No. 18 Penn State hosts Wisconsin for its Big Ten home opener this weekend. Game one is set for 7:30 p.m. Friday, and game two will be at 7:30 p.m. Saturday.
The Badgers are heading into the weekend 2-8 overall and 1-5 in conference play, with their lone conference win being 2-1 against Notre Dame on November 2nd. The team is coming off a home series against conference foe Minnesota, where the Gophers won 3-2 in both contests.
The Nittany Lions are coming off another bye week after their own series against Minnesota in Minneapolis. They lost 3-1 and 1-0 to the Gophers, getting shut out by Liam Souliere, a former Nittany Lion.
Penn State has a 27-23-3 edge over the Badgers and a 15-9-1 lead advantage in Pegula Ice Arena. Last season, however, the Badgers swept the Nittany Lions in all four matches out scoring them 19-6.
Wisconsin is without three of the top five leading scorers from last season, including leading scorer Carson Bantle, who had 14 goals, Cruz Lucius had 13 goals with the team-best 34 points, and David Silye had the team-high of 23 assists and 32 points good for second on the team.
Simon Tassey is the leading point returner from last season as he ranked third on the team with 12 goals and 16 assists for 28 points. This season, however, he has only found the back of the net once and collected two assists in the teams 10 games.
Sophomore Quinn Finley leads the Badgers in points with 10 between seven goals and three assists. Three of his seven goals were on the man advantage, tying him for first place in the Big Ten and third place nationally. His 10 points are tied for seventh in the conference. Finley scored two of the teams four goals against Minnesota last weekend, one in each game.
One of the biggest struggles for the Badgers this season has been their special teams. The penalty kill that has gone 20-for-27 (74.1 percent) is ranked last in the conference and 50th out of 64 teams nationally. The power play has been a tad bit more successful at 18.9 percent good for third in the conference, but still in the midst of the national rankings.
Wisconsin is without their starting netminder from last season, who won the Mike Richter Award, Kyle McClellan, who had a 1.94 goals-against average and a .931 save percentage through his 37 starts.
They do, however, return sophomore netminder William Gramme, who started three games last season and played in six total, recording a .959 save percentage and 1.13 goals-against average facing 94 shots. Gramme is joined by RIT transfer Tommy Scarfone, and they have split the games evenly so far. Gramme is currently posting a .886 save percentage and 3.17 goals-against average, and Scarfone is recording a .885 save percentage and 2.59 goals-against average.
The Nittany Lions are led by sophomore Aiden Fink, who has nine points in the team's seven games between two goals and nine assists. Reese Laubach leads the team in goals with four, along with two assists for six points, tying senior Danny Dzhaniyev, who has three goals and three assists on the season.
Dzhaniyev was named the third alternate captain earlier this week, joining fellow senior Carson Dyck and fifth-year Jimmy Dowd Jr., who have donned the “A” since the start of the season, and Simon Mack, who has donned the “C”.
Mack's five points so far this season, including one goal and four assists, are good for third on the team. His 10 blocked shots are tied for second on the team with fellow defenseman Carter Schade, behind Jarod Crespo, who has 13.
The Badgers and Nittany Lions are the top two teams in faceoffs in the conference, with the Badgers winning 55.3 percent of its draws and the Nittany Lions winning 55.1 percent, ranking ninth and 11th nationally. Wisconsin's Owen Lindmark leads the conference with a 67.6 percent record on the dot, with Penn State’s freshman Keaton Peters coming in second with a 61.1 percent success rate.
The blue and white have had a very successful penalty kill this season, going 31-for-32, not allowing a single opponent to score on the powerplay for the first 28 opportunities of the season until Jimmy Snuggerud knocked one in two weekends ago. The team has also scored three shorthanded goals, tying for the lead in the Big Ten and third nationally; last season, the team only recorded one.
While Souliere transferred to Minnesota at the end of last season, and junior transfer Arsenii Sergeev has really stepped up the Nittany Lion goaltending. He is the only Big Ten goalie to play every minute of his team's games. Sergeev's 1.71 goals-against average is currently ranked sixth in the conference and 16th overall but is tied for second in the conference and seventh in the nation for netminders who have played in at least seven games. His .929 save percentage is good for sixth in the conference and 21st nationally but third in the conference and tenth nationally among players who have played at least seven games.
The team unveiled new throwback jerseys for the Friday night game. The sweaters were inspired by the 1940-1941 season, when they played their first-ever varsity game before World War I.
Saturday night's game is the annual Teddy Bear Toss, a hockey tradition in which fans throw teddy bears onto the ice. The bears are then donated to children's hospitals to be given to children undergoing cancer treatment.
“It’s super cool, it’s fun to see all the kids enjoy it and all the families, everyone is into it, and it creates that community sort of feeling.” Dowd Jr. said.
This game is also associated with Penn State THON, a 46-hour entirely student-run dance marathon held every February in the Bryce Jordan Center, which is the largest student-run dance marathon in the nation, where all proceeds go to the Four Diamonds Foundation, raising money for childhood cancer.
