Rumor Roundup

A few things of some note happened in the world of Penn State hockey over the weekend (other than the games with Robert Morris, of course) while I was out of town and without non-phone internet access.

"Pegula Arena"

According to a story broken by StateCollege.com on Friday:

The new ice arena planned at Penn State University Park may be named Pegula Arena.

University trustees are scheduled to vote Jan. 21 on whether to adopt that name for the facility, a meeting agenda shows.

So I guess that's the likely name. Now we all have to get to work on figuring out how to say it quickly without saying "Pegularena" (just one of many reasons "Center" is superior).

Big Ten Hockey

A blog called The College Hockey HighHorse reports that:

NCAA winter meetings have been going on all week and are winding up today. Talks have been ongoing all week concerning the possible formation of a Big Ten Hockey League. Schools participating in the talks are the Big Ten School and WCHA schools, that much has been written about in stories like this from SB Nation.

Our source who is in the winter meetings says that the Big Ten Hockey Conference will start in 2014.

Another total non-shocker, but just more smoke coming from what most of us who follow college hockey view as an (unfortunate?) inevitability.

Derek Schooley

Just to be clear, this isn't a rumor, it's more of a mancrush than anything else. I profiled Schooley in my Head Coach Candidate series last week, then in a work of tremendous synergy between myself and legitimate media types, Steve Penstone interviewed him during the first intermission of Friday's game with his school's ACHA team.

Schooley discussed some of the hurdles facing Penn State's NCAA program.

Well, it's a challenge. You have to have a lot of patience and you have to do a lot of work. When I first got to Robert Morris, I had a desk. I didn't even have a computer or a phone. I imagine they might have a little bit more at Penn State's hockey offices to start, but you know, you're going to have to go out on the road. You're going to have to get hockey players, and you're going to have to have some patience with them. And you have to set the culture of what you want to have as your hockey program. You're going to have a whole bunch of new players, you're going to have a whole bunch of new guys, they're going to be wide-eyed to the college game, you're not going to have anybody to show them the way, but it's going to be one of those things where you take them from a big ball of clay and mold them into what you want to do and how you want them to play.

And that's the exciting thing to see right now after seven years in our program, to see where it's come and see where we started. You have to set the tone and set how you want the hockey program to go. It's a challenge, but it's an exciting one, it's a fun one, it's a great ride, and I'm sure the fans and people of State College will really get behind the hockey program, and it's going to be fun to watch, that's for sure, especially with the Big Ten Conference potentially coming together, however that's going to work out. It's going to be a neat ride because there's going to be big-time schools coming in to play Penn State, that's for sure.

After some comments about Big Ten hockey and the growth of hockey in western Pennsylvania - which are worth watching, as is the whole interview, hence my embedding the video and not just transcribing - Penstone, to his credit, dropped the tough question on him. So what say you, Mr. Schooley, wanna coach Penn State?

I'm very happy where I'm at, you know, I'm focused on my hockey team right now, and doing the best job we possibly can. Obviously, the Penn State job is going to be a very attractive job to whoever takes it and whoever applies for it and I think it's going to be a good thing for college hockey and I'll avoid your question. But, like I said, I'm very happy where I'm at, I like our hockey team and I like our direction. But it's going to be a very attractive job for a lot of people.

Well, what did you expect?