Saturday night was uniquely and especially — and specially — Penn State along upper University Drive on the University Park campus.
You had THON. You had a record-setting indoor Whiteout. You had a satisfying sweep of the un-beloved Buckeyes. You had a(nother) heartbreaking Penn State men’s basketball loss after blowing a big lead.
And, it all happened at the same time in the same corner of campus with the same energy:
At the 28-year-old Bryce Jordan Center, located officially at 720 Curtin Road, it was THON night for the Nittany Lions’ home game against Minnesota.
And at 250 University Drive, literally across the street, the Penn State men’s hockey team held its annual Wear White night inside Pegula Ice Hockey Arena, the 10th in a series of icy Whiteouts.
By night’s end, there was some history-making math:
• 1 win, 1 loss, 1 big victory for Penn State Athletics and its marketing staff.
• 6,578 fans in Pegula, an all-time record.
• 12,336 in the BJC, the season’s biggest home crowd.
• 18,914 total fans.
Or, maybe, one less fan than that. Penn State’s First Cheerleader, athletic director Pat Kraft, was a double-counter.
Kraft — wearing a white hockey jersey — was at both contests. In the bowels of Pegula, he gave a pre-game fist-bump to each Nittany Lion skater on his way to the rink. Courtside inside the BJC, sitting at the end of the first row of seats behind the photographers on the end line near the Penn State bench, Kraft took in the hoops game with pal James Franklin and chief of staff Nick Colella, a former Nittany Lion hoopster himself.
It was a crafty, in almost all ways possible, performance inside Pegula on Saturday evening:
Energized by the record crowd, the Nittany Lions jumped out to a 3-0 lead, gave up three goals, then scored late on a wrist shot by senior Tyler Paquette to take an exhilarating 4-3 victory over Ohio State. The dramatic win was witnessed by the largest-ever crowd in Pegula since it opened on Oct. 11, 2013. Penn State won by the same identical score for the second night in a row, giving Guy Gadowsky’s squad its first-ever sweep of the hated Buckeyes.
The 6,578 broke the attendance record of 6,566, set last January for Penn State’s 3-2 win over Notre Dame. That, too, was a Wear White game. Penn State wore special uniforms on Saturday night, featuring a classy Penn State script, with Lionhead logos on each sleeve. Classier still was the fact that they are auctioning off the game jerseys
to support the State College Coyotes Sled Hockey team. To bid, click here.
It was quite the environment. That is Gadowsky’s word. Nearly seven years ago, I did a summer series of interviews with Penn State’s most successful coaches about the one word that best describes their program’s philosophy. Guy’s? “Environment.”
He meant the locker room. And I can vouch that he produces a steady stream of quality student-athletes, on and off the ice, throughout his program. So, his quote below was meant to be about his players. But it speaks volumes, too, about the environment he has built in the Pegula Ice Hockey Arena as well. Credit him.
“…You can’t [snaps fingers], make it happen in a few months,” Gadowsky said back then. “This is something that builds. You build a foundation where your environment is very inviting, it’s something your guys want to be a part of, to put the work in get the results at a high level.”
Soak in that environment, via a video recap by Penn State Athletics, here.
The win over Ohio State boosted the Penn State’s seniors’ Wear White record to a pristine 3-0 (there was no such game in pandemic 2020). And it boosted Penn State’s — and Gadowsky’s — home record in Pegula to 116-66-16. That’s 198 games. Game No. 200 will be on Feb. 17 against Michigan, for a 7 p.m. face-off that will be televised on the Big Ten Network. It should be a good environment.
(This season, the icers have already beaten Michigan — 5-3, as part of a November split in Ann Arbor. That gives them wins over both Ohio State and Michigan in the same season. That’s something the basketball Nittany Lions, under first-year head coach Mike Rhoades, have done as well, splitting with the Buckeyes and also beating the Wolverines in The Palestra.)
THON AND HOOPS
Then there was the THON hoopla at the BJC. Emboldened by the largest home crowd of the season — many students were wearing their colors of THON — and pumped full of pre-game energy, Penn State jumped out to a 45-31 halftime lead. Then, then…they gave up 53 second-half points, to fall 83-74.
It put a bit of a damper on the evening’s festivities. But, it has been that kind of first season for Rhoades, a good hire by Kraft. He has assembled an oft-competitive, occasionally exciting and frequently-frustrating team built using three freshmen scholarship holdovers, bailing wire and a NIL checkbook that needs more zeroes. Penn State’s recent upset of a good Wisconsin squad ignited a student rush of the BJC home court. (“So,” I asked the students in my sports class when I showed the clip in class two days later, “you guys now storm the court when you beat a No. 11?”)
Even in defeat on Saturday night, Rhoades gets the unique dynamics of Penn State, THON and a tight-knit student community. What was it that Guy said? #Environment.
“That was an awesome crowd,” Rhoades said after the game. “Our students, the THON game, they showed up and they were loud. They were the stars of the night. To experience this in my first year, even on a night of defeat, I don’t want to ever forget that. Our students are showing up and they’re really into it. I appreciate that and take it personal, because I love them being a part of this. I was very humbled. We have to do our part…”
