Team Notes: Top-Ranked Cornell Opens Against Robert Morris

ITHACA, N.Y. -- For the first time in program history, the Cornell women’s hockey program will bear the mantle of the nation’s number one team when it opens the 2010-11 season in a two-game series against Robert Morris at Lynah Rink. Live stats and live streaming video from both games will be available through links posted on CornellBigRed.com.

HEAD COACH DOUG DERRAUGH
Now in his sixth season as head coach of the Cornell women’s hockey team, Doug Derraugh has turned the program into a contender for the national championship. With a 58-81-15 overall record, Derraugh guided the Big Red to a 21-9-6 record last season and a berth in the national championship game. He led Cornell to its first-ever ECAC Hockey regular season and tournament championships and first appearance in the NCAA tournament, defeating traditional powers Harvard and Mercyhurst on the way to the national title game. He has led the Big Red to double-digit win totals in each of the past three seasons and set a program record for wins in a season with 21 last year. Derraugh took over the program prior to the 2005-06 season after a 13-year professional playing career in Europe and has transformed the Big Red into one of the top young programs in the country. He is assisted by fifth-year assistant coach Danille Biloudeau, a former Cornell player and 2001 graduate, Edith Zimering, in her second season with the Big Red, and volunteer assistant coach Meredith Roth, in her first year with Cornell.

ABOUT THE BIG RED
The Big Red opens the 2010-11 season as one of the early-season favorites for the national championship. With 13 players returning from last year’s national runner-up squad and the addition of six talented incoming freshmen and the return of junior Rebecca Johnston, who sat out the 2009-10 season while playing with the Canadian Olympic Team, the Big Red appears to have the talent on paper to bring home the program’s first national title. Cornell returns its top five scorers from a year ago, including a trio of All-Americans, and both of the goaltenders from last year’s team. Leading the way offensively will be the reigning ECAC Hockey Player of the Year, junior Catherine White, while First-Team All-America Laura Fortino and Second-Team All-American Lauriane Rougeau, both sophomores will anchor the Big Red’s blue-liners. In goal, junior Amanda Mazzotta is already statistically one of the top goaltenders in Cornell history and will look to improve upon her already stellar career numbers. Highlighting the newcomers are forwards Brianne Jenner and Jessica Campbell. Jenner was centralized in 2009-10 with the Canadian Olympic Team before being one of the final players cut prior to the Vancouver Olympics, while Campbell was named the most valuable player at the IIHF U18 World Championships last spring.

ABOUT ROBERT MORRIS
Robert Morris enters the weekend with a 1-5 record on the season, having dropped each of its last five contests after starting the year with a 5-4 victory over Providence, a team receiving votes in this week’s USA Today/USA Hockey Division I poll. The Colonials are led offensively by junior Brianna Delaney, who has seven points in six games on three goals and four assists. Her sister, sophomore Cobina Delaney, and senior Maria Stoa, have also chipped in a team-best three goals on the year. Robert Morris has played a platoon in goal, with senior Daneca Butterfield appearing in four games, posting a .883 save percentage and a 4.25 goals-against average. Sophomore Kristen DiCiocco has appeared in three contests with a .867 save percentage and a 4.51 goals-against average. As a team, the Colonials are allowing 4.50 goals per game while saving 87.2 percent of the shots faced. Robert Morris has struggled on the penalty kill, ranking 27th in the nation and killing off 75 percent of the penalties against (18-of-24), though the power play has had success in the early going, ranking eighth in the nation at 18.5 percent (5-of-27).

THE SERIES WITH ROBERT MORRIS
Cornell and Robert Morris have met just once in women’s hockey, with the Colonials scoring a 2-1 victory on Nov. 1, 2008, at Lynah Rink, the third game of the 2008-09 season. In that game, Cornell’s Hayley Hughes scored the opening goal of the match before Robert Morris’ Brianna Delaney scored a goal in the first and second periods for the only scoring of the contest. Just eight players who were in the lineup that day for the Big Red are on the roster for the 2010-11 season. Cornell has a losing record against all five current teams in College Hockey America, though a sweep over the Colonials this weekend would tip that series in favor of the Big Red.

OH CANADA!
Of the 20 members of the Cornell roster in 2010-11, nine were selected to participate in the Canadian U22 National Team Selection Camp in early August, with eight of those players being named to the select team that faced the United States in a three-game series later that month. The eight included goaltender Amanda Mazzotta, defensemen Laura Fortino and Lauriane Rougeau, and forwards Jessica Campbell, Brianne Jenner, Rebecca Johnston, Chelsea Karpenko and Catherine White. Also invited to the camp but not named to the select team was defenseman Hayleigh Cudmore. The nine players invited to the camp far surpassed any other collegiate program, with Boston University placing four players in the initial camp and Mercyhurst placing three.

