The Irish home opener is coming this weekend
The Notre Dame Fighting Irish hockey team returned from their season opening road trip last weekend with two wins where nearly everything went right. They return home to build on those wins at the start of a six game homestand that will take them right into conference play. First up, two games against the Alaska Nanooks on Friday and Saturday.
Where, When, How to Watch
- Where: Compton Family Ice Arena, South bend, IN
- When: Friday, October 18, 7:05pm ET (game one); Saturday, October 19, 6:05pm ET (game two)
- How to Watch: Both games streaming on Peacock
A week ago Notre Dame opened their season with two games in New York, against the St. Lawrence Saints and Clarkson Golden Knights. Notre Dame won both games scoring nine goals and only allowing three. Picking up two wins in the opening two road games set Notre Dame up to really start a run before the enter Big Ten play in a few weeks.
The offense for Notre Dame was led by sophomores Cole Knuble and Danny Nelson, with three and two goals respectively. Knuble and Nelson are likely to lead the Irish all season, as they were the second and third top scorers a year ago behind the now departed Graham Slaggert. If they can lead the team from the start and avoid any down streaks it will go a long way towards stabilizing an offense that still has some questions. Newcomer Blake Biondi also got on the scoresheet with a goal, scoring the first of the season for the Irish. He was joined by Justin Janicke, Hunter Strand, and Michael Mastrodomenico, all returning upper classmen.
In goal for the Irish the first two games were split, and both were strong starts that haven’t really cleared up the netminder hierarchy. Transfer Owen Say started game one and allowed only one goal and saved 32. Freshman Nicholas Kempf allowed two goals and made 30 saves. Having two goalies is not a bad thing and playing games is valuable experience for both goalies. If early returns are any indication either player in net gives Notre Dame a strong chance to win and I would expect them to continue splitting time for a few weeks at least.
This weekend the Alaska Nanooks visit Notre Dame after opening their season with four losses in their first four games. Two of those losses were in overtime though so they’ve produced better than their record might indicate. Still though it is a long road trip from Fairbanks to South Bend and that is something Notre Dame can take advantage of. Notre Dame and Alaska have met fairly often for two teams without any geographical connection, 62 time sin total with Notre Dame leading the series 33-26-4. The Irish are an even better 21-12-1 in South Bend. Most recently the two teams split a series at Compton during the 2022-23 season.
Prediction
There are still some questions surrounding this Notre Dame team, mainly where will the goals come from and what will the goaltending look like. Last weekend help to start answer those questions but two games is not enough to establish anything definitive. Still, if the Irish can carry their performance from last weekend forward that was a team that can win both games this weekend as well, and start to establish themselves as legitimate contenders in the process.