Penn State field hockey pulled off an absolute stunner last Friday, handing No. 1 Northwestern its first loss in Big Ten play in four years with a 2-0 shutout victory.

It was the second-ever win over a No. 1 opponent in program history and the first in over 20 years. Several Penn State programs, despite long and rich histories, haven’t gotten one yet. Even for the ones who have, it’s been a while.

Let’s take a look at each Penn State sports team’s last win against a No. 1-ranked opponent, or, if such a win hasn’t happened in program history, its most recent stunner.

Football: No. 1 Notre Dame (November 17, 1990)

Penn State football’s record against top-five and top-10 opponents has been in the national narrative for a long time, so it’s not surprising that the last time it defeated an AP No. 1 opponent was 36 years ago.

That night in mid-November 1990 was a true stunner.

The Nittany Lions, in the middle of a stint of playing merely good football between their national championship in 1986 and their should-be national title in 1994, started the 1990 season 0-2. They lost at home to Texas and on the road to No. 6 USC.

A seven-game winning streak almost exclusively over weak, regional opponents in the pre-Big Ten era had Penn State unranked heading into South Bend, Indiana, to face the top-ranked Fighting Irish. Heisman candidate running back Raghib Ismail led the Fighting Irish in a battle between legendary coaches Joe Paterno and Lou Holtz.

Notre Dame led 21-7 at halftime, but an injury to Ismail completely halted its offense, allowing Penn State to rally back.

A game-tying touchdown pass from Tony Sacca to Al Golden tied it at 21 with seven minutes to go, and a backbreaking interception in the final minutes by Darren Perry put the Nittany Lions in field goal range for freshman kicker Craig Fayak. He nailed a 34-yarder to walk off the game.

In the 36 years since, Penn State is 0-7 against No. 1 opponents, with five of those losses coming against Ohio State. Its best win since was the Block Six in October 2016 against No. 2 Ohio State.

Men’s Basketball: No. 2 Michigan State (March 9, 2001)

The men’s basketball team has never defeated a No. 1-ranked opponent, carrying a 0-15 record. The closest it ever came was a one-point loss to Temple in 1988 and two overtime losses to North Carolina in 1981 and Indiana in 1993.

The program’s highest-ranked win came in the magical 2001 season, which eventually ended in a Sweet 16 berth.

As the No. 7 seed in the 2001 Big Ten Tournament, the Nittany Lions first knocked off Michigan in the first round before facing the No. 2 Spartans in the quarterfinals. Despite having the best ranking in the Big Ten, Michigan State lost the regular-season conference crown to No. 4 Illinois.

In a game that was reduced to SPN Plus Regional, a now-defunct regional secondary network under the main brand, the Nittany Lions avenged a 19-point February home loss by stunning Zach Randolph and the Spartans with a late scoring barrage from Joe Crispin, who scored 19 of his 22 points in the final 12 minutes. Penn State won 65-63.

Michigan State rebounded and did not lose another game until the Final Four against Arizona, but this win was part of the best season in recent Penn State basketball history.

Women’s Basketball: No. 1 Virginia (January 3, 1991)

Despite the golden era of the Lady Lions taking place after they joined the Big Ten and perennially making the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament in the late 1990s and early 2000s, the last time they conquered the top of the sport was during their last season in the Atlantic 10.

As the team climbed the rankings amidst an incredible 29-2 season, it sat at No. 4 when the calendar turned to 1991 and traveled to Charlottesville, Virginia, to take on the Cavaliers.

There isn’t much record of the game, likely because women’s sports got little coverage back then. But the Lady Lions prevailed 73-71 and used it to build what soon became the resume of the best team in women’s basketball.

The Lady Lions entered the NCAA Tournament with just one loss. But instead of making the first Final Four in program history, Penn State flamed out in a second-round stunner to No. 8-seeded James Madison in just its second loss of the season.

Men’s Hockey: No. 1 Michigan State (February 22, 2025)

You don’t have to go too far back for the last time Penn State men’s hockey took down Goliath.

As part of the Nittany Lions’ incredible late-season rally to not only make the NCAA Tournament, but advance to the program’s first Frozen Four, the Nittany Lions improbably took five out of six points in a road series against the top-ranked Spartans in late February, riding the incredible goaltending of Arsenii Sergeev.

After a Friday night shootout win, Penn State led 2-0 in the first two minutes on goals from Charlie Cerrato and JJ Wiebusch before taking a three-goal lead after two periods on a goal by Matt DiMarsico.

Sergeev, who faced persistent pressure all game, held a shutout for 52 minutes until a shorthanded goal broke through. A desperation goal by Karsen Dorwart with nine seconds left on Michigan State’s 44th shot of the night was merely window dressing in a program-defining 3-2 win in regulation in East Lansing.

Women’s Hockey: No. 3 Minnesota (January 4, 2025)

Penn State women’s hockey head coach Jeff Kampersal’s crew has routinely challenged itself with top-10 battles over the last several seasons as the Nittany Lions have become a powerhouse in women’s college hockey, but their number of true signature wins is limited.

The Nittany Lions are 0-5-0 all-time with zero goals scored against No. 1 teams and have come up short several times in the last two years against No. 2 teams, including in the Frozen Four back in March.

The program’s top win came at the East-West Showcase in Minneapolis right after the calendar flipped to 2025, against the WCHA powerhouse Golden Gophers.

Four goals in the first 11:21, including ones by current Nittany Lions Grace Outwater and Abby Stonehouse, stunned the Golden Gophers early. Tessa Janecke’s power-play goal late in the third period sealed a 6-2 win.

Minnesota made another Frozen Four despite this setback, while Penn State lost in the first round to St. Lawrence for the second consecutive season.

Wrestling: No. 2 Ohio State (February 13, 2026)

When you’ve been No. 1 in every poll for nearly six years, you don’t get many opportunities to play No. 1.

Cael Sanderson’s 16 years of unbridled dominance have given Penn State wrestling just seven opportunities to face the No. 1 team since polling began in 2001. The Nittany Lions are 0-7 in those matches, with the most recent one coming in 2020 at Carter-Hawkeye Arena in what is currently Penn State’s most recent dual meet loss.

“The Dual of the Century” in mid-February against Ohio State is the most recent win over No. 2, which Penn State won 36-5.

Baseball: No. 8 Miami (February 17, 2023)

Penn State baseball’s lack of signature wins is two-pronged. For one, it has had few seasons in which it was capable of it. The ones where it was one of the sport’s best teams came long before polls existed.

Second, the Nittany Lions compete in a conference that is not a traditional baseball power. A Big Ten team has not won a national championship since 1966. Only Michigan in 2019 has made the national title game in the last few decades.

As a result, most of Penn State’s ranked wins have come outside the top 10, with the only definitive top-10 win in recent memory coming against No. 8 Miami to open the 2023 season on the road.

Five combined RBIs from Jay Harry and Kyle Hannon and five strong innings from Travis Luensmann stunned the Hurricanes and offered an early bright spot in a middling campaign.

Softball: No. 1 Michigan (February 18, 2006)

There’s better record-keeping for Penn State softball’s history, and it put up a signature win early in a 2006 season that saw the Nittany Lions go 39-17 and make the NCAA Tournament.

After a 1-2 start at the GRU Gator Invitational down in Gainesville, Florida, Penn State stunned No. 1 Michigan in a low-scoring, 1-0 win. Offense wasn’t that team’s strength in Florida, as it was shut out in two of the five games it played that weekend, both against No. 21 DePaul.

Men’s Lacrosse: No. 1 Denver (March 26, 2016)

Despite three Final Four appearances in the last decade, Jeff Tambroni’s crew hasn’t pulled off an upset of No. 1 since midseason 2016.

Penn State started the year at an uneven 5-3, but brought its A-game to the Patriot Cup in Dallas that Saturday, ending the defending national champions’ 20-game win streak.

Ryan Keenan and Dan Craig both scored three goals, while TJ Sanders had four total points.

The Nittany Lions didn’t take any momentum from this game, scuffling down the stretch to finish 8-7 without an NCAA Tournament trip.

Women’s Lacrosse: No. 1 Northwestern (March 22, 2024)

Something about upsetting No. 1 Northwestern.

Only two years ago, Penn State women’s lacrosse did what field hockey pulled off this year, knocking off a top-ranked powerhouse from Evanston, Illinois, at home.

Early in what proved to be a gauntlet of a Big Ten schedule, the Nittany Lions had an extremely competitive, back-and-forth game against the Wildcats that went into overtime.

With just over a minute to go in the lone overtime period, Kristin O’Neill buried her sixth goal of the game to walk it off for Penn State, winning 14-13.

The Nittany Lions made the NCAA Tournament despite an inconsistent regular season with this win, but lost to James Madison in the first round.

Men’s Soccer: No. 1 Virginia (September 8, 2002)

While the Penn State men’s soccer team has been struggling to win conference games, there was once a time it could knock off No. 1.

As recently as 2023, it pulled off a tie against No. 1 Syracuse and has done so numerous times over the last 24 years. But an early-season 4-2 win over No. 1 Virginia back in 2002 stands as the Nittany Lions’ most recent signature win.

Ironically, it came just two days after a 2-1 loss to an unranked Maryland at the Maryland Classic, but the Nittany Lions went on to finish 16-8-2 with a Big Ten Tournament title and two NCAA Tournament wins.

Women’s Soccer: No. 1 North Carolina (September 12, 1999)

The Penn State women’s soccer team won a national championship in 2015 and has been nationally relevant for decades now, but it hasn’t beaten the No. 1 team in the nation in the 21st century.

At the 1999 Nike/Carolina Classic in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, the Nittany Lions went on the road and bounced back after a loss to No. 20 Duke two days earlier with a 3-2 win over the top-ranked Tar Heels.

North Carolina, which lost in the national championship game in 1998, went on to win it all in 1999 with just two losses. The following year, it avenged the loss to Penn State.

Since then?

The Nittany Lions are 0-9-1 against No. 1-ranked teams.

Women’s Volleyball: No. 1 Stanford (September 1, 2017)

Penn State women’s volleyball has faced a No. 1 team in three consecutive seasons, but has been swept each time.

Katie Schumacher-Cawley has a national championship, but not a win over a No. 1 team in the AVCA Poll. Instead, you have to go back to Russ Rose’s tenure in 2017 against Stanford.

In a battle between two teams that have met plenty in the NCAA Tournament, Penn State prevailed in four sets at the Texas A&M Tournament to improve to 4-0 in a season the Nittany Lions eventually finished 33-2, with a loss in the national semifinals.

Men’s Volleyball: No. 1 Ohio State (January 28, 2024)

Penn State and Ohio State are not in the same conference in men’s volleyball, but the two programs played a home-and-home series in late January 2024. The Nittany Lions swept both.

After the Nittany Lions stunned the No. 1 Buckeyes in Columbus, Ohio, on January 25, they faced a two-set deficit in the home match at Rec Hall before winning three consecutive sets to pull off the reverse sweep.

Field Hockey: No. 1 Northwestern (October 30, 2026)

The first season under head coach Hannah Prince got its signature win on Senior Day, as the Nittany Lions ended Northwestern’s 35-game conference winning streak and cost it the full share of the Big Ten regular-season title.

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