EARLY PICKS
When the ECAC Hockey preseason coaches poll was released, it was no surprise to see the Big Red standing as the favorite among league coaches to repeat as champions. Cornell received all 11 possible first-place votes with Clarkson gaining the final vote, with coaches unable to vote for their own teams. 

THE FIRST SIX
Along with the preseason coaches poll, the ECAC Hockey bench bosses selected the preseason all-league team, with four Big Red players named among the six spots. The Big Red placed defensemen Laura Fortino and Lauriane Rougeau and forwards Rebecca Johnston and Catherine White among the top six, with Quinnipiac goaltender Victoria Vigilanti and Harvard forward Kate Buesser rounding out the league’s preseason selections.

GO FOR THE GOLD
Rebecca Johnston returns to the Big Red for her junior season after sitting out the 2009-10 campaign while centralized with the Canadian senior national team. Johnston was named to the Canadian team that captured the gold medal at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, playing in five of Canada’s six games and scoring one goal with five assists and a +9 rating.

EVERYBODY’S ALL-AMERICAN
Cornell returns four players who have previously earned AHCA All-America honors during their career, including the program’s first First-Team selection in sophomore defenseman Laura Fortino, who was selected to the nation’s top six in her freshman season. Joining in that group are 2010 second-team selections Catherine White and Lauriane Rougeau and 2009 second-team pick Rebecca Johnston. 

WORLD CHAMPIONS
Cornell’s roster includes a pair of players who were a part of the Canadian team that won the IIHF U18 World Championship last spring. Freshmen Jessica Campbell and Hayleigh Cudmore were both members of that squad, with Campbell being named the most valuable player of the tournament for her play.

DRAWING A CROWD
Cornell’s win in the ECAC Hockey championship game against Clarkson last season came in front of 1,528 fans, the most spectators on record to see a Cornell women’s hockey game at Lynah Rink.

DRAWING A BLANK
Last season, opponents found it exceptionally hard to score on Cornell goaltender Amanda Mazzotta. The junior netminder set a Cornell record – men’s and women’s – by posting 11 shutouts last year, surpassing the total of 10 set by men’s goaltender David McKee during the 2004-05 season. The previous best by a women’s goaltender was six, set by Kathryn LoPresti in the 1988-89 season.

GOING STREAKING
Last season, Cornell goaltender Amanda Mazzotta recorded the fourth-longest shutout streak in NCAA history, recording four straight shutouts from Feb. 5 through Feb. 13. Her total time stretched for 286:54, the longest streak in ECAC Hockey history and fourth-longest all-time in NCAA history. Wisconsin alumna Jessie Vetter owns two of the three longest streaks in NCAA history, including the record of 448:39.

TREATY OF NEUTRALITY
Cornell’s two games at the NCAA Frozen Four last season marked the 42nd and 43rd games the Big Red has played on neutral ice. Cornell holds a 23-17-3 record all-time when playing at a neutral venue. Prior to last season’s national championship weekend, the Big Red’s last neutral site game came on Jan. 21, 2001, when it lost to St. Lawrence, 4-1, at Lake Placid, N.Y. The Big Red is not scheduled to play any neutral site contests this season, potentially playing as many as four should Cornell advance in postseason play.

PENALTY KILLING? NO PROBLEM
Cornell was exceptional at staying out of the penalty box last season, ranking 33rd among the 35 teams in Division I in penalty minutes per game. Even when the Big Red found itself shorthanded, however, Cornell still played outstanding defense. The Big Red ranked first in the nation in penalty-killing percentage, allowing just 10 goals in 131 opponents’ power plays (92.4 percent). Cornell’s 2009-10 percentage ranked eighth all-time in NCAA history.

TWO-WAY PLAYER
Sophomore forward Xandra Hompe gives new meaning to that term, as the New Cannan, Conn., native is a dual-sport athlete. Hompe spends her fall season with the Cornell women’s soccer team, where she is tied for third on the team in scoring and shares the team lead in assists with four. 

LYNAH LOCKDOWN
Cornell went 4-0 in postseason games at Lynah Rink last season. Prior to thiat, the Big Red had never won a postseason game, and had never played a postseason game at home.

UP NEXT
The Big Red opens up ECAC Hockey play with its first road trip of the season, traveling to Princeton and Quinnipiac for a pair of games. The Big Red opens the league slate against Quinnipiac on Friday, Oct. 29, in Hamden, Conn., before taking on Princeton the following afternoon in Princeton, N.J