Penn State’s men’s hockey was swept at home this weekend by Wisconsin, dropping the squad to 0-4 against Big Ten opponents. If you were still grabbing popcorn at the opening buzzer, though, you’d be more than surprised at that figure.

The team fell flat out of the gates against Wisconsin on Saturday, giving up four goals in the first eight minutes. Through their nine-game stretch to open the season, the Nittany Lions have aggregated a goal deficit of -5 in the first 10 minutes of each game, a stat only moored by a two-goal opening in the team’s first game of the season against Alaska Fairbanks.

That’s not to say the team isn’t strong, though. In the other 50 minutes in each game, Penn State has a much more favorable +6 goal differential. Against the Badgers, scrubbing the first-period hiccups, the Nittany Lions’ offensive production would have seen them grind out two competitive wins. On Monday, head coach Guy Gadowsky was vocal about how his team needs to stop its early struggles.

“The performance of the team as a whole is very, very, very good, except for the starts,” Gadowsky said. “That’s not the first time it happened either. Against St. Lawrence, I think it was 49 seconds into the game. Against Quinnipiac, we’re down 2-0 the first period. So this isn’t like, ‘Oh, Jesus, this happened once.’ It’s something that we have to figure out.

“It was addressed with the team. I think it has to rely on them, to be honest with you. If there are issues from an operational standpoint about what we’re doing, we’re figuring it out right now,” Gadowsky continued. “But after that, it’s on them.”

Jarod Crespo was on the ice for Wisconsin’s first-minute goal on Saturday and agreed he and his teammates need to come together to squash the issue.

“It’s all mental preparation. Every guy prepares differently, but we’ve got to figure out individually what it’s going to take to make sure that we’re all on the same page when puck drop happens. We haven’t gotten there yet,” Crespo said. “Going down by four in eight minutes, that’s never a good thing to see. So hopefully it’s a wake-up call for everybody to be ready to go out at the drop of the puck.”

Forward Dane Dowiak hoped the team will turn over a new leaf this season with some confidence-building self-reflection ahead of its next game.

“Obviously, the way we’ve been starting is not acceptable. But I think as a team, we’ve got to take a look in the mirror and get together that mentality that we’re the better team,” Dowiak said. “We’re going to do everything we can to make the other team believe that, too. When we start the game and we’re laying the body, we’re being physical, that’s when we’re at our best. If we do that from the start, there’s not many teams that can beat us.”

Penn State will be hard at work this week as it works to right the ship, benefiting from an extended stay at home through Thanksgiving week when the Nittany Lions will host series against Michigan and Colgate. Dowiak believes the fight Penn State has shown while it trailed this weekend gives his side more than enough confidence to claim wins against the Wolverines and Raiders.

“We’re a young team, and we’ve got to realize that showing resilience this early in the season should make us very optimistic,” Dowiak said. “There’s no doubt in my mind that we’re in a rough patch now. But we all love playing against Michigan. We don’t like those guys, they don’t like us, and we’re going to be ready to go. I promise that.”