Coaching at Hobbs Ice Center for the first time since 1987, Wisconsin Badgers men’s hockey coach Mike Eaves was taken aback at how far the arena has come since his stint as Blugold head coach nearly 20 years ago.

The former coach, who brought his Badgers’ squad up to Hobbs Ice Center for an intrasquad scrimmage Saturday afternoon, said the event exceeded his expectations because of the atmosphere inside the home of the 2013 NCAA Division III National Champion Blugolds.

“It’s an amazing transformation,” Eaves said. “I haven’t been at a lot of (Division III) places, but I would say this would rank right up there. It’s great to see the progress of this program here culminated with winning the Division III National Championship; they got a great house here. If they can just keep things rolling here, it’s going to be something special.”

More than 1,000 people, most of them clad in the cardinal and white colors of UW-Madison, turned out to see the Badgers on the first Saturday of October, something Eaves said helped his current team play hard in the scrimmage.

“We played at a pretty high tempo today because we had a great atmosphere here,” Eaves said. “Our kids were excited to be here, the house was packed, and it was a fun atmosphere for our guys. We got a lot out of this day.”

The structure of the afternoon was a 30-minute practice session for the Badgers, who come into the season ranked third in the NCAA Division I, followed by two 20-minute periods with a shootout at the end. The scrimmage ended in a 3-3 tie with the cardinal team winning 9-6 after the shootout.

The highlight of the scrimmage, for Eau Claire hockey fans anyway, came when two former Eau Claire Memorial High School teammates hooked up for a goal in the first period. Former Mr. Hockey, given annually to the top prep hockey player in Wisconsin, and current assistant captain of the Badgers, Jefferson Dahl, knocked the puck into the back of the net off a pass from the other assistant captain and Old Abe alumn Jake McCabe, drawing a thunderous ovation from the near capacity crowd at Hobbs Ice Center.

Dahl said it was pretty special to score a goal in the same building he played in for Eau Claire Memorial.

“It was nice to get one here, definitely,” Dahl said. “It was a lot of fun.”

McCabe, too, said it was great to score a point in the arena he once called home.

“We were laughing when we came in after that goal and guys were giving us crap like, ‘Oh, Eau Claire connection,’” McCabe said.

All proceeds of the day’s events went  directly to the Blugold men’s hockey program. A week removed from receiving their massive 3XL championship rings commemorating the title won last March, head coach Matt Loen said the day’s event couldn’t have gone much better.

“It was awesome,” Loen said. “It was kind of weird to see all of the red in the stands, but other than that I thought it went well.”

Loen also said it was encouraging to see so many community members in the stands, because he said it only emphasizes Eau Claire has become a hockey town.

“It was nice to see because I don’t think we had many students out there, which is a lot of our crowds,” he said. “It was great to see all of the Eau Claire youth hockey and community came out to see the Badgers. Neat atmosphere for us.”

Everybody benefited from the event, as Dahl said the Badgers had a blast making the two-and-a-half hour trek from Madison to play in front of his hometown.

“This is great,” Dahl said. “We knew people from Eau Claire were going to come support the Blugolds and us, and it couldn’t have gone any better.”

Eaves said he is already considering making a similar trip, whether it would be to Eau Claire or another smaller venue, next year. The Badgers start their regular season Friday night against Northern Michigan at the KohlCenter in Madison.

As for the Blugolds, they’ll begin their title defense with the first practice on Oct. 21 and the first game coming at home against St. Olaf (Minn.) Nov. 8.