After putting up 40 goals in two games in blowout wins over the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, the Eastern club hockey team hit a bump on its two game road trip to St. Louis this past weekend, falling 8-5 and 4-1.

Despite the score, junior forward Andrew Maronich said the game was closer than indicated on the scoreboard.

“We played with them the whole game, we shot ourselves in the foot by taking a few to many dumb penalties,” he said. “A lot like the first game, the (second) game was a lot closer than the score indicated. I really thought we outplayed them in the first and third periods.”

In the second game, St. Louis scored two goals in two minutes, which Maronich said was a turning point in the game.

“We fired more shots on net than they did in the second game, but we were having trouble putting it behind their goalie,” he said. “Once again (senior goalie) Andrew Teske played a great game, and deserved a win, we all were pretty bummed that we couldn’t get him one.”

Maronich said the team needs to regroup defensively in preparation for its next series against Southern Illinois-Edwardsville.

“We need to really focus on the defensive zone in practice this week, we were running around way to often in the defensive zone which led to a few goals for SLU,” he said.

Maronich also stressed staying out of the penalty box and converting on the power plays.

“We had a good amount of chances on the Power Play but only scored on it a couple times all weekend,” he said. “In order for us to put more pucks in the net we need to capitalize when we have the man advantage.”

Overall, Maronich called this weekend’s series a reality check for the team, now 2-2 on the season.

“I thought that this weekend was a good reality check,” he said. “We know what we have to work on, and on the flip side, we know what we did well.”

The team will hit the road again this weekend, taking on Southern Illinois-Edwardsville at 6:30 p.m. Friday and 8:45 a.m. Saturday at the East Alton Ice Arena in East Alton.

Dominic Renzetti can be reached at 581-2812 or dcrenzetti@eiu.edu.