UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Jimmy Dowd Jr. knows it's cliche to say, but to him the "Wear White" game against Wisconsin this past weekend was "unreal."
"It was unreal. I know hockey players say that a lot, but it was an unbelievable experience," Dowd said. "First time I've ever been a part of a wear white game here… just to be in that atmosphere this weekend was incredible. Just like the student section, basically every seat was filled. So much fun, just so much fun."
Penn State's sweep of Wisconsin in a packed Pegula Ice Arena is something Dowd, Connor MacEachern and Christian Sarlo can all agree was a highlight of the season.
"It was crazy loud, we were all on the bench saying that," Sarlo said. "Going into the second, we were saying the building was waiting to erupt."
The Nittany Lions' 7-2 takedown of the Badgers on Saturday was full of memorable moments for the team. Kirwan's bar-down goal during the second period, the Roar Zone's chants and dances, and Ben Schoen's second goal in front of an electric crowd are all moments that stick out to Sarlo when he looks back on the weekend.
"It was so awesome with all the fans," MacEachern agreed. "Really feeling that at home, getting two big wins was huge. And the all-white look was unbelievable. I've never heard the place louder in the three years I've been here. So, it was really good for our team to have a couple of wins."
But coming into a new week, the team is focused on facing off against the Buckeyes Friday.
Hockey is a "short term" memory sport, according to Sarlo. It's important to acknowledge success and feel it, but with another game on the horizon the group can't spend too much time basking in the warmth of a win.
To Sarlo, the sweep is an opportunity for him to reflect on what went well, what needs work and how he can take that information and apply it to the next series.
"I think it's important for us to know that we're capable of playing as well as we did, and we need to keep doing that moving forward," MacEachern said, echoing Sarlo's sentiments.
To head coach Guy Gadowsky, as great as it feels to get a win – especially one as impactful as the team's win against Wisconsin Saturday night – it can sometimes make it harder to "take the lesson and move on."
When the team has a poor weekend, it's easier to take the lessons learned and start working towards improvement, as everyone is eager to let go of the loss. But when the team has a good weekend, it can be tough to let go of the high that comes with winning and focus on the work that needs to get done.
"It's nice because obviously the environment is a little more peppy… but, that doesn't at all mean that we don't have lessons to learn from this weekend," Gadowsky said. "If we look back at our series at Ohio State going into the third period, we had very poor third periods on both nights, and there were reasons for it that we needed to address. And you can't just address it automatically, we've been working towards those. It seems like at least recently, those lessons are starting to stick. So, from a coaching standpoint, we actually hope we have a really short memory with what happened… enjoy the peppiness, but it doesn't mean we've achieved anything, and we can't check that box and move on. We really have to continue on the lessons learned."
