It wasn’t even 15 years ago that hockey was a club sport at Penn State. Through 2012, Penn State boasted a fairly impressive club hockey team, being perennial contenders for the ACHA title. From 1998 to 2007, they made ten consecutive ACHA title games, winning five championships.

But there was a desire for something more. Specifically, billionaire alumni Terry Pegula, who owns the NFL’s Buffalo Bills and the NHL’s Buffalo Sabres, wanted more. A nine-figure investment into the program saw Penn State not only build a brand new arena, which would be named after Pegula, but would also produce state-of-the-art facilities and elevate the program to official varsity status.

With the move to varsity status, the university hired Guy Gadowsky, then coach of Princeton’s hockey team, to take over as Penn State’s men’s hockey head coach for the 2011-12 season, the final year of club team status. Fast forward nearly 15 years, and Gadowsky is still coaching the Nittany Lions. After making his first Frozen Four as a coach last season, he went to work bringing in the best recruiting class in the history of the program.

Friday will be the start of a new era in Penn State men’s hockey. The opening of the CHL-to-NCAA pipeline has led to several highly touted players from various Canadian leagues making the move to play for the blue and white. Gadowsky has his most talented roster ever, and he’s well aware of it. The challenge for him, and for the team, will be not to let the hype and talent change their identity.

“It’s not a new page, it’s continuing where we left off,” Gadowsky said. “I think that the team is very proud of what they went through, specifically how they started. What they did was pretty spectacular, they’re really proud of it, and they want to continue it.”

The identity of Penn State hockey is not one of glitz and glamor, but instead resiliency and grit, which Gadowsky attributes to being a reason they were able to bring in such a stellar recruiting class.

The hype isn’t just around the country and in the media, but is palpable around campus. Student season tickets sold out within an hour despite ticket shenanigans. Most days, you’ll see someone wearing a hockey jersey around campus. Despite not even being a Division I sport here 15 years ago, there’s a case to be made that hockey will be second only to football in popularity this year.

“I definitely think so,” said newly minted captain Dane Dowiak. “You go to class, a professor might say, ‘I can’t wait to watch the hockey game,’ or one of your classmates that you sit next to might say it. It’s pretty cool. There’s a lot of buzz around and, with the players we got coming in and the team we had last year, we’re going to make some noise.”

“All the people here are very supportive of all their sports,” said freshman phenom Gavin McKenna when asked about the excitement around campus. “They rally behind their sports, so the support I’ve gotten has been pretty amazing.”

With excitement comes expectations. Less than a year ago, you would have been laughed out of the room if you said Penn State would contend for a national championship in hockey in 2025-26, but the magical run to the Frozen Four created so much positive momentum that they currently stand as the favorite to win it all on the betting markets. Expectations create pressure, but the Nittany Lions aren’t worried about pressure. Gadowsky says that expectations are what you live for.

“I don’t think, if you’re an athlete, you come to Penn State if that’s not what you want,” he said. “A lot of athletes come to Penn State because they don’t mind those expectations.”

“These are the days we were looking forward to. I can tell you, back when there was zero expectations, and the only expectation was that you were going to get killed, this is a lot better.”

Gadowsky went just 21-40-2 in his first two seasons at Penn State after joining Division I. By his fifth year, they won the Big Ten Tournament. By his eighth, they won their first, and to this date only, Big Ten regular-season title. His 13th yielded his deepest run in the NCAA Tournament. Now, entering the program’s 14th year since the elevation and 13th year in the Big Ten, they want a whole lot more.

“It definitely lights a little bit of a fire under us,” Dowiak said about how the way last year ended motivates the team. “You get a taste of winning, you just want more. It’s addictive, right? Obviously, that’s our end goal: to win a national championship.”

Bringing in this highly touted recruiting class means not only bringing in a lot of young players, but a lot of guys who might have one eye towards their NHL prospects. No matter who you ask, though, everyone seems locked in on the season ahead.

“I don’t think for anybody it’s just a stop to come here and move on to the next level,” said Dowiak. “Everybody wants to be here. Everybody wants to win. The more we play, the more we practice together, I think that bond is more than just guys wanting to move on.”

The season opener will not be in the friendly confines of Pegula Ice Arena but over 2,000 miles away in Tempe, Arizona. Mullet Arena, which hosted the final seasons of the Arizona Coyotes and currently hosts Arizona State’s hockey teams, will be the arena where the college hockey world will get its first looks at McKenna, Jackson Smith, and this new-look Penn State hockey team.

“He is an absolute thoroughbred,” Gadowsky said about the program’s first-ever first-rounder in Smith. “He’s one of the most beautiful skaters you’ll ever see in your life, except he’s doing it in a big, 6’4″ frame. He is absolutely an NHL player.”

“The perfect guy for Penn State. It’s like you’re watching beauty on ice.”

“Me and Gav, we pick each other’s brains every day about the power play,” Aiden Fink said about McKenna. “We’re always talking to each other, seeing what looks we have, what we can do better.”

“We’re a very competitive team, we’re a very fast team,” McKenna said. “We talked a lot about offense and bringing offense. I think, honestly, my whole game is offense and playing with speed. I think I fit in very well.”

You always want to make a good first impression, and it would be a great first impression to go on the road and beat a ranked team. Upon the NHL’s announcement of the game being aired on NHL Network and streamed on YouTube, the hockey world will have its eyes on this matchup.

Penn State men’s hockey opens its season on the road against Arizona State on Friday, October 3, at 10 p.m., with the series concluding on Saturday at 8 p.m. Along with the coverage on the NHL Network and their YouTube page, it’ll also be broadcast on NCHC.TV (subscription required).