Growing up in Yaroslavl, Russia, Arsenii Sergeev never envisioned a career in college hockey. In fact, he never even knew the NCAA existed until a few years after he moved to the United States in 2019.
Sergeev started playing hockey when he was six years old. Back home in Russia, hockey was everything. Every kid grew up with the dream of playing for Lokomotiv Yaroslavl, the local professional club and a branch of the Kontinental Hockey League. Sergeev’s aspirations were no different.
Though he now spends his time making saves, it didn’t originally start out this way. When he first picked up a stick, he was not a netminder, but rather a defenseman. Despite this, Sergeev always knew being in the crease was his destiny.
“I always wanted to be a goalie,” Sergeev said.
The change in positions was prompted by a scene many young hockey players can relate to. Sergeev would play ball hockey with his dad. He always found himself blocking shots that his dad would fire at him, and immediately knew goaltending was for him.
One Christmas, Santa surprised the young D-Man with goalie equipment, and he never looked back.
Sergeev’s parents mean the world to him. From his early days playing with his father to now, they have always been supportive of each step in their son’s career.
“I’m so grateful for what they did for me,” Sergeev said. “They gave me a chance to feel these experiences around my hockey career, and I’m so glad for that.”
The family provided Sergeev with a sense of comfort and familiarity, two things that he lacked after moving across the world, by himself, to pursue a career in professional hockey.
When he was just 16 years old, Sergeev began his goaltending career on American soil playing for the New Jersey Junior Titans, a team affiliated with the North American Hockey League. He had no friends or relatives in the States, and hardly spoke any English, so making the transition was very difficult at first.
“The beginning was tough,” Sergeev said. “But over time, you start picking up the language and then making connections, and then it’s much better.”
During his stint with New Jersey, Sergeev became very close with somebody who had moved from Ukraine, along with another person who shared his native language of Russian. While he didn’t have much, having these friends made Sergeev feel a lot more comfortable living in a country where everything was new.
Sergeev spent his first year in the United States playing for three teams in three separate leagues. He played 15 games with the Junior Titans in the NAHL, before making his United States Hockey League debut with the Sioux Falls Stampede.
After playing just two games with the Stampede, Sergeev moved back to New Jersey where he would play four games with the Rockets, an organization in the National Collegiate Development Conference.
It wasn’t until Sergeev joined the USHL’s Tri-City Storm club when he could finally showcase his talent and prove to be the goalie he knew he could be. In 41 games with the club, he boasted a .918 save percentage while accumulating Goaltender of the Week honors.
Earlier that year, Sergeev also saw a dream come to fruition when he was selected by the Calgary Flames in the seventh round of the NHL Draft. A few months later, he announced that he would commit to play college hockey for the University of Connecticut. The kid from Yaroslavl was making a name for himself, his future undoubtedly bright.
Segreev’s advisor was the one who introduced him to the NCAA in the first place. Coming from Russia, the league was not widely known, and was still a relatively uncommon path for future NHLers. But when Sergeev learned about the opportunities at UConn, both academically and athletically, he decided it was the smartest route for him.
In 2023, Segreev’s freshman season with the Huskies, he split his starts with sophomore Logan Terness. The two boasted nearly identical save percentages as they led the team to a 20-12-3 record and Hockey East quarterfinal appearance.
The following season, Sergeev again split his playing time, this time with Clarkson transfer Ethan Haider. The team finished with a 15-19-2 record, and was once more bounced in the Hockey East quarterfinals, this time by top-ranked Boston College.
After two years in Storrs, Connecticut, things weren’t going as Sergeev would have hoped, and he knew he needed a change.
“I felt that at the time I was at UConn, I was kind of stuck in my development. I felt like I had more potential than the opportunities that were given. I just felt like the team kind of wasn’t where we wanted to be,” Sergeev said.
After his sophomore season, Sergeev decided to hit the transfer portal to search for a place that would better suit his needs. That’s when he met Guy Gadowsky. And that’s when he fell in love with Penn State.
In June of 2024, Sergeev announced that he would be joining Gadowsky’s squad in Hockey Valley, helping to fill the void left by Liam Souliere’s transfer to Minnesota.
“It was an absolute blast. I think it was the best decision in my career,” Sergeev said of his time with the Nittany Lions.
He, along with the rest of the team, had high expectations going into the 2024-25 season. Winning the National Championship was the goal, and the guys shared that mutual drive to bring home the hardware to Pegula Ice Arena.
But the season didn’t begin like Sergeev, or anyone, would have expected. In November, Sergeev was diagnosed with a lower body injury that would keep him off the ice until January. In his absence, Penn State fell to an abysmal 0-9 start in Big Ten play.
Despite this, Sergeev remained optimistic. While he admits that he questioned his decision to transfer after the rough patch at the beginning of the season, his teammates still meant the world to him and he wouldn’t trade that for anything.
