would have expected reasonably by way of preview when the season began. Yes, this is a two-for-one type of post; both preview and retrospect.

What did the Lynah Faithful know before the puck was dropped last Friday in Chestnut Hill? We knew collectively that Cornell had lost over a two years' span arguably the four best defensemen to ever wear carnelian and white. Fortino and Rougeau departed last season. Ask the best female hockey players in the world which defensive paring is the worst to oppose on the other side of the blue line. The answer is predictable. Cudmore and Gagliardi closed the gap last season, and tended to our carnelian fortress. Now, Cudmore and Gagliardi are graduated.

Defense was going to be a question mark. But, was an allowance of 12 goals during the first weekend out expected? One needs to consider that two of the five defensemen who saw ice time this weekend are freshmen. The true veterans of the defensive corp with more than a season's experience were Morgan Richardson and Cassandra Poudrier.

Richardson ended the weekend owning a minus one. The junior defenseman was on the ice for a mere one-third of the goals allowed. Poudrier, of the goal that sunk the eventual national champion in the ECAC Hockey Championship Final, allowed just two even-strength goals while she was on the ice. An even sheet for Poudrier characterized her first weekend.

Both upperclassmen registered performances showing that they are positioned to carry the weight  that has fallen to them. Emphasizing the stellar play of Richardson and Poudrier is not to the exclusion of the impressive performances of the younger members of the defensive corp. Notably, freshman Erin O'Connor showed few signs of her newcomers status.

The defensive side of the ice during the second game was not as porous as one would expect. There are few teams on which a flashy scorer and Patty Kazmaier Memorial Award Finalist like Cornell's own Jill Saulnier would be seen upping her impressive defensive game during the off-season, but her confidence and brilliance in obstructing passing lanes and blocking pucks displayed the team-defense, team-first ethos of Cornell hockey.

Special teams were among the roughest of edges during the game. Five of the 12 goals that Cornell allowed to the Eagles were on special teams. One of those five was a short-handed attempt. The short-handed tally was a result of a combination of the overwhelming need to chase a game and a Boston College-favoring bounce. Nevertheless, Boston College scored more goals on special teams than Cornell did in the entire series. If there was one fatal flaw of the weekend, it was this.

The Red power play was stymied by the stifling defense of Boston College that left few usable passing or shooting lanes. Cornell's penalty kill was disorganized. The unit left entire vulnerable zones of the ice uncontested and free for Boston College's exploitation at times. Cornell converted on a mere one of six power-play opportunities that it was given.

Goaltending has been a hallmark of Cornell women's hockey since its most modern ascendance. Take a moment to gaze at the honored sweater hanging above center ice at Lynah Rink and reflect upon what that netminder meant to the current success of the men's program. It has been difficult to live up to his statistics let alone his mythos. Now, realize that either recently departed Mazzotta or Slebodnick is the analog on the women's side of the program. 

Much is expected now of Cornell's netminders, and much will be given, but expectations cannot be unreasonable. Remember, this was Paula Voorheis (may I call her Big Paula?) who was tending the pipes against Boston College. She is the same goaltender who backstopped Cornell through half of its 2014 ECAC Hockey Championship run. Last weekend may have been somewhat disappointing, but she and the talented goaltending group of Moak and Boughn are ready to deliver what Cornell needs in the future.

We are the Lynah Faithful, we know that defense, and goaltending by extension, is a team sport. Missteps on the penalty kill and power play made Voorheis's weekend long and challenging. Facing 81 shots did not help either. Cornell had gone through half of another entire game last season before it faced as many shots. Cornell surrendered less than half as many during its playoff homestand in the 2014 ECAC Hockey Tournament. Voorheis's positioning was solid. She inspired the ire of the few Boston College fans who came out to watch the contests and stifled most breakout rushes.

There was no greater turnaround than Cornell's offensive output between the two contests. Boston College hemmed Cornell into its own end for what seemed like the entire game on Friday afternoon. The 6-2 margin at the close of the contest appeared to capture well how dominated Cornell was in that contest. The same could not be said of Saturday's tilt.

Saturday, the Big Red took its game to the Eagles. Cornell controlled significant amounts of zone time and ground Boston College down in its own end. Misfortune and a few phenomenal defensive plays from the Eagles against a sharp, yet unhoned, Cornell attack prevented the game from breaking in Cornell's favor. Until midway through the third period on Saturday, there was a palpable sense that the game would erupt in favor of Cornell. It would not happen.

Brianne Jenner proved that unlike silver, gold does not tarnish, when she returned to her transcendent form on Saturday. Despite scoring her goal of the weekend on Friday, it was Saturday when Jenner shone like the unselfish star that she can be. She drew Eagles to her like vulnerable prey and then sprang connecting offense to others on the ice who were afforded greater time and space as the opponent's defense was drawn to its scouting report's gold medalist.

Emily Fulton is ready to pick up where she left off with her 43-point performance from her junior campaign. Fulton joined Jenner as the only two players to tally a point in each contest. The wearer of her head coach's number, 17, notched a goal in each contest to continue her honoring that number's legacy.

Anecdotally, the jump from freshman to sophomore seasons is supposed to witness the greatest leap in form and talent. Those who were fortunate enough to watch Hanna Bunton's breakway goal off of a transition play have plenty of reason to believe that the sophomore is ready to challenge as one of the Big Red's most deadly offensive threats this season. Want proof? Well, I told you.

Okay, now that we have done that, put down that lighter fluid and put your sweater back in a safe place. A young defensive corps with new elder leadership and special-teams units that had barely a week to get ready for a marque opponent are the reasons that the results looked so grizzly. Progress probably will not be immediate, but there were bright spots on which Cornell will build. This team may need to rely on a big second half of the season, but Cornell will chip away at the few shortcomings that prevented its success until it resembles the embodiment of dominance that we expect.

Be there when Princeton and Quinnipiac brave Lynah Rink for the first ECAC Hockey contest of the season. The Tigers and Bobcats are both uncertain and unproven commodities. Quinnipiac is unbeaten, but has grappled with no programs that are consistent or of the highest calibre. Princeton earned a split against the free radical that is Penn State. 

The Bobcats proved last season to Cornell and the college-hockey world that they are a program on the rise. This season, they are driven to prove that they are much more than Babstock. Princeton, well, this writer is pretty sure that they have at least one reason to want to beat Cornell.

Told you that you would need that sweater.

This writer decided to limit this all-time analysis of the dominance of college-hockey programs to the NCAA era. Rivalrous claims to national titles and inadequate data from the pre-NCAA era undermine the legitimacy of using that era's statistics in direct historical comparisons. Therefore, the findings of this analysis are limited necessarily to college-hockey dominance since the first NCAA tournament in 1948.

The perceived "fair share" represents how often one would expect a program to win if results were random. Consider a hypothetical conference of four members. Each team would be expected to win every four years if unadulterated chance governed. However, if over eight years, one team won four titles, that team has won twice as often as it is expected. That team has won half of the championships awarded while representing a mere quarter of the membership. The factor of two by which this team has outperformed chance is a measure of that team's dominance.

A meaningful analysis of dominance must take into account changes over time. The seismic shifts in conference affiliation over the last three seasons have made this clear. Competing in the WCHA during the 2014-15 season is not the same as competing in the similarly named conference during the 2010-11 season. Hockey East now possesses 12 members when but a few seasons ago it counted a mere 10 programs as members. Both realities affect how likely a program is to win a league championship by chance. Furthermore, the legacy of a program like Union cannot be undercut for not winning NCAA national titles in eras when it had no program or was not competing at the appropriate level.

Consider again the above four-team conference and the eight years of championships. However, this time, imagine that the conference expanded to eight members after the fourth championship. Immediately, it becomes apparent that it matters when each championship was won. The team in question is expected to win more often competing in the four-member configuration than it is when it is a member of an eight-team conference. Assume that two titles were won in each configuration over the eight years. The number of titles won in the first iteration of the conference reflects the team's ability to outperform chance by a factor of two while the number won in the second iteration reflects an outperformance rate of four.

Using the increments of seasons and the incidental dominance value of number of championships that a particular team has won with respect to those awarded until that point, one creates a weighted system that can be averaged over those seasons to calculate the average degree of dominance that a college-hockey program has enjoyed throughout its existence.

Realignment and changing affiliations create other issues because they involve not only the change in the number of members within a conference, but also the number of years over which that championship has been awarded or for which a team has been competing for those championships. Therefore, after realignment, all teams rightly are considered to be competing for the first championship given and begin a new era of dominance calculations within their new cohort. Their dominance and success in previous conferences are still averaged and weighted over the existence of the program.

The dominance of new members is calculated relative to their date of entry. For example, Union's rate of winning in ECAC Hockey is calculated out of how many championships that they have won since they were eligible for ECAC Hockey's post-season in 1992, not since the conference's first postseason in 1962. This applies at the national level as well for programs that were later additions to the NCAA Division I level.

National dominance is easily calculated. The national dominance rating of a team at any given time is calculated as the numerator of the number of NCAA championships that it has won divided by the number of years over which that program has been eligible for the NCAA tournament divided by the divisor of the percentage of programs in NCAA Division I hockey that the program in question represents within a given season.

