Penn State’s Pegula Money Paved Way for Hockey Star McKenna

How does a school like Penn State build upon the first Frozen Four appearance in program history? It signs the most prized prospect in NCAA history—and the likely No. 1 overall pick in the 2026 NHL Draft, Gavin McKenna.

According to ESPN, McKenna received the biggest NIL offer in college hockey history, considered an “extremely generous six-figure” deal to go to Happy Valley.

While details were not disclosed, the offer is the latest financial infusion into a program that was playing down at the club level just over a decade ago.

Penn State’s men’s and women’s hockey programs were seeded in 2010, when Terry and Kim Pegula donated $88 million—the largest private gift in school history—to help launch the teams at the NCAA Division I level and build a 6,000-seat arena, known now as Pegula Ice Arena. The university launched a separate fundraising campaign at that same time to secure another $10 million to maintain the arena and create endowments for the programs. In 2012, the Pegulas added another $14 million to the Penn State hockey efforts.

The men’s team went 13-14-0 in its first year in D-I and 8-26-2 in its second before a run of six straight winning seasons. The Nittany Lions made their first NCAA tournament in 2017, and made their first Frozen Four this past season, losing to Boston University in the semifinals.

While it took a few years for the team to compete with the country’s best programs, it has always spent like them. In 2013-14, the team’s first season, Penn State reported spending $3.37 million on men’s hockey, according to numbers submitted annually to the U.S. Department of Education. That ranked eighth in the country.

Penn State ranked ninth in 2016-17 ($3.8 million), and ninth again in 2020-2021 ($3.16 million). In 2023-24, the most recent year of available reporting, the Nittany Lions ranked 14th at $4.17 million.

The investment in the program is paying dividends in the stands. In 2023-24, PSU men’s hockey pulled in $2.2 million in ticket sales, the 12th-most among all FBS public school teams outside of football and men’s basketball. While the data isn’t available yet, there’s reasonable expectation for ticket revenue to have risen this past season amidst the program’s run to the Frozen Four.

The addition of McKenna to the national semifinalists was also made possible thanks to the NCAA’s decision to lift its ban on junior hockey players. Last summer, the NCAA’s Division I Council tweaked an eligibility bylaw regarding pre-enrollment activities, opening a recruiting pipeline for top players from the Canadian Hockey League (CHL). The bylaw change will be official on Aug. 1.

The CHL is considered superior to the United States Hockey League (USHL) in terms of developing young talent. Many elite prospects choose to play up north versus the USHL or the NCAA as a pathway to make the NHL. CHL teams pay players a stipend, which previously made them ineligible for the NCAA before the advent of NIL.

McKenna spent three seasons with the Medicine Hat Tigers in the Western Hockey League, which is part of the wider CHL. Leading the club to its first WHL title since 2007, McKenna notched 129 points (44 goals, 85 assists) on his way to CHL Player of the Year honors. At 17 years old, he became the third-youngest player to take home the award after Sidney Crosby and John Tavares pulled off the feat at 16.

With assistance from Eben Novy-Williams.