Devils in Detail
Fansided

Coach Powers, players reflect on massive sweep of No. 1 Denver and new No. 19 ranking

The Sun Devils earned a signature series win in their inaugural season as NCHC members.

By Austen Bundy

Nebraska-Omaha v Arizona State
Nebraska-Omaha v Arizona State / Zac BonDurant/GettyImages
facebooktwitterreddit

Arizona State stunned the college hockey world over the weekend with its road sweep over No. 1 Denver. The Sun Devils took down the reigning national champion Pioneers 3-2 on Friday and then again 5-2 on Saturday, handing them their first losses of the 2024-25 season.

Monday, the team was rewarded for its titan toppling efforts with the No. 19 ranking in the USCHO poll while Denver fell just one spot to No. 2, behind Big Ten member Michigan State now.

ASU head coach Greg Powers spoke with PHNX Hockey on Tuesday and explained that his team's weekend sweep was not at all surprising to him.

"You hate to be results focused but that's kind of the business I'm in and the results this weekend are what I expected," he said. "This is the standard."

ASU looking to build from Denver sweep, compete in NCHC

The Sun Devils (6-7-1) are the only ranked team with a sub-.500 record but the team is hoping it can prove their talent speaks louder than their record says.

"You can be doing the right things over and over ... but not getting those Ws in the win loss column," grad transfer Artem Shlaine told PHNX Hockey on Tuesday. "Now we gotta just stick with it, right, don't get complacent, don't get bored of doing the same thing over and over again if it works."

Saturday's win was the 300th of Powers' career which started in 2008 as an assistant at ASU before being promoted to head coach in 2010. He also played goaltender for the Sun Devils from 1995-99 when they were still a club team. ASU transitioned to NCAA DI status in 2015.

"It's a tremendous honor, obviously," Powers said Tuesday. "It's a combination of the two levels ... it's a lot of people who contributed to all those wins ... [and I] will never forget where we came from and everybody who's a part of all 300 of them."

ASU's next contests come Dec. 6 and 7 at home against Minnesota Duluth before a three week hiatus. The team has a scheduled exhibition series against the U.S. National Team Development Program on Dec. 28 and 29 before returning to NCAA action in the Desert Hockey Classic against Robert Morris and either Cornell or UMass.