Forgive the cliché. But something’s got to give.
Yes, something’s got to give this weekend at Compton Family Ice Arena. Two Big Ten conference wins are up for the taking on Friday and Saturday night, and only Notre Dame or Wisconsin can take them. Both teams are struggling, but one way or another someone’s walking away a winner.
Perhaps this is an unfair assessment of the hockey affairs in South Bend and Madison at the moment. After all, both the Fighting Irish (4-2-0) and the Badgers (1-5-0) are receiving votes in this week’s USCHO poll, and Notre Dame is ranked No. 19.
But it would be difficult for even the most optimistic observer to characterize this weekend’s matchup as one between two teams playing their best hockey. Notre Dame limps into its Big Ten opener with two losses in its last three games, including a pair of losses at home to beatable squads in Alaska and Long Island.
The Badgers have fared no better. Ranked 10th in USCHO’s preseason poll, Wisconsin split its season-opening series with Lindenwood — a program in its third season with a 15-44-1 record all-time. It’s widely accepted that anyone can beat anyone in college hockey. But the Badgers have since dropped out of the poll altogether after four straight losses and were swept last weekend at defending national champion Denver.
Wisconsin will arrive in South Bend desperate to rectify its start to the season. Despite holding a better record, Notre Dame is insistent that they are no more comfortable with their own situation.
“We need to be a desperate hockey club too, right?” 20-year Irish head coach Jeff Jackson said. “We just came off losing to Alaska and LIU at home in the last two weekends, and if we don't have that kind of level of desperation in our game, then it doesn't matter who you play in the Big Ten, you’re gonna get beaten.”
With a week of practice under both teams’ belts, six points are on the line between Friday and Saturday. Something’s got to give, right?
Crease questions
Both squads enter the weekend with questions about the goaltending position, though the content of those questions are different for each side.
After rotating junior Owen Say and freshman Nicholas Kempf for the first three weeks of the season, Notre Dame has to be pleasantly surprised. Say currently leads the nation with a .969 save percentage through three games played, and Kempf isn’t too far behind with his .927 posting. Notre Dame’s team save percentage is .944, third-best nationally. Both goaltenders have fared well.
But there’s a catch — Notre Dame is undefeated with Say between the pipes, and with Kempf, they’re 1-2. More factors are at play in that dynamic than just goaltending, but Kempf also struggled for the first time this season in Saturday’s 5-2 loss to LIU. With more competitive Big Ten play beginning this weekend, will Jackson give Say a greater share of the net?
“I think Owen’s kinda moved ahead for this point in time,” Jackson said. “But it's still gonna depend on how he performs on the weekend [to] determine if we're gonna play him back-to-back. I have not made that decision yet, that's gonna be determined by his play, and obviously Nick’s play as well.”
Wisconsin has not had the same good fortune with netminders. After the graduation of 2024 Big Ten Goaltender of the Year Kyle McClellan, the Badgers attempted to reload in a similar way to Notre Dame. They brought in a veteran transfer from Atlantic Hockey, RIT’s Tommy Scarfone, to supplement a promising young player in William Gramme. Employing the same sort of rotation between the two, Wisconsin has had opposite results: the senior Scarfone has posted a career-worst .864 save percentage, and Gramme lags even further behind with an .851 mark. Combined, Wisconsin has the worst team save percentage in the country.
Sadder Saturdays?
Another theme Notre Dame fans will have their eye on this weekend will be the team’s performance on Saturday. The Irish are a perfect 3-0 on Friday night this season, with all their losses having come on the second night of the weekend.
Jackson has largely attributed this phenomenon to mental factors such as the team’s maturity, experience, and respect for their opponent.
“The last two Saturdays, I felt like we beat ourselves,” he said.
Whether the trend continues against Big Ten opponents remains a question. The Irish were a middling 6-9-1 in the second game of a weekend series last season.
History at play
Wisconsin swept all four games between these two teams last season. This weekend marks their first meeting since last February’s penalty-ridden series in Madison, where the teams combined for 75 penalty minutes over two games. Notre Dame was whistled for 61 of those minutes, including three game misconduct penalties.
While that ill-fated series is perhaps the most dramatic example, a certain feistiness has characterized most meetings between the Badgers and Irish dating back to their first round series in the 2022 Big Ten Tournament. Notre Dame won that series, and three out of four games during the 2022-2023 season, before getting swept last year.
The puck drops at Compton Family Ice Arena at 7 p.m. on Friday night. A 6 p.m. start follows on Saturday.
