The Cyclones wore their red road jerseys as part of Friday night’s “red out” for its series opener against the Bobcats of Ohio University.

Despite the road attire, Iowa State  looked right at home as they skated past the Bobcats 4-2.

The Cyclones came out aggressive, putting the Bobcats against the boards early and limiting their shot opportunities. Ohio stayed aggressive as they continued to push the puck into Cyclone territory, but strong defensive play kept the pressure off sophomore goalie Erik Hudson.

Both teams had only 14 combined shots on goal in the opening period and Iowa State played a man down for most of the period as they were handicapped by numerous slashing penalties. The decrease in penalties throughout the game helped the Cyclones get the victory.

“We need to adjust to the way the refs are calling the game,” associate head coach Brian Wierson said. “We took three slashing penalties in the first period but the penalties swung in our favor throughout the game and I give credit to the guys for that. We talked to them about that between periods and I thought we did a good job of that tonight too.”

Junior forward Brian Spring also thought the decrease in penalties had an effect on the game.

“I think were a lot better team five-on-five, its hard to kill penalties all period, but we did a good job of pental killing, Spring said. “But its not something we want to do all game so eliminating the lazy slashing penalties definitely helped us in this game.”

The second period began much like the first with no goals in the opening five minutes of the period. With a little under 13 minutes left in the second period, freshman defenseman Josh Mandich picked up a two -minute penalty for hooking, putting the Cyclones a man down once again, but their special teams defense kept the Bobcats off the scoreboard once again.

With 8:50 left in the period, Iowa State gained a man advantage as Ohio was called for an interference penalty allowing the Cyclones to score right as the penalty expired. They were able to get five consecutive shots on goal, before junior forward Derek Behrman put in the games first goal off the deflection. The Cyclones went up 1-0.

“It was a big momentum gainer for us, we had a lot of penalties in the first period so that first goal really set the momentum for us going forward.” Behrman said.

This also spoke volumes about the Cyclones rebounding ability.

“That’s one of the things we focused on,” Wierson said. “Marshall, the goalie for OU is one of the top goalies in the nation; he made the World University Games team, so to score on goalies like that, you aren’t going to score on the first shot very often. Our guys had to do a lot of puck hunting tonight and I thought we did a great job of that.”

With just under two minutes left in the period, The Bobcats started to put more pressure on the Cyclones, but Hudson’s strong goalkeeping kept them at bay once again, as he stopped 3 rebound shots from close range and the second period ended with Iowa State’s lead still in tact at 1-0.

In the third period, the floodgates opened for both teams as the goals started to flow.

ISU carried the momentum into the third period as they scored less than a minute in, with senior forward Bill Adolph pushing the Cyclone lead to 2-0. The goal gave Adolph eleven goals on the season to go along with 15 assists.

The Bobcats were finally able to put a dent in the score column as center Michael Schultz put one past Hudson on a nicely placed, top-shelf shot.

With 10:51 remaining, Spring put the Cyclones up 3-1 with a one-timer just in front of the blue line. Freshman defenseman Brody Toigo and junior defenseman Adam Mueller were credited with the assists on the play. This was Spring’s 19th goal of the season, which ties him for the team lead with senior forward Mike Murtaugh.

Ohio answered back quickly, however, as defenseman Steve Osacky answered back with a slap shot of his own, bringing the difference back to one at 3-2 With 8:30 remaining in the game.

Less than a minute later, Behrman continued to put the pressure on as he scored his second goal of the game, stretching the lead back to 4-2, which held until the final buzzer sounded.

The sixith-ranked Cyclones pushed their record to 20-4-1 with the victory.