A year ago, Penn State entered a hockey season wondering just how high one of the most talented rosters in program history could climb.
This year, the question is considerably different.
Who replaces all those goals?
Big Ten scoring champion Gavin McKenna is gone after a 51-point freshman season and becoming the No. 1 overall pick in the 2026 NHL Draft. Forwards Aiden Fink, Charlie Cerrato and Matt DiMarsico are gone, too. Then there is forward JJ Wiebusch, who entered the transfer portal and landed back home at Wisconsin.
Those five players alone accounted for 66 goals and 194 points last season.
Penn State didn’t merely lose a few important pieces. It lost the heart of an offense that was built around some of the most gifted players ever to wear a Nittany Lion sweater.
Of Penn State’s 136 goals last season, only 55 were scored by players who return in 2026-27 which is 40.4% of goal production returning.
The drop is even greater when looking at total production. Penn State returns 140 of its 384 individual points or just 36.5% of its offense.
That makes head coach Guy Gadowsky’s challenge entering 2026-27 clear.
Penn State has talent. What it doesn’t have yet is proof that all of its new pieces can replace what walked out the door.
A Different Kind of Penn State Offense
Trying to replace McKenna with another McKenna would be a fool’s errand..
What compounds the task is the depth beyond McKenna that Gadowsky is seeking answers where DiMarsico led Penn State with 18 goals. Wiebusch scored 16. Fink finished with 38 points, while Cerrato added another 27.
Instead, Gadowsky appears ready to lean into something much more familiar to longtime followers of the program: waves of forwards playing fast.
Penn State relied heavily on two high-end scoring lines last season.
Gadowsky said Tuesday that this year’s team could get back to generating offense with greater depth, describing the approach as scoring through “tempo and committee.”
The coaching staff has consequently spent the preseason moving forwards between combinations rather than locking in traditional first, second, third and fourth lines.
That makes forward Justin Poirier one of the most important additions on the roster.
Poirier isn’t being asked to replace McKenna’s game, but Penn State badly needs his ability to put pucks in the net. The Maine transfer scored 18 goals and 29 points in only 27 games last season despite missing the final eight games with an injury.
A healthy Poirier gives Penn State something it desperately needs: a proven college goal scorer.
Then there is perhaps the most fascinating player on the roster.
Andrew Kuzma is finally getting his opportunity at Penn State.
Kuzma originally arrived as a highly regarded recruit but never played during the 2024-25 season after doctors discovered a heart condition. He underwent open-heart surgery, spent last season with the OHL’s Kingston Frontenacs and now returns to Hockey Valley.
There are other intriguing newcomers. Kale Dach produced 75 points with Calgary in the WHL. Marco Mignosa and Justin Larose add more young offensive talent.
But newcomers alone can’t carry this offense.
Shea Van Olm and Luke Misa need to become more productive players.
Van Olm scored nine goals and 12 points last season. Gadowsky through the end of last season was starting to notice Van Olm starting to put together the makings of an elite power forward. What Gadowsky hopes Van Olm continues to blossom into the player he was in his last season with the Spokane Chiefs of the WHL where he led the league in goals with 49.
Misa a former five-star forward from Brampton had eight goals and 19 points. Both now have an opportunity to move into much larger roles.
And Penn State needs its veterans.
Co-captains Reese Laubach and Dane Dowiak will need to be the steady force in the room.
Laubach is the leading returning scorer after producing 12 goals and 28 points last season. Dowiak had become the team’s most reliable two-way forward after Cerrato’s injury last year between his scoring touch with nine goals and 18 points in only 27 games before a season-ending injury to go along with a team leading plus-16.
Their importance goes beyond the scoresheet.
Gadowsky pointed to both players’ willingness to accept changing roles last season as Penn State loaded its lineup with high-end talent. Now Laubach and Dowiak are the captains of a team that may need patience as new combinations form.
Jackson Smith Gives Penn State Something to Build Around
For all the uncertainty up front, Penn State should feel considerably better about the back end.
And it starts with Jackson Smith.
Add Nittany Sports Now as a preferred source in Google! Click here to add us.Smith’s freshman season offered a glimpse of just how good the Columbus Blue Jackets prospect can become. The 6-foot-4 defenseman scored 11 goals and 26 points and earned preseason second-team All-Big Ten recognition.
Those aren’t merely good numbers for a defenseman. Smith is Penn State’s second-leading returning scorer, trailing only Laubach.
He gives the Nittany Lions a legitimate offensive weapon from the blue line and someone capable of driving a power play that must replace significant skill.
On the power play, Smith had seven power play goals (PPG) for another Penn State defensive record and the second-most PPG in a single-season all-time.
Mac Gadowsky also returns after recording 17 assists and 18 points last season, while Nolan Collins provides another experienced presence. Add newcomers Caeden Herrington, Ethan Weber and Charlie Michaud, and the blue line has a potentially intriguing combination of experience, size and upside.
Weber is particularly interesting after producing 51 points with Penticton, while Herrington arrives from Vermont as a 2025 fourth-round selection of the Los Angeles Kings.
If that group develops as expected, defense could become one of Penn State’s biggest strengths.
It may need to be.
Penn State Should Be Excellent in Net
There may not be another position on the roster with a better combination of established production and upside than goaltender.
Josh Fleming is back.
Fleming went 10-7-2 with a 2.61 goals-against average and .924 save percentage as a freshman last season. His performance put him among the finalists for the Mike Richter Award.
And somehow Penn State managed to add another elite option.
Freshman Ryder Fetterolf arrives after earning both OHL and CHL Goaltender of the Year honors with the Ottawa 67’s.
That’s an enviable situation for Gadowsky.
Penn State shouldn’t have to ask a rebuilt offense to win 6-5 games every weekend. Fleming has already demonstrated that he can steal games at the college level, and Fetterolf gives Penn State another potentially high-end option behind him.
For a team trying to figure itself out offensively, that matters enormously.
This Team Doesn’t Have to Be Last Year’s Team
The temptation will be to compare everything this Penn State team does with the star-studded group that preceded it.
That’s probably unfair.
McKenna isn’t walking through the door. Neither are Fink, DiMarsico, Cerrato or Wiebusch.
The numbers make the challenge impossible to hide: 59.6% of Penn State’s goals and 63.5% of its total point production must be replaced.
But that doesn’t mean the cupboard is bare.
Poirier gives Penn State a proven scorer. Kuzma finally gets his opportunity. Laubach and Dowiak provide veteran leadership. Van Olm and Misa have room to make significant jumps. Dach and the rest of the newcomers provide upside.
Smith anchors what could become a very good defensive corps.
Fleming and Fetterolf could give Penn State one of the better goaltending situations in college hockey.
There is enough here to be good.
The question is how quickly all of it becomes a team.
Penn State won’t have much time to figure that out. The No. 17 Nittany Lions open Friday against No. 15 UConn before facing Sacred Heart the following night at the Ice Breaker Tournament. A week later, No. 7 Quinnipiac comes to Pegula Ice Arena. Big Ten play begins at Minnesota on Oct. 30.
Last season, Penn State could look toward the top of its lineup and know where the offense was coming from.
This season will require something different.
More lines. More contributors. More defense. More saves.
Perhaps that’s the best way to understand the 2026-27 Nittany Lions.
Penn State lost more star power than any team in the Big Ten. It might have enough depth everywhere else to survive it.
