As Penn State men’s hockey took the ice against Ohio State earlier this season at Pegula Ice Arena, the fans roared, the students cheered and the potential No. 1 overall pick in the upcoming 2022 NHL Entry Draft, Logan Cooley, looked on, taking part in an official recruiting visit.
Cooley — a Pittsburgh native who slots in as the projected No. 1 or No. 2 overall pick, depending on who you ask — had recently decommitted from Notre Dame, opening his recruitment to the rest of college hockey. As the weeks wore on, his decision narrowed down to Penn State, Minnesota and North Dakota, according to two program sources.
Fast forward to the days leading up to Penn State and Minnesota taking the ice this past weekend. Cooley made the call before the Gophers’ plane had even landed in State College: he was committing to Minnesota.
For Penn State it was a gut-punch, but also something hard to judge. Was the glass was half full or half empty? By any measure Cooley was the highest profile prospect to visit Penn State with a legitimate opportunity to skate for the Nittany Lions. That sort of thing is not without value in and of itself and a very easy half-full glass for a program to come far enough to gather legitimate interest from a player of Cooley’s caliber, local or not.
A glass half empty notes the obvious: Penn State was in the running for the kind of player that rarely comes calling, let alone in your own backyard, let alone with genuine interest in your program. Cooley knew Penn State players growing up, lived just hours from State College and would still be playing in the Big Ten. It was in many ways a layup commitment for Penn State if it was a slightly more established program.
Broadly, the Nittany Lions are in desperate need of a player like Cooley taking the leap and joining a still young program to help open a pipeline of high level prospects that see Penn State as a legitimate option in their professional development. Missing out on Cooley was missing out on the most obvious opportunity Penn State has had in this department so far.
“Any [recruiting] miss hurts,” Penn State coach Guy Gadowsky said on Monday speaking generally about recruiting. “But it also gives you an opportunity to reevaluate what you do. … It is a process to overcome and get better and keep keep grinding and learning what you do well, learning what you can do better. I can tell you we’re not going to stop; we’re going to get better and better. Until we develop the pipelines that we need to, and specifically we want to have several, but we definitely want the best players in our area to come to Penn State hockey.”
It’s a bit of an existential challenge for Penn State at this moment in time, a decade old but many decades behind its competitors. No matter what Gadowsky does, he won’t be able to create the cultural cache that Michigan or Minnesota or others already have in college hockey. He also won’t be able to make up for the fact Michigan exists a drive from the USA Hockey developmental program or that Minnesota as an entire state lives and breaths hockey. Leaning on 60+ years of tradition means having 60+ years of existing under your belt. Nothing can make that time pass quickly.
In turn, Penn State has leaned on finding hidden gems like — to name just a few — Brandon Biro, Liam Folkes, Alex Limoges or, now long ago, Casey Bailey. The program has found its moderate success and won a Big Ten title on the backs of development, scouting and a bit of luck. It’s hard to argue with two NCAA Tournament appearances, a Big Ten Tournament victory and a Big Ten regular season title in the first decade as a program. Penn State having a bad year in 2021-22 doesn’t negate an otherwise outstanding opening salvo of success.
But the next step is perhaps the most challenging. Penn State was hopeful that the likes of former Nittany Lion Evan Barratt (a Pennsylvania product and third round draft choice by the Chicago Blackhawks) would open at least a small pipeline of local or regional talent.
So far it has been a mixed bag.
“We [were] hoping that Evan Barratt would be the one for really high end Pennsylvania guys,” Gadowsky added. “I think he certainly helped but I think we’re gonna need another one or two to be the leader… and create pipelines locally. And then once you do that locally, then you can disperse a little bit, but I think that’s what it’s going to take.”
In the meanwhile, Penn State will have to make things work the way it has for the past decade, leaning on development, synergy and a little bit of luck. Gadowsky does a good job talking up his team, as he should, but there are words and phrases here or there that showcase what he really knows: they need a Cooley to get to where they want to go, and they just missed out on one.
