MINNEAPOLIS — If you were going to boil it down to two numbers: earlier this season Penn State men’s hockey passed the 400 game mark as a modern Division I program as Minnesota’s men’s hockey rounded the corner toward 3,200 games played in the program’s 100+ year history.
Maybe it’s obvious that one of the most established programs in the sport has played more games than one of the newest, but in an era of instant gratitude and anxious-for-success fans, you can forget that Penn State’s 12 seasons of play are dwarfed by the decades of established hockey represented in the Big Ten. The Gophers have had four head coaches atop the program for more than a decade, Penn State has had one coach, ever, in its modern configuration.
Sitting in the team hotel in downtown Minneapolis, that one coach — Guy Gadowsky — is reminded on a regular basis the gap which exists between his program’s tradition and history and that which exists elsewhere in the conference. The Nittany Lions hail from a state in which five players from Pennsylvania have skated in an NHL game this season, according to Quant Hockey, while Minnesota boasts 53 players who have skated in the league this season. The Minneapolis/Saint Paul region is swarming with talent, the state hockey playoffs underway just down the street. If Minnesota comes with an arrogance and superiority about its hockey, it’s not without good reason. State of Hockey indeed.
Move around the Big Ten and you’ve got Michigan, Yost Arena less than 20 miles from the headquarters of US Hockey’s program in Plymouth, players under the age of 18 not yet committed to a college playing right down the road from one of the nation’s premiere college hockey powers. It’s not a pipeline; it’s just a freeway. The list goes on and on. NHL scouts, executives, coaches, assistants, agents and more with Big Ten ties. Move into the amateur and semi-pro ranks or across the border into Canada and around every corner are even more ties to programs across the Big Ten. The legacies are everywhere, the recruiting pipelines as firm as the ones shipping oil across the continent. There is little room for anyone else. Even Michigan State, which is having its best season ever in Big Ten play, has been in the national title game more times than Penn State has even been in the tournament.
All of this backdrops a process, one which requires patience, according to Gadowsky.
“I came here to win national titles,” he says. Although there is a lot that comes before that point.
Penn State is set to play Minnesota this weekend in the opening round of the Big Ten Tournament. If the Nittany Lions fail to win the best-of-three series their season will end with a losing record for the second time in three years, a third time in four if you count a confusing pandemic season. Of course, sandwiched in between those two years is a near Frozen Four appearance as Penn State fell to Michigan in overtime last season in the regional final. Prior to that, COVID-19 will always haunt Penn State with the shadow of “what if?” as the program’s undisputed best team ever, carrying a legitimate national title dream, never played in the postseason as the tournament was canceled before it was even seeded. All told the Nittany Lions were a pandemic and an overtime goal away from legitimately making the Frozen Four twice in five years.
Not so bad for a still fledgling program. Three official tournament appearances in the first 12 years, four if you account for the fact Penn State may have been a No. 1 seed in the COVID-19 year postseason. Not bad for a program that many expected to struggle for a decade or more. All the same, sitting two losses from the end of a bumpy season that wasn’t short on injuries, goalie issues and bad luck, Gadowsky feels good about where things stand, with an optimism of what it can grow into, even if this year didn’t go quite as planned.
“I’m actually really happy,” Gadowsky said. “I think the steps we’ve taken — we’re playing our best hockey near the end of the season and in a way that maintains a culture. A culture that’s going to give you success in the future is really important for us. We stated that from day one that we were building for success either this year or in the future and right now it’s nice to be playing some of our best hockey right now, which is really important.”
Gadowsky is adamant in what his program has accomplished, no small part defensive and indignant that it could even really be going much better. Sure, there are games here or there, moments that he would like back. But there’s also a reminder that for all the things Michigan might have going for it, the Wolverines have still yet to win a regular season Big Ten title. The Nittany Lions have one, and are one of three programs to have won both the regular season and tournament title. Add in NCAA Tournament appearances and Gadowsky is fervent in his belief that his program knows what it’s doing and that the rest will come with time.
“I think it’s very motivating, but it is a little unrealistic to think every single year you’re gonna get that opportunity. But who knows, we’re playing our best hockey and we’re going to the (Big Ten) playoffs,” Gadowsky said, finishing his statement with a smile.
Gadowsky’s glimpse into the future is a time in which Penn State has cultivated enough success that it permeates into other reaches of game. It’s an era when the growth of hockey in the state creates more and more talent that opts to stay home (near Penn State commit and former high profile prospect Logan Cooley, now a rookie with the Arizona Coyotes, was a Pittsburgh product but also a member of the US U-18 team located in Michigan during which he befriended many future Minnesota Gopher teammates), a time when players who left their mark at Penn State are movers and shakers in other parts of the game. It’s a time when more time has passed.
In the meanwhile, he will continue the march. This season Penn State posted attendance records in the face of some lukewarm results as good of a sign as any that the bloom is not off the rose for the program just a few hundred yards from the football building where patience among fans often runs thin. The best news Gadowsky can continue to get is that ticket holders still understand that 12 years doesn’t compare to 100+ and that the occasional bump in the road is not always indicative of larger issues.
“Last year was close,” Gadowsky said. “So we know how to do it. We’re gonna do it again, and I look forward to doing it. I enjoy the process of doing it. But you have to understand, it’s not gonna happen every year, or even every [other] year. If you do it right, and build it the right way. You’re great. I look forward to doing it again. And one of these times it’s gonna go, whether it’s an overtime goal stopping us or, or a pandemic (eventually) neither of those is (going to) happen.”
Time will tell how long it takes for Gadowsky and company to get to where they want to go. Then again welcome to sports, where most everyone takes a turn coming up short, hoping that next year is the year.
And for some, eventually that year really does come.
