The Alaska Nanooks men’s ice hockey team will begin their 2025-26 regular season with a two-game series against the Minnesota Duluth Bulldogs at the Carlson Center in Fairbanks on Friday, October 3 and Saturday, October 4. Both games are scheduled to start at 7:07 p.m.
Last weekend, the Nanooks completed their exhibition openers with two shutout victories at home. On September 26, they defeated UNLV 3-0, with goaltender Lassi Lehti earning the shutout. The following night, Calvin Vachon posted a shutout as Alaska won 8-0 over the Briercrest Clippers.
The University of Alaska Fairbanks recently extended its media rights partnership with FloHockey for three more years. This agreement ensures that Nanooks Division I hockey games will continue to be streamed live through the 2027–28 season on FloHockey, which has been the exclusive streaming provider since 2019-20. Fans will have access to every home game as well as highlights and on-demand replays.
Radio coverage of all Nanooks games is provided by Bruce Cech on KSUA 91.5 FM and KSUAradio.com.
This weekend’s series also marks the Nanooks’ participation in Student-Athlete Mental Health Week alongside Hilinski’s Hope Foundation. The team will wear white stickers featuring a green ribbon on their helmets to raise awareness for mental health among student-athletes. According to the press release: “This week is a call to action to raise mental health awareness, destigmatize help-seeking, and provide quality resources to our student-athletes because #MentalHealthMatters.” The Hilinski’s Hope Foundation was established in memory of Tyler Hilinski and aims to support mental wellness programs for student-athletes.
Careline Alaska Crisis Prevention will have an informational table at Friday’s game for fans interested in learning more about mental health care or making donations.
On Saturday, the Nanooks partner with the Breast Cancer Detection Center of Alaska for “Go Pink!” Night, encouraging fans to wear pink in support of breast cancer awareness. The first 2,000 attendees will receive a limited edition pink scarf co-branded by Kinross Alaska and Alaska Nanooks Hockey.
Alaska enters this season after finishing last year with a record of 12-14-6. During that campaign, they achieved ranked wins over teams including Notre Dame and Union. However, they lost their top three scorers from last season—Matt Hubbarde (now playing professionally), Broten Sabo (transferred to Ohio State), and Kyle Gaffney (transferred to Minnesota Duluth). Gaffney returns this weekend as part of the Bulldogs roster.
Chase Dafoe is now captain for Alaska; he led returning players last season with 17 points and five power-play goals. In goal, senior Lassi Lehti returns after recording a .924 save percentage over 13 appearances last year.
For Minnesota Duluth, this visit marks their first trip to Fairbanks in program history; previous meetings were all played in Duluth since their first matchup in October 1984. Last season’s contest saw Alaska defeat UMD for the first time ever by a score of 2-1 in overtime. Scott Sandelin continues as head coach for his twenty-sixth year at UMD.
After this opening series, Alaska travels to Tempe, Arizona for the Icebreaker Tournament before returning home later in October.