The above method yields an NCAA and conference rating of dominance. To allow more ready comparison, this writer scaled the respective ratings of NCAA and conference dominance to 100 points. Michigan exhibited the greatest NCAA dominance and its NCAA dominance rating was scaled to 100 points. Every other program's respective NCAA dominance rating was calculated proportionally from that base. The same was done with Wisconsin as the 100-point basis for calculating conference dominance.

Considering that NCAA dominance is valued more highly than conference dominance within college-hockey fandom, the all-time dominance rating given to each program weights a program's NCAA dominance rating twice as much as it does its conference dominance rating. The resulting all-time overall dominance ratings for each NCAA title-winning program are included at the top and bottom of this post. The related NCAA and conference dominance ratings are graphically represented.

Some of the results are surprising, others are far from it. Despite middling historical dominance of its own conference, Michigan's winning of the first NCAA title and eight thereafter ensures that the Wolverines are the most dominant program in the history of college hockey. The maize and blue tumble from a possible perfect dominance rating of 100 to one of 74.

Wisconsin's consistent dominance over its conference peers, whether it is playing in the WCHA or winning the inaugural Big-Ten tournament, propels it to within striking distance of Michigan. The fact that Wisconsin with six NCAA titles outpaces Denver with its seven NCAA titles highlights how in unpredictable but yet sensical ways the dominance rating prioritizes success. This phenomenon is discussed more later.

Cornell owns the eighth-best NCAA dominance rating. However, it is the Big Red's historic and consistent dominance over its conference cohort that catapults the Ithacans from eighth place to fourth in the all-time dominance rating. Wisconsin is the only program that imposes more historic dominance over its conference than does Cornell.

The programs that follow Cornell immediately have more NCAA titles than does Cornell. How does this make sense? The answer is twofold. Boston University and Michigan State were eligible for the NCAA tournament nearly a decade longer than was Cornell. The latter won an NCAA title a mere season before Cornell won its first. The former waited until four seasons after Cornell won its first crown. The extended period over which neither program won but was eligible is why Cornell is calculated to have the same dominance rating as both programs.

In essence, Boston University and Michigan State had all but fallen behind the rate of winning that chance would predict by the time that either won their first NCAA title. Boston College suffers from the 52-year period of not winning an NCAA championship. A similar drought factor pulls down Cornell's dominance rating somewhat, but an incredible dominance of ECAC Hockey counteracts part of this effect.

Boston University's conference dominance rating suffers from historically remaining only the second-most dominant in the two conferences in which it has been a member. In ECAC Hockey, the Terriers were second to Cornell. In Hockey East, Boston University trails behind the dominance of Boston College. The small size of Hockey East until recently exacerbates Boston University's need to outcompete its "fair share." However, the Terriers still edge out the Eagles because of their past second-most dominant status in ECAC Hockey.

Most starkly, the dominance rating illustrates which programs of high esteem are clearly not programs of immense success in the playoffs. The Golden Gophers of Minnesota clock in at a disappointing 12th ranking. Playing in the historically modestly sized WCHA and exhausting 24 seasons before winning its first NCAA title, Minnesota outperforms, but just barely, its "fair share" over time. 

The examples of Boston University, Michigan State, and Minnesota need not undermine this model as valuing early success too highly. One only needs to regard Colorado College to allay these fears. The Tigers won the third and tenth NCAA tournaments. They have been eligible for all such tournaments. Colorado College ranks 16th all-time in dominance far behind all three more recent winners.

It is interesting to note that eight NCAA title-winning programs historically have averaged winning their conference less often than random chance would predict. Those programs are Michigan, North Dakota, Michigan Tech, Colorado College, RPI, Minnesota-Duluth, Union, and Yale. Five programs are relatively more dominant on the national scale than they have been within their associated conferences. Those programs are Michigan, North Dakota, Michigan Tech, Colorado College, and RPI.

Some will disagree with these findings. The interesting result is how this model captures some of the subconscious assumptions of college-hockey fans. It quantifies why many fans give Cornell greater respect as a program than they do programs of greater absolute numbers of NCAA titles like Michigan State, Lake Superior State, or Michigan Tech.

Yes, it is true that programs of greater numbers of NCAA titles may slide up or down relative to this dominance rating model in terms of social cache that they actually enjoy. The model nonetheless stratifies college hockey into relatable and reasonable bands. The dominance rating serves as one means to determine which programs are the greatest in the great sport of college hockey over periods of great change. The conclusions of this model can be understood to indicate which programs have been the most consistently dominant in the minds of the greatest number of generations of fans.