Penn State goes 0-1-1 on the Weekend

Penn State hockey started their weekend off against RIT on Friday night. The puck dropped at 7 pm at Pegula Ice Arena in State College.

Yet again, the student section was full and rowdy with chants of “Jo-o-o-ordan” taunting the opposing goalie (Jordan Ruby). Unfortunately, that wasn’t enough to get the win.

The first goal came at 6:15 from Penn State’s Dylan Richard. RIT followed up with two power play goals to finish out the first period. (Adam Mitchell 8:19, Mike Colavecchia 18:13)

The lone second period goal was scored by Penn State’s David Goodwin at 15:21 as a result of RIT’s slashing penalty. This gave a much-needed spark to the team and the fans.

At 8:47 of the third, Penn State took the lead back with a goal from Curtis Loik to make it 3-2. Four minutes later, RIT’s Brad McGowan tied it up again. The rest of the period remained scoreless and the two teams went into overtime. After another scoreless five minutes, the game ended in a 3-3.

RIT won the shootout 2-0, which has no effect on the score or team standings (unfortunately for RIT who remains winless this season).

SIDENOTE: The shootout didn’t matter in this game, but for Penn State’s future Big Ten games, the shootout will be used to decide the outcome of a tie.

The next day Penn State took on Vermont at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia for the second annual College Hockey Faceoff. The game started at 5 pm in front of a crowd of 17,632.

With backup goalie Eamon McAdam in net for the Nittany Lions, Penn State fell to Vermont 5-2.

Penn State started off strong with a goal from Taylor Holstrom at 13:17. Less than 2 minutes later, Captain Tommy Olczyk scored a shorthanded goal to give the Nittany Lions a 2-0 lead. After that, though, it was all UVM. Jake Fallon cut the lead in half with a goal at 15:27.

Vermont deflated Penn State with a tying goal scored by Nick Luukka shortly after PSU killed off a 5-minute major penalty. Matt White scored Vermont’s third goal of the game at 9:45. Penn State was outshot 12-1 in the second period.

Vermont went on to score 2 more goals in the third period (Brendan Bradley, Pete Massar). UVM improved to 1-1-1 with their first win of the season after some sloppy play by the Nittany Lions. Last year, Penn State beat UVM 4-2. Now the series is all tied up, which will make for a fun game next season.

Penn State’s power play was 1 for 10 this weekend and they took a total of 17 penalties between the 2 games (this has been on ongoing issue for the Lions since the start of the season).

This wasn’t the weekend Penn State was hoping for, and now they go into their next game against Robert Morris with a 1-3-1 record. The Nittany Lions will travel to Pittsburgh to face the 0-4-1 Colonials at 7 pm on Friday.