The ISU hockey team will play its first road series this weekend when it takes the trip to Ypsilanti, Mich., to face off against the Eastern Michigan University Eagles.

The Cyclones are coming off of a 9-3 home stand that includes three series sweeps and three series splits.

Eastern Michigan, on the other hand, has not been as successful as Iowa State with only a 2-7 record. However, junior forward Pete Majkozak said the Cyclones cannot afford to overlook the Eagles.

“You can never go into the series thinking you’re going to blow out the other team, especially when you’re playing on the road,” Majkozak said. “They play in our conference, which is a strong conference from what we’ve seen in the past. Any one team can beat the other team on any given night.”

Junior defenseman Brent Cornelius is expecting Eastern Michigan, despite their struggles this season, to give the Cyclones a tough challenge this weekend.

“They’ll be a quick team,” Cornelius said. “They’ll probably try and draw some penalties from us and hopefully we can play disciplined.”

The Cyclones’ offense will be looking to put up some strong numbers as they face an Eastern Michigan team that has allowed 58 goals in 12 games. The Cyclones will also be looking to stop Eastern Michigan’s leading scorer, sophomore forward Joe Schweiger, who is also tied for fifth in the ACHA in goals scored.

Eastern Michigan, on the other hand, will have its work cut out as it goes up against an ISU defense that held Lindenwood, the highest scoring offense in the Central States Collegiate Hockey League, to its lowest scoring output of the season.

For Friday’s game, the Cyclones will find themselves playing on an Olympic sheet of ice, which is a little wider than the normal NHL rink. Olympic ice is 100 feet wide while the NHL size is 85 feet wide. Coach Al Murdoch said the home ice advantage will not disrupt the play of the Cyclones.

“A bigger sheet of ice works to the advantage of a better skating team and I feel as though we are pretty good skating team,” Murdoch said. “They’ll try to utilize the home ice advantage, but we play well on the road, so we’ll try to take away that advantage early by scoring early and often.”

The Cyclones hope this road trip will be continuation of their early success. Although it is still early, Cornelius and the rest of the team believe this series will give the younger players some good experience as well as help build the team’s confidence.

“For some of the freshmen it’s their first road trip, and hopefully when we get there they’ll grasp the concept [of away games] quickly,” Cornelius said.

Cornelius also referenced last year’s opening road series against Ohio and how its early road struggles did not help the team’s confidence.

“Those losses last year weren’t good for the team’s morale,” Cornelius said. “I’m hoping that this weekend will be different. We’re flying [to Eastern Michigan] this year so hopefully we won’t have road legs. We’re also practicing earlier that morning and hopefully that’ll help.”

Majkozak also believes winning these road games will be important for the team.

“It’s very important mostly because it’s always good to get the first road win out of the way, it’s always tougher, though, but you need to win on the road if you’re a high-ranked team,” he said.