“You always keep in mind where you want to be,” he said. “The guys around me were unbelievable, and I love my teammates. If I’m not playing, it means God wants it this way. You just try to go through the hard times and then find the good ones.”
That belief that things happen for a reason took on many different meanings last season. This was especially the case for goaltender John Seifarth, who was called up from the Penn State ACHA club program in the middle of the season.
“John was absolutely unbelievable since day one for this team,” Sergeev said. “This guy is the most positive, hardest worker. It somehow turned around the program.”
While Seifarth was able to anchor the team for a handful of games, it was obvious that the Nittany Lions were still missing the wall that was Sergeev.
In January, he finally returned from injury to take on Notre Dame in Wrigley Field, as part of The Frozen Confines series.
Penn State grabbed the second game of the back-to-back, as Sergeev accounted for a 34-save shutout in just his second game back in the crease. From that moment on, the team went on an improbable run to the program’s first ever Frozen Four.
The second half of the year featured many overtime and shootout wins, close calls, and come-from-behind victories. Sergeev cites the team’s positive mindset throughout the year as a core reason for the late-season successes.
“You can’t lose hope,” he said. The guys in the locker room, especially the leadership group, whether Simon Mack or Carson Dyck, they refuse to be negative. And that’s exactly what it was.”
Even though Sergeev was faced with a lot of high-stakes moments, the pressure never seemed to affect him.
“I’m not thinking about the pressure the way the fans are in the game. I’ll put it this way, it’s much more fun to win with the pressure,” he said.
But Sergeev’s ability to win in high leverage situations is no accident. His extensive routine to prepare for games is what keeps him ready for the moment.
He arrives at the rink each morning for warmup, which concludes around 8 a.m. After taking a nap, refueling, and taking a cold shower, he will then head back to the rink before the evening game to get loose again. Sergeev never allows himself to be on his phone in the locker room as it acts as a distraction.
“I try to minimize my superstitions,” he said.
Evidently, the repetition and monotony of Sergeev’s schedule worked out well for him. The netminder finished the season with a .919 save percentage in 33 games played and numerous awards throughout the year, but he cared a whole lot more about the team’s performance than individual stats.
“I’m more proud of the way we turned over. I’ll put a team first and I’m so glad to be part of it,” Sergeev said.
After qualifying for the NCAA tournament, Penn State would wind up having to facing UConn, Sergeev’s former school, in the Allentown Regional Final. What had been his teammates the previous season were now the only people standing in the way of the program’s first ever Frozen Four appearance.
“Going into the game, I couldn’t sleep. I didn’t sleep,” Sergeev said. “I layed down on the bed and tried to close my eyes and not think about it. But you can’t. You can’t throw away two years of your life. This game was special.”
There was no doubting that the result of this game would define Penn State Hockey for years to come. Though the stakes were higher than ever before for Sergeev, the task was as simple as it always had been: let in fewer pucks than the goalie opposite him. If he successfully did this, the Nittany Lions would be playing for a spot in the National Championship.
“It was definitely tough, each aspect of the game, mentally and then physically as well. But that’s the game,” he said.
The game wound up being one for the ages. Penn State would defeat UConn in overtime courtesy of a Matt DiMarsico game winner. Sergeev needed to stand on his head on multiple occasions for the Nittany Lions, and he did just that.
“It was unbelievable. I’m proud to be a Penn Stater,” he said.
Though he’s been involved in the sport for 16 years, Sergeev looks back on that moment in Allentown as his favorite hockey memory.
After the season concluded in Saint Louis, Sergeev announced a few weeks later that he would be signing an entry-level contract with the Flames, the organization that drafted him four years prior.
“It was a dream as a kid, the goal to be in the NHL. It’s unbelievable. I appreciate the organization to have me sign it,” he said.
Sergeev is currently playing with the Rapid City Rush, Calgary’s East Coast Hockey League affiliate. He had the opportunity to attend the Flames’ training camp, where he met the players he hopes will be his future teammates.
Just as the goal was to win the National Championship at Penn State, Sergeev already has his sights set on winning the Stanley Cup. Growing up, he admired the current two-time defending champion goalie Sergei Bobrovsky. He hopes that one day he will be able to find as much success as his idol has at the professional level.
Though Penn State’s incredible ride ended just short of a national title, Sergeev’s one season wearing the blue and white will be remembered forever. His presence on the ice not only changed the trajectory of the program, but also his mindset and perspective on life.
“Last year showed me anything is possible,” he said.
The bonds that Sergeev created with his teammates in Hockey Valley will last him a lifetime, especially those with Jimmy Dowd, whom he met when he first arrived in the United States, and now-captain Dane Dowiak.
While Sergeev is now onto bigger things in his post-college life, he will always look back fondly on his Penn State career. He wishes he could relive his time spent in front of the Roar Zone, and experience the culture of the university and everything it means to be a Nittany Lion once more.
“The best year of my life was being at Penn State,” Sergeev said.