Two weeks and a day after his official arrival at Arizona State, Dave Hakstol will coach his first NCHC game since March 7th, 2015.
The Sun Devils, coming off a bye week that Hakstol labeled a "mini training camp," will head north to the State of Hockey to face St. Cloud State in their NCHC opener Friday, and finish the two-game set Saturday. With plenty of storylines, media comments, and a growing history between the two schools, here's what you need to know.
More Than One New Face
Hakstol making his NCHC re-appearance isn't the only new blood in the nations premier hockey conference.
The Huskies also sport a new head man, Nick Oliver, who will be making his NCHC debut on Friday. Brett Larson, who had coached the prior eight seasons for St. Cloud State, departed to take the head coaching position at the University of Minnesota.
Oliver, just 34 years old, made his NCAA head coaching debut as a whole on Oct. 3 to begin this season. He had just two years of head coaching experience prior in a juniors league, the USHL, for the Fargo Force, but has plenty of assistant experience, including four years with the Huskies.
Oliver was no stranger to St. Cloud State prior to his assistant days, as all four of his NCAA years were spend in the Granite City. He was the team's captain as a Senior, for the 2014-15 season. That same season, they faced off four times with North Dakota, where Dave Hakstol was in what would end up being his final season in Grand Forks. Hakstol got the better of Oliver's Huskies, winning the season series 3-1.
Tight Contest On Paper
With both teams coming off a bye week, they've have plenty of time to work through some early season kinks. The Sun Devils are coming off a road sweep of UMass-Lowell in Haksol's debut behind the bench after sputtering to start the season. They split series' against Lindenwood and Holy Cross, both unranked opponents, prior to Hakstol's arrival. Now, they have had to week to instill more of what Hakstol wants, and he has had the opportunity to find out more about his bunch of players.
"I'm new here... I'm not going to start to peg anybody into one specific role or not. This week is about great opportunity for each and every player."
Dave Hakstol on the bye week
St. Cloud State is sitting at just 2-3, but are coming off a big road win over perennial powerhouse, #18 Boston College. They earned ranked splits in back to back weeks, the one prior against #11 Michigan Tech, but fell in their season opener to unranked Bemidji State.
Coming into the week, the teams are separated by just one vote in the USCHO.com poll. Both are on the outside looking in, with Arizona State garnering nine votes, and St. Cloud State getting eight top 20 votes.
St. Cloud State Head Coach Nick Oliver's Comments on The Sun Devils
"Very talented roster, a lot of additions in the off season for them, whether it was transfer portal, whether it was Freshman, so it's a different looking roster than they had last year. But I think when we go through it, they have a lot of ability, they have a lot of talent, they're deep, and you wouldn't expect anything less out of a team in our division (NCHC). And they're (ASU) playing well, obviously new staff, changes that they've made there, they won both games (against UMass-Lowell), so they're going the be feeling good about what they're doing, and similar to us, had an offweek to continue to prepare and get better, so we're going to expect a really good team coming in here."
Budding Rivalry?
The Sun Devils will head to the Herb Brooks National Hockey Center in St. Cloud for the second time in their programs history. The first time, in the 2024-25 season, the team earned a big ranked sweep over the Huskies, en route to a 2nd place finish in the NCHC. Last season, in St. Cloud State's first visit to Mullett Arena, it was they who picked up the sweep of the Sun Devils.
The only other matchup between the two schools as full-time Division 1 programs was in 2016-17, Arizona State's first exclusively D1 season, at the Desert Hockey Classic in Prescott Valley, AZ. St Cloud State won 4-2, and they lead the all time series, 3-2.
Across the five matchups, it has been the road team that has emerged victorious in all five. With Arizona State undefeated in the Hakstol era, they'll be looking to follow the same success they found last time in St. Cloud.
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