Penn State Hockey: Nittany Lions Blow Out Mercyhurst 7-0

Penn State hockey improved to 2-1 on the year with a 7-0 victory against Mercyhurst on Friday night in Erie.

The Nittany Lions picked up their second win of the season after falling 6-3 to No. 16 St Lawrence last Saturday. Nikita Pavlychev registered his first goal of the year just under four minutes into regulation to open the scoring. Penn State picked up two goals in the first period as Chase Berger added another 12:57 into the period.

Penn State outshot Mercyhurst 17-4 in the opening 20 minutes of play.

The second period was more of the same as freshman Nate Sucese added a breakaway tally to make it 3-0 just 1:09 into the second frame. Payton Jones kept it a shutout affair on a breakaway save on a shorthanded attempt. With just over seven minutes to go Sucese added his second goal of the game to make it 4-0 after 40 minutes of play.

In final 20 minutes Penn State added three more goals to the box score, freshman Denis Smirnov adding his first of the season. Trevor Hamilton and Andrew Sturtz picked up the final goals of the game to cap off the scoring.

Penn State finished off the evening outshooting Mercyhurst 43-20 as Jones picked up his first shutout of the season to bounce back from giving up three goals on the first eight shots last weekend. The Nittany Lions killed off all seven power play opportunities by the Lakers while scoring on two chances.

The Nittany Lions will return back to State College after the one game series, Penn State will head out to South Bend next weekend for a two game series against Notre Dame.