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This weekend marks the 44th and 45th meetings in the all-time series with Notre Dame holding the 22-14-7 advantage. The teams have split the series at Pegula evenly through the first 20 meetings with an 8-8-4 record, however, the Nittany Lions have won each of the last four games played in Hockey Valley and are unbeaten (5-0-2) in the last seven dating back to the 2023-24 campaign.
The Nittany Lions won the season series last year taking 9-of-12 points after sweeping the series at Pegula and winning in a shootout before an overtime loss on the road.
Sophomore goaltender Josh Fleming won both his starts last season against the Irish posting a 4-1 victory at home before winning a shootout after a 3-3 tie in South Bend. Fleming enters the series with a .949 save percentage and a 1.92 goals-against average in his two starts against Notre Dame.
Senior Reese Laubach leads all Nittany Lions with six points on two goals and four assists in 12 career games against the Irish while sophomore Luke Misa registered two goals and three assists for five points in four games against Notre Dame last season. Senior Dane Dowiak has also seen success against the Irish with a team-best three goals and two assists for five points in nine career games.
The Nittany Lions have the fourth youngest team in the conference and the 11th youngest nationally with an average age of 21 years and five months while the Irish are the second oldest team in the conference, but still the 18th youngest nationally with an average age of 21 years and eight months.
SIZZILIN SMITTY
Sophomore defenseman Jackson Smith has points in six of his eight games this season including two multi-point games. Smith has tied his career-high in back-to-back weekends registering three points including the game-winning goal in overtime against Canisius two weeks ago before setting a new career-high with three assists in an overtime loss against Minnesota last week.
Smith also had a career-long five-game point streak earlier this season while his 10 points are the second-most among Big Ten blueliners and the fourth-most in the nation while his eight assists are tied for the national lead among defensemen.
The Calgary native moved into fifth all-time in goals by a defenseman in Penn State history with 13 for his career after netting his first two of the season against Canisius two weeks ago.
SCOUTING NOTRE DAME
Notre Dame finished last in the Big Ten a year ago going just 9-23-5 overall with a 5-17-2 mark in conference play under first year head coach Brock Sheahan. The Irish started this season with a sweep against Niagara but enter the weekend having lost six-straight games, all to ranked opponents, and have been outscored 34-7 over that stretch.
The Irish will be without a trio of players following suspensions handed out after an incident late in the third period of Saturday's game at Wisconsin as defensemen Jaedon Kerr and Leo Gruba along with forward David Klee were each handed supplemental discipline by the league.
Notre Dame is allowing the most goals per game in the Big Ten at 4.38 per game to rank 58th nationally out of 63 teams. The Irish are also averaging just 1.75 goals per game themselves which is also the worst in the Big Ten and the 55th worst nationally.
The Irish are paced by Evan Werner with four goals and six points through eight games while Danny Nelson has added a pair of goals to a team-best four assists for six points.
Nicholas Kempf returns between the pipes for the Irish and has split time with freshman Patrick Quinlan as each goaltender has started four games. Kempf has both Irish wins and has posted a 2.75 goals-against average and a .922 save percentage while Quinlan has started the last four games with Kempf sidelined and posted a 8.32 save percentage and a 5.86 goals-against average.
The Irish special teams have also struggled to start the year with the powerplay converting just 4-of-20 (20 percent) and the PK allowing a national high 14 powerplay goals killing off just 62.2 percent of opponent chances to rank only slightly ahead of Lindenwood's 60 percent PK.
BONUS HOCKEY
Penn State has played three-straight overtime games with a wide range of emotions as the Nittany Lions won the first in just 15 seconds, tied the second before winning in a shootout and lost the third in just 17 seconds.
The shootout was the first of the year for the Nittany Lions as they won 2-1 in five rounds.
NEXT UP
Penn State hits the road for back-to-back weekends beginning in Ann Arbor with a weekend series against No. 2 Michigan next Friday and Saturday night.