Penn State men’s hockey left its opening weekend with two losses. Head coach Guy Gadowsky left each game with two very different impressions.

The Nittany Lions entered the Ice Breaker Tournament ranked No. 17 in the USCHO poll, but losses to No. 16 UConn and Sacred Heart knocked them out of the rankings on Monday.

Penn State outshot UConn 43-25 and held the Huskies to just three shots in the first period.

“We were actually really happy with how we played Friday night, and really unhappy with the early periods on Saturday,” Gadowsky said Tuesday.

On Saturday, Sacred Heart outshot Penn State 12-5 in the opening frame and carried that momentum into the second. By the time the Nittany Lions headed into the locker room for the second intermission, they trailed 3-0 and had been outshot by 15 (28-13).

For Gadowsky, two issues stood out from Saturday’s performance: his team’s lack of readiness from the opening puck drop and its slow organization without the puck.

With so many newcomers adjusting to college hockey, Gadowsky said he expects the same standard on back-to-back nights, regardless of experience.

“It has to be the standard, and it wasn’t there,” Gadowsky said.

Sacred Heart scored three goals in a 5:51 span during the second period. But the goals weren’t the only problem. Penn State struggled to regroup as the game began slipping away.

“We didn’t necessarily act like a mature team, turning the page really quickly when the pucks started going against us,” Gadowsky said. “But when we had a chance to regroup, I think the captains, specifically Dane Dowiak and Reese Laubach, did a really good job of getting us refocused.”

That response came in the third period.

Kale Dach put Penn State on the board just over three minutes in, and Justin Larose scored his first collegiate goal 21 seconds later. Dowiak then completed the comeback, tying the game at three with Penn State’s third goal in just 87 seconds.

But Sacred Heart took the lead back at 9:17 of the third period, then added two empty-net goals to seal the 6-3 win.

The weekend also gave Gadowsky a better idea of how quickly his new-looking roster was coming together.

“If you asked the staff Friday night, we would probably have a much different answer. We would have thought, hey, this is happening a lot quicker than we thought,” Gadowsky said. “But as we say often here at Penn State, consistency is better than greatness.”

Penn State has shown it can generate scoring chances and control stretches of a game. The challenge is now doing it for a full 60 minutes.

With several new faces still adjusting to college hockey, that consistency may take time to develop. But the Nittany Lions won’t have much time to dwell on their opening weekend.

No. 8 Quinnipiac visits Pegula Ice Arena on Friday for Penn State’s home opener, giving the Nittany Lions another chance to prove themselves against a nationally ranked program.

And despite the 0-2 start, Larose is confident in what his “friends” can bring to the ice.

“Quinnipiac’s really good, and we’re gonna show them what real Penn State hockey is,” Larose said.