March 29, 2003

2003 East Regional
NCAA Division I Men's Ice Hockey Championship
GAME 1 - Cornell 5 Minnesota State 2

Cornell University
Head Coach Mike Schafer:
"The game went as planned from our standpoint. A lot of teams in our league have speed so we were ready for that. We wanted to wear them down in the defensive zone. In the second period give credit to their goaltender, he played well."

On Cornell playing a team not seeded #16:
"I was not pleased with the seeding at first, I made my comments and that was it. We moved on. Mankato is a good team and we had good preparation. Like Shane (Hynes) said we were playing a faceless opponent today."

On the perception of what kind of team Cornell is:
"Teams think we're defensive. We come after teams and force them to make plays. Everyone thinks we're big and slow, let them keep thinking that. Our defense is mobile. Today we played our kind of hockey."

On Minnesota State's ability to come back:
"We knew they'd try to come back in the third. We knew if they got down it wasn't over. They capitalized on mistakes, we only had a couple, but they capitalized on them."

On the tournament expanding to 16 teams:
"As coaches we've wanted 16 teams. It's a great move for college hockey to grow with all the up-and-coming programs."

Sophomore forward Mike Knoepfli:
On Cornell's overall depth:
"The strength of our team is our four lines. Every night they can come up big for us."

On his experience in the NCAA Tournament:
"My experience helped to know the focus and presence needed. We've had big games before and we came in relaxed and ready."

On finishing games strong:
"Towards the third period, that's when we pick it up and our conditioning kicks in."

On playing against Minnesota State's speed:
"We've played against that speed before so we knew what we had to do to stop them."

Freshman forward Shane Hynes:
On Cornell's overall performance:
"Today we really played our game. We kept it simple in our own zone and cycled it down low."

On why the Power Play was so effective today:
"I think a lot of it had to do with the breakouts, we've been working on them and we did a good job of getting it into the zone, getting it down low and putting it in front of the net."

On whether or not the team that they played made a difference:
"Not Really. We just came prepared, we didn't know who we were facing. As the #1 seed we expect to win our games. It doesn't if we play the #14 seed or the #16 seed."