Feb. 23, 2017
| WEEKEND PREVIEW | |
| 18-8-2 (7-6-1-0 B1G) | 6-19-3 (2-10-2-0 B1G) |
| Friday at 7:00 p.m. | Saturday at 7:00 p.m. | |
| MUNN ICE ARENA | EAST LANSING, Mich. | |
| GAME DAY CENTRAL |
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| Radio: Penn State Sports Network (Affiliates) |
| TV: Big Ten Network |
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| INSIDE THE NUMBERS | ||
| PSU | MSU | |
| 18-8-2 | Overall Record | 6-19-3 |
| 7-6-1-0 | Conference Record | 2-10-2-0 |
| 117 | Goals Scored | 69 |
| 77 | Goals Allowed | 106 |
| 4.18 | Goals Scored/gm. | 2.46 |
| 2.75 | Goals Allowed/gm. | 3.79 |
| 1292 | Shots | 712 |
| 46.1 | Shots/gm. | 25.4 |
| 192 | Assists | 116 |
| 26-130 | Power Plays | 20-132 |
| .200 | Power-Play Pct. | .152 |
| 90-109 | Penalty Kills | 94-127 |
| .8226 | Penalty-Kill Pct. | .740 |
| 662 | Saves | 735 |
| 2 | Shutouts | 1 |
EAST LANSING, Mich. - The eleventh-ranked Penn State men's ice hockey team looks to get back to their winning ways after a tough weekend against Minnesota as they travel to Munn Ice Arena to close out the regular season series against the Michigan State Spartans on Friday and Saturday evening.
THIS WEEK'S MATCHUP
- Penn State travels to East Lansing to close out the regular season series against Michigan State at Munn Ice Arena with a pair of 7 p.m. face-offs.
- The Nittany Lions lead the all-time series 7-6-3 after their weekend sweep earlier this season against the Spartans at Pegula Ice Arena. Penn State is 5-0-1-1 against MSU over the last two seasons.
LAST TIME THEY MET
- Penn State swept Michigan State in early January winning 5-2 and 5-3. Chase Berger collected three goals and one assist over the weekend while David Goodwin added a goal and a pair of assists and Vince Pedrie had one goal and three assists over the two games.
CAPTAIN CONSISTENCY
- Senior Captain David Goodwin is currently riding a career-best eight-game point streak where he has scored five goals and added five assists for 10 points. Twice before in his career, Goodwin had seven-game point streaks, but his goal in the second period last Saturday gave him a new career-high eight game streak.
- The senior is also just one-point shy of registering 30 points in a season for the third straight year. His 119 career points is a program record as earlier this season he became the first Penn State player to eclipse the 100-point plateau. Goodwin's 79 assists is also a program standard while his 40 goals is second behind the 45 of Casey Bailey.
- Goodwin is tied for tenth in the entire NCAA for career points by active players with his 119 points. That mark is good for third in the Big Ten behind Minnesota's Justin Kloos (144) and Ohio State's Nick Schilkey (124).
SWITCHING IT UP
- Two weeks ago out of necessity head coach Guy Gadowsky was forced to shuffle his lines and he may have stumbled upon something great. He moved David Goodwin back to his natural position at right-wing and Nate Sucese is centering that line with Denis Smirnov on the left.
- Both Smirnov and Sucese have four-game point streaks since the switch to go along with Goodwin's eight-game streak. The line has combined for 11 goals and 12 assists for 23 of the 42 total points registered by Penn State over the last two weekends.
- Sucese has scored three goals and added four assists during his four-game streak while Smirnov has potted five goals and added five helpers for 10 points over the last two weekends. Smirnov has assisted on each of Sucese's three goals while Sucese has returned the favor twice to the Russian and Smirnov has also tallied an unassisted goal, a penalty shot goal and a goal assisted by Goodwin.
FRESHMAN PHENOM
- Denis Smirnov ended his first semester of college hockey with 27 points in just 15 games. His point total was already a new single-season Penn State freshman record as well as his 17 assists. The rookie also began his career on a ten-game point streak, which is another Penn State program record. His hat trick against Arizona State was also just the fourth in program history.
- After a mid-season lull, the freshman has returned to form and currently leads the entire nation in freshman scoring with 39 points while his 16 goals and 23 assists are second amongst rookies nationally.
- Smirnov is also just one-point shy of tying Casey Bailey's single-season program record of 40 points set during the 2014-15 season.
- With his penalty shot goal last Saturday, the freshman also became just the second player in program history to cash in on the free chance as Tommy Olcyzk '16 accomplished the same feat on October 10, 2014.
I CAN BE YOUR PLUS-ONE
- Both Smirnov and junior Erik Autio currently have a plus-23 rating to pace the Big Ten and tie for fifth in the nation.
- Autio, who's just plus-one behind Will Butcher from Denver and Dennis Gilbert of Notre Dame for tops in the country amongst blue-liners, and defensive partner Vince Pedrie (plus-20) are the highest rated pair in all of college hockey.
- Smirnov is the highest rated freshman ahead of Ohio State's Tanner Laczynski (plus-20).
SHOTS FIRED
- Penn State continues to pace the country in shots on goal averaging 46.14, which is 10.36 shots more than their closest competitor Quinnipiac (35.78).
- Sophomore Vince Pedrie leads the entire Big Ten in shots on goal per game averaging 4.68, good for third in the nation. His 15 career goals also ties Luke Juha '16 for the Penn State program record for goals by a defenseman. Pedrie had a goal disallowed last Friday due to a goaltender interference call before he clanked the crossbar on Saturday.
A HAMIL - TON OF POINTS
- Junior Trevor Hamilton has already set the Penn State single-season record for assists by a defenseman with 17 and he has added six goals for 23 points. He now sits just one point shy of tying the single-season Penn State defenseman record of 24 set last season by Luke Juha '16. He is also just two goals shy of tying the single-season defenseman goal record of eight, which Juha and Vince Pedrie attained in 2015-16.
- Hamilton also became just the second blue-liner in Penn State history to record a short-handed goal as he trailed the play to bang in an easy shorty goal off the stick of Nate Sucese two weeks ago at Wisconsin. Connor Varley '16 is the only other Penn State defenseman to register a short-handed tally, which he did as he found the empty net during a 5-1 victory over Air Force on November 10, 2012.
THE KIDS ARE ALRIGHT
- Penn State's freshman class is third in the nation in scoring with 110 points (44 goals, 66 assists). In 2012-13 the freshman class registered 127 points (54 goals, 73 assists) in just 25 games, but not all games were against NCAA Division I competition as it was during their hybrid season.
HIGH-FIVE
- When scoring 5+ goals in a game this season Penn State is 12-0-0. However, when allowing 5+ goals in a game the Nittany Lions are 0-6-0, including last Friday's 6-3 loss to Minnesota.
RECAPPING MINNESOTA
- Penn State was swept for just the fifth time at Pegula Ice Arena and first since the inaugural Big Ten season of 2013-14. It was also their first overtime loss in over two years when they dropped a 5-4 decision to Ohio State on January 9, 2015.
- Denis Smirnov paced the offense with two multi-point efforts as he collected three assists on Friday before scoring twice on Saturday.
- The Nittany Lions never trailed on Saturday until Rem Pitlick fired home the game-winner with 1:33 remaining in overtime. Penn State also only trailed for 25:29 on Friday night. Overall PSU trailed just 21 percent of the time last weekend, but was unable to secure a victory.
SCOUTING MICHIGAN STATE
- Michigan State only has two wins since winter break and both were against Michigan at Yost Ice Arena. The Spartans are coming off a sweep by Ohio State last weekend in a pair of one-goal games.
- Michigan State is just 2-11-1 at home this season while going 4-6-1 on the road and 0-2-1 in neutral site contests.
- The Spartans are led by Winnipeg Jets draft-pick Mason Appleton with 11 goals and 25 points while freshman Taro Hirose leads the team with 15 assists.
- Appleton is tied for second in the Big Ten in power-play tallies with seven as more than half of his total goals have come with the man-advantage. His seven PPG's also ranks tied for 15th in the nation.
- MSU has switched things up in recent weeks and have gone with a two-goalie system as John Lethemon has been splitting time with Ed Minney who started the majority of games up until a few weeks ago. Minney leads the team with 22 games played and a 5-12-2 record with an .883 save percentage and 3.58 goals against average.
- Michigan State is last in the Big Ten in power-play percentage, as they have converted just 20 of their 132 man-advantage opportunities or 15.2 percent. The Spartans also rank second to last in the conference in penalty kill at just 74 percent (94-for-127). Those ranks are also 45th and 57th in the nation, respectively.
NEXT TIME OUT
- Penn State returns home for a pair of contests against Wisconsin as part of senior weekend. There will be a brief senior day ceremony before the game on Saturday. Saturday's contest is also available on American Sports Network with an 8 p.m. puck drop.