ST. LOUIS — Penn State wasn’t supposed to be here.
Or so people thought.
The Nittany Lions lost their first eight games in the Big Ten before picking up a point in a shootout loss vs. Notre Dame on Jan. 3, outdoors at Wrigley Field.
It probably wasn’t a surprise for the team picked to finish second from last to be sitting at the bottom of the standings.
“We were left for dead not long ago,” said Penn State coach Guy Gadowsky.
But his team still felt it had life.
After a win at Notre Dame on Jan. 5, Penn State began a turnaround for which the coach and players credit senior leadership.
“I learned a lesson from them this year,” said Gadowsky. “I mean, the way that they stuck together and stayed positive in the hardest times — when it would’ve been really easy not to — is just, is really, really impressive.”
“The senior class did an unbelievable job with the leadership this year, showing us the way,” said sophomore forward Aiden Fink, a Hobey Baker Award top 10 finalist and team-leading scorer.
The Nittany Lions went 9-3-3 over the rest of the conference season, finishing in fifth place. They went on to upset Michigan in a first-round sweep in the Big Ten playoffs before losing to Ohio State in overtime.
A successful nonconference schedule and favorable playoff results in other leagues got Penn State into the NCAA tournament as an at-large team.
The Nittany Lions dominated Maine and squeaked by UConn in overtime to advance to Thursday’s semifinal, where Penn State came up short in a 3-1 loss to Boston University.
The team had its chances against BU, including a couple of short-handed breakaways and some grade-A chances.
“We just didn’t finish. So sometimes you don’t have your A game and you finish,” said Gadowsky. “We certainly got momentum later, but when we had chances to — big chances when we weren’t playing our A game — we just didn’t finish.”
“It’s super tough with the outcome that happened, but just to be able to wear the Penn State crest for the past five years — it means everything to me,” said Jimmy Dowd, Jr., a grad student taking advantage of his fifth year.
Gadowsky turned his comments from finishing plays well to finishing well in life.
“I think there’s a lot of eyes on our game, but I hope there are a lot of eyes on what type of men these guys are,” Gadowsky said.
“They’re fantastic students,” said Gadowsky, who pointed out Dowd. “He could be the mayor of State College. He could. Everywhere I go, people look at me and they ask if I know Jimmy Dowd, and that’s a wonderful thing.
“And then [2024 Hockey Humanitarian Award winner] Dylan Lugris, what he did in the community is incredible. The community is going to be a much, much better place because of this senior class and the type of guys they were.”
Penn State checked a box, according to Gadowsky, by making it to the Frozen Four. And he agreed that the step forward will bring more attention to the team on the ice.
But more than that is the way the team responded, learned, and grew amid difficulty.
“It’s not just how we played in the success they had. I think it’s what kind of men they are,” said Gadowsky. “And I think that will be just as impactful.”
