While Iowa State’s football team will have to wait a couple of months to play Missouri, Cyclone Hockey will play host to the Tigers this weekend in their season opening series as they look to build off last year’s 31-11-2 finish and a second-round loss in the National Tournament to eventual runner-up Lindenwood University.

Cyclone Hockey last played the Tigers two seasons ago, with the