Penn State Nittany Lions women's ice hockey

History

The first women's hockey team at Penn State was a club team known as the Lady Icers, which began play in the 1996–97 season. Students Ellen Bradley and Kathy Beckford recruited players from around campus and enlisted Vinnie Scalamogna, the assistant manager of the Penn State Ice Pavilion, as coach. The Lady Icers won their first game on February 1, 1997, a 5–4 victory over the Susquehanna Rockettes, an adult club team.

Over sixteen years, the club won six conference regular season or playoff titles and qualified for the ACHA National Tournament six times, with a best finish of third place in the 2001–02 season. The Lady Icers concluded their ACHA tenure in February 2012 under head coach Josh Brandwene, playing a mixed schedule that included ACHA and ECWHL opponents as well as eleven games against NCAA Division I and Division III teams. That season, they won the ECWHL regular season title but lost to Rhode Island in the league's playoff championship. The program transitioned to NCAA Division I for the 2012–13 season, made possible by a Penn State-record $88 million donation (later increased to $102 million) from alumnus Terrence Pegula and his wife Kim, announced on September 17, 2010.

The donation funded the construction of Pegula Ice Arena, a 5,782-seat facility that opened in September 2013, replacing the 1,350-seat Ice Pavilion where the Nittany Lions played their first NCAA season. Brandwene was hired as the first varsity head coach in May 2011, and in June 2011 former Lady Icers head coach Mo Stroemel and Gina Kearns, previously an assistant at Neumann University, joined his staff. Penn State was accepted into College Hockey America in September 2011, becoming the fifth member for the 2012–13 season after Wayne State ended its women's hockey program.