MADISON, Wis. – To cap off its fall semester schedule, the No. 6 Wisconsin men's hockey team earned its fifth-consecutive win with a 4-1 victory over the No. 17 Penn State Nittany Lions on Saturday at the Kohl Center.
Despite letting in a goal on the first shot of the game, freshman goaltender William Gramme earned his second-career victory in his second-career start for Wisconsin (14-4-0, 8-2-0 Big Ten), stopping 25 of Penn State's (9-7-3, 2-5-3 Big Ten) shots on goal to give UW its fourth-consecutive conference victory.
Penn State got on the scoreboard first exactly one minute into the opening period on a shot from Jimmy Dowd Jr.
The Badgers battled back, tying the game up 13:35 into the period. Sophomore forward Cruz Lucius sent a long pass from the left side of the Penn State zone to find senior forward Anthony Kehrer at the right circle, who sent a wrist shot home for his first of the season.
Christian Fitzgerald gave Wisconsin its first lead of the game 10:07 into the second period. Graduate student defenseman
Mike Vorlicky passed up the ice to freshman forward
William Whitelaw at Penn State's blue line. Whitelaw carried the puck into the zone and passed to his left to meet sophomore forward
Christian Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald skated up towards the net and sunk a swift shot past Penn State goaltender Liam Souliere to make it 2-1.
Wisconsin's penalty kill shined tonight, killing off five Penn State power plays, including a five-minute major assessed near the end of the second period to keep the score 2-1.
Exactly four minutes into the third period,
Charlie Stramel notched his second goal of the season. Freshman defenseman
Joe Palodichuk made a defensive play to keep the puck in the Penn State zone before taking a shot that Stramel tipped into the net to extend Wisconsin's lead to two goals.
To secure the victory, sophomore forward
Jack Horbach scored a buzzer-beating empty-net goal to send stuffed animals flying onto the ice from the Teddy Bear Toss presented by BMO for Toys for Tots.
Notes to know:
-
Anthony Kehrer's goal was his first since scoring at Minnesota on Dec. 10, 2022
- This marks the second time the Badgers have had a win streak of at least five this season
- Tonight's contest lowered UW's national-leading scoring defense number to 1.72 opponent goals per game
- UW's 9-1 home record marks its best home start since opening 9-0-1 through 10 games at the Kohl Center in the 2013-04 season
- Sophomore forward
Cruz Lucius hit 50 career points in his 50th career game as a Badger
Straight From the Rink
Head Coach Mike Hastings
On the team's scoring depth
"First of all, you're really happy for those young men because when you talk about Kehrer, he's a glue guy. He's one of those guys that comes to work every day, and he's one of the most unassuming. If he has a really good day, he just rinses and repeats; if he has a bad day, it's for a short period of time, and he goes right back to work. What an unbelievable pass from Cruz to find him and then for him to finish. This first half, he's played through a lot of pain. He's had some bumps and bruises, he's a mentally tough young man and he's [one of] the reasons we were able to string together a little bit of the first half that we had because of a guy like that big-time character."
Sophomore forward Christian Fitzgerald
On bouncing back after Penn State's first goal
"I think just saying positive on the bench, keeping each other up, you know you never really look back after that. Obviously, you don't want to start down a goal but we have a lot of belief in one another."
Senior defenseman Anthony Kehrer
On his goal tonight
"It's always nice scoring a goal and like you said, it's been a while. Whenever it goes in it is pretty exciting and to do it at home against Penn State was pretty awesome."
Up Next: The Badgers will break for finals and the holidays before participating in the Kwik Trip Holiday Face-Off at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee on Thursday and Friday, Dec. 28-29. The Badgers will play Air Force on Thursday, Dec. 28, at 7:30 p.m., then either Minnesota Duluth or Northeastern on Friday, Dec. 29 at 7:30 p.m. depending on semifinal results. Both games will air on Bally Sports Wisconsin. Audio play-by-play for both games can be found on 1310 WIBA in the Madison area, 97.3 The Game in Milwaukee, as well as on the Badgers app and The Varsity Network App. You can also follow along on X/Twitter and Instagram @BadgerMHockey.
