Preview: Penn State Hockey Takes On Cornell At Madison Square Garden

Where: Madison Square Garden, New York, New York.

When: 8 p.m.

Live Stream: Ivy League Digital ($)

Live Stat Tracker: Sidearmstats.com

Penn State and Cornell enter the match-up in The Frozen Apple with each team in winning grooves. After starting 0-3-1 Cornell has gone 3-1-0 in the past four games. At 3-4-1, the Big Red hope to continue the winning pattern. The Lions (7-3-2) are coming off a pair of split series on the road against Michigan and UMass-Lowell.

Scouting Cornell

Following a weekend that included a 3-2 win against Yale and a 4-0 shutout over Brown, the Red Bears are on an upswing. Prior to last weekend the team had not scored more than two goals in a game all season. Averaging 1.8 goals scored per game, Cornell has played in many low-scoring games. The team is holding opponents to a 1.6 goals per game. Goalie Mitch Gillam has been in net for all but two games this season, while backup goalie Hayden Stewart owns a 1-1 record including a shutout and a .91 goals against average.

Joel Lowry is the leading scorer with five points on the year including two goals. Four players have four points on the season for Cornell, three players have three points and two players have two points. The rest of the scorers have only a single point on the year. Penn State has eight players with six or more points on the year.

Cornell hockey has roots dating back over 100 years, making the team one of the oldest NCAA hockey programs. Penn State is the newest Division 1 program that is currently playing hockey. Coach Mike Shafer has been at the helm for twenty years, carrying a 364-208-71 record.

Since the year 2000, the Big Red have been to the NCAA Tournament seven times, most recently in 2012. Senior forward John McCarron captains the squad. The team has a mix of experience and youth, containing more underclassmen than upperclassmen. Seven players have been drafted by an NHL team.

The official school colors are Carnelian and White so it is unclear why the Cornellians describe the team as 'Big Red'. Probably because it's so hard to spell Carnelian. The Big Red hockey team has 3500 games under their belt while Penn State has fewer than 100 as a Division 1 team. History is on the side of Cornell, but the present may very well belong to the Blue and White.

Notes

• The game in Madison Square Gardern will be the fourth NHL facility that Penn State has visited in three years, including the Wells Fargo Center in Philly, the CONSOL Energy Center in Pittsburgh and the Xcel Energy Center in St.Paul.
• PSU coach Guy Gadowsky had a record of 7-9-0 while coaching Princeton against Cornell from 2004-2011.
• The comment section of this article will serve as the open-thread during the game.
• Check out the team all packed into one elevator at Madison Square Garden.