Penn State Men’s Hockey’s JJ Wiebusch & Matt DiMarsico Named To U.S. Collegiate Select Team For 2025 Spengler Cup
The Behind-the-Back Boys have been one of, if not the best, lines in all of college hockey throughout the first month of the 2025-26 season. Their dominance for Penn State men’s hockey has been noticed, so much so that the three will be reunited on the U.S. Collegiate Select Team in December.
On Thursday, forwards JJ Wiebusch and Matt DiMarsico were two of the five new players revealed who will compete in the Spengler Cup in late December, joining three of their teammates and their head coach on the preliminary roster.
Wiebusch, a sophomore from Verona, Wisconsin, has only built off of his exceptional freshman season by leading all of college hockey in goals as of Thursday afternoon with 11 in just 10 games. His 18 total points lead the team and are second in the nation behind Minnesota-Duluth’s Max Plante. In the first five weeks of the season, he’s already been named Big Ten First Star and Third Star of the Week, while also breaking a program record by scoring four goals in a game on October 9 against Clarkson.
DiMarsico, a junior from Wexford, Pennsylvania, isn’t far behind his linemate in the goals or points department. His eight goals are second on the team and tied for fifth in the nation, while his 15 points are tied for sixth in the nation. He’s already notched two hat tricks on the young season, becoming the first Nittany Lion in program history to register two in the same season. He was named Big Ten First Star of the Week for the week of October 21.
These two join their linemate, Charlie Cerrato, along with defenseman Mac Gadowsky and forward Aiden Fink. It remains to be seen if the upper-body injury that Fink suffered against Ohio State will affect his availability for the tournament in just under two months.
The U.S. Collegiate Select team will be comprised of some of the best American college hockey players and will compete, for the very first time, in the Spengler Cup.
The Spengler Cup, held annually in Switzerland during December, has been an annual event since 1923 and is the world’s oldest invitational hockey tournament. Canadian and European teams usually populate it, but the United States will compete for the first time since a U.S. Selects team won the 1988 edition. This year’s edition will include teams from Czechia, Finland, Canada, and two from Switzerland, including the reigning champions HC Fribourg-Gottéron.
Penn State men’s hockey head coach Guy Gadowsky was already named as the team’s head coach back in August. Along with the five Nittany Lions already named to the roster, thirteen other players have been revealed, including four others in the Big Ten: Michigan’s TJ Hughes, Wisconsin’s Quinn Finley, and Notre Dame’s Danny Nelson and Cole Knuble.
The tournament is scheduled to begin on Friday, December 26, with the U.S. Collegiate Selects team facing off against Team Canada to begin group play, and will end by New Year’s Eve. It will run at the same time as the World Junior Championships, which could include a number of Penn State’s younger players, such as Jackson Smith and Gavin McKenna.
It will not threaten availability for the Penn State men’s hockey season, which will be in winter break from Thanksgiving until Friday, January 3, against RIT.
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