November 1, 2022
by Joshua Messe/CHN Reporter
If junior goalkeeper Liam Souliere is to be believed, the “way a hockey team feels about itself is what you did last week,” and Penn State’s last week was pretty good.
A two-game road sweep of fellow Big Ten foe Wisconsin left the Nittany Lions (8-0) as one of two undefeated teams (Harvard is 2-0), and earned them the title of Team of the Week.
During the first edition of the Wisconsin series Friday, Penn State escaped with a 2-1 victory. After letting in an early ricochet goal off a Badger skate, Souliere was perfect for the rest of the night, allowing time for a Nittany Lions equalizer in the second period. Despite significant pressure late on the side of the Badgers, nothing materialized.
“I think (Wisconsin was) very resilient,” senior forward Connor McMenamin said. “I think there were a lot of ups and downs to the game. You know, they had a lot of push at us and we were able to hold it off.”
Souliere continued his perfection all the way through Saturday’s game as well, adding 32 more saves to his total, logging a whopping .985 on the series. Early in the first, McMenamin gathered his rebound and scored to give Penn State the lead early, but all scoring dried up for both teams after that. The Nittany Lions allowed Wisconsin to stay close into the third, but a three-goal explosion late put the game well out of reach.
The Penn State penalty kill was instrumental in both games — Wisconsin did not score a single power-play goal on six chances.
The new-look penalty kill is the result of a complete reworking of the Nittany Lions’ mindset and philosophical approach. And this work has paid off, transforming it from a weakness of last year’s team to one of its biggest strengths.
“(The penalty kill has) been a huge stress factor for us this year,” McNenamin said. “Last year’s penalty kill wasn’t anywhere where we wanted it to be and we took a lot of time to focus in and rethink some of our ideologies a little bit. We’ve been working on it really hard, so it’s nice to see it pay off.”
But even with the new penalty kill, and Soulierre’s clean play in net, it hasn’t been completely smooth sailing.
The Nittany Lions needed an overtime period to convert their second win over St. Thomas, and some of their other early season games were closer than they probably should have been. But…
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