I watched a three-hour commercial for Ohio State on Saturday night.
It was paid for by the NHL.
Seriously, that’s what this year’s Stadium Series game was.
Excuse me, sorry, that’s THE Stadium Series game.
It was a three-hour commercial for Ohio State athletics, paid for by the NHL that just happened to feature the Columbus Blue Jackets and Detroit Red Wings.
There was their giant American flag. There was Script Ohio. There were bands essential to the Columbus region. There was Ohio State’s marching band. The rink was outlined in the famous block O. There were giant Ohio State helmet stickers on the ground. Even the red line at center ice was the same pattern as that of Ohio State’s football helmets.
And yes, a hockey game was played, the growth of the sport in Ohio’s capital was celebrated but it was – at its core – a giant billboard for Ohio State’s athletic department.
So what does this have to do with Penn State?
That giant show was a good reminder of what’s to come once Beaver Stadium’s $700 million renovation is done.
Eventually, one day Penn State will host an outdoor NHL game. I’m not speaking this into existence. I’m not manifesting this. I’m guaranteeing it.
I’m willing to wager more money on Penn State – in my lifetime – hosting an outdoor NHL game than I am on a Penn State football national championship. I’m just that confident in the fact that this will happen.
Why?
Because Pat Kraft can’t and won’t pass up on an opportunity to get a three-hour commercial for Penn State athletics that way Ohio State just got one this weekend.
It’s why Kraft has been so steadfast on the renovation. Or well, just one of the many reasons why it was well past time for Beaver Stadium to get a facelift.
“Oh, absolutely. I think it’d be amazing in Beaver Stadium,” Kraft told StateCollege.com back in 2023. “If the NHL called me today, I’d be like, Yep, let’s go. I think number one, it would be very cool. I think it’d be great for the NHL, I think it’d be great for Happy Valley and for our fans. I think there’s ways to figure out how our teams could play out there, our hockey culture is really strong. But from a Penn State perspective, we’re all in. We’re still trying to get our arms around what all that entails, right? You’ve got to have all the amenities to do that and winterization will help but yeah, we’d be very excited to do that with the NHL.”
Since then, he and Penn State have kindled this rhetoric repeatedly. In the initial proposal for the Beaver Stadium renovation, there was language about non-football sporting events. Kraft even seemed to lament the very Stadium Series that happened this weekend back in August.
On tonight's coaches show, Pat Kraft said Penn State turned down two major events that went to Columbus instead. Beaver Stadium renos should help fix that.
— Max Ralph (@maxralph_) August 29, 2024
"First off, that bothers me, a lot. And secondly, we should be able to host those events. It's good for State College"
He’s made it clear that an outdoor NHL game is going to happen at the corner of Curtin and Porter.
Kraft’s M.O. about Penn State has been brash and more aggressive than many other administrators before him. If it helps the brand, it seems like he won’t say no.
The NHL has indicated that Beaver Stadium is still an attractive opportunity for them.
“We’d love to talk at some point about Penn State. We said, ‘make us aware of your timeline.’ By no means have we committed to them, though we always think it’s attractive,” NHL president of events and content Steve Mayer told ESPN (and Penn State alum) Emily Kaplan last week. “Remember the timing has also been interesting over the years too, because we did play back-to-back [2017 and 2019] Philadelphia versus Pittsburgh once in Pittsburgh, then in Philadelphia, which I think you almost have to do when you play at Penn State. It was too soon. And so we’ve definitely talked again.”
Of course, Beaver Stadium has needed a renovation for other reasons and a hockey game is going to be a most likely one-time thing. But it’s too big of a brand opportunity to pass up for all parties involved.
What was fascinating about this year’s Stadium Series was that it was so heavily focused on Ohio State. When Michigan hosted the Winter Classic at the Big House between the Toronto Maple Leafs and Detroit Red Wings back in 2014, it was more about the fact the NHL was going to get the biggest crowd it possibly can for a hockey game.
Michigan Stadium just happened to host the game back then, but the Horseshoe was the star of this year’s Stadium Series. It was Buckeye propaganda that Buck-I-Guy himself could not have written, and it was hard not to salivate over what happened at the Horseshoe this past weekend as both a Penn State and hockey fan.
For so many reasons, this game makes sense. With Beaver Stadium, Penn State gets to be put into the national spotlight and the NHL gets a crack at seeing an attendance record (105,491) once again. (While we don’t know Beaver Stadium’s future capacity just yet, it will be at least 100,000-plus.)
Among other reasons, it worked that well for Ohio State and the NHL because it was the Stadium Series – not the Winter Classic. While that Michigan Stadium Winter Classic did shatter all kinds of attendance records, it was played in a slightly different era of college football. As Kaplan pointed out, the College Football Playoff – and the tight timeline to go from home playoff game to hockey rink in a few days – has seemingly taken the Winter Classic off of the board for college stadiums.
“A lot of the issues we have as well are now the schedules are really crowded in terms of college football,” Mayer told Kaplan. “In Utah, for example, their football stadium, you could never do a Winter Classic because of the possibility of doing a college football playoff game.”
I’d also throw in that while not every Penn State football fan would attend the Beaver Stadium game, there would be a heavy overlap between football and hockey fans. Many of them wouldn’t want to miss the event because Penn State is playing in the College Football Playoff on or around New Year’s Day when the Winter Classic is normally played.
That’s also why this weekend in Columbus seemed to work so well, and that’s why it’s going to work in Happy Valley someday too.
One of the hesitations to Penn State hosting – aside from the fact the stadium didn’t have enough premium seats and wasn’t winterized – was that the infrastructure around Happy Valley can’t hold events big enough.
Back during Michigan’s Winter Classic, much of the corporate activation took place in Detroit – 45 minutes east of Ann Arbor.
But Kaplan pointed out the NHL has learned more lessons since that game. Small Canadian cities have hosted outdoor NHL games since then and have handled it well. The NHL now knows what it’s doing compared to when outdoor games were in their infancy.
Even in America – albeit in smaller stadiums – Navy and Air Force have hosted outdoor games. To be fair, the game at Air Force went famously horrendously due to traffic but that’s nothing Penn Staters aren’t used to on a Saturday for a noon kickoff.
What’s most interesting is the opponents. Columbus is Ohio State’s town. The Blue Jackets are still very second there and that is probably why the NHL leaned into the Ohio State theming so much on Saturday.
But for Penn State, there’s the obvious Pittsburgh-Philadelphia matchup. It’s easy to envision the rink outlined in the shape of Pennsyvlania as well. But I do have to wonder if Board of Trustees member, major Penn State benefactor and owner of the Buffalo Sabres Terry Pegula would have something to say about that.
Still, those are issues that can be ironed out at a later date. Regardless, a game at Beaver Stadium would be a giant PR showcase for the athletic department and school. It’d be a big win for the NHL too.
For right now, the commercial for Ohio State didn’t sell me on the Ohio State brand. I, like you, am too ingrained in Penn State to even think about changing sides for a millisecond. (Plus, I’d be shunned by my family.)
It did however sell me that once again an outdoor NHL game is going to happen at Beaver Stadium.
It’s not a matter of if. It’s a matter of when.
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