Dropping two in a row to Robert Morris Springfield is never easy after beating University of Cincinnati 20-4 in two games, but it’s how Eastern’s RSO hockey team lost that’s even harder to swallow.

Going into the away trip to Springfield, Eastern hadn’t had any ice practice since their games against Cincinnati two weeks earlier. Perhaps the byeweek last weekend hurt Eastern, losing out 6-2 in their opener Friday night, 12-6 on Saturday.

“We were flat all weekend and we just plain got beat,” head coach Cameron Estes said. “Next week will say a lot as to how we come out for the rest of the season.”

It’s hard to win when Eastern sat for 114 minutes in the box the first game, with forward and big scorer Derek Hay received a disqualification and forward Matt Gross also had a disqualification for fighting. In addition, defenseman Kevin Hicks was sat for not showing up to a couple of practices during the week on Friday.

According to defenseman and assistant captain Richie Nelson, Hay and Gross got in there, punching a forward in the crease, resulting in the disqualifications.

Nelson said the referees lost control of the first five minutes of the first game, as after the fight in the defensive zone, the defense just fell apart.

“The last couple minutes of the game, I got out of the box, ran a kid, then he challenged me to fight; then as I tried to get his helmet off the other four people on his team wanted to fight me too, so I’m swingin’ left and right, ref pretty much throws me. I believe we had five people in the box after that tussle,” Nelson said.

Unlike Robert Morris, who Captain Dave Fitzgerald said came ready to play, as they were digging at the corners and were flying from the first play, Eastern was anything but.

“We just didn’t play good,” forward Joe Kopka said. “We didn’t have practice this week at all because of a trial arena football league in Danville and really didn’t have much hustle during the games. We had a couple guys out for team policy and suspensions that could of helped. We really are a lot better than what we showed this weekend.”

In the second game, Maggio did give up five goals in 25 minutes, although Fitzgerald said he didn’t receive much support defensively and goalie Brian Blake let up the remaining seven on 25 shots.

The games were a result of both bad calls on the refs and bad playing by the team, according to Nelson, something that needs to be corrected this weekend at home against Marquette.

“I think having a couple of soft games before this hurt,” Fitzgerald said. “We need to put these losses behind us and come out strong next weekend. If we play the way we all know we can play we will come out on top next weekend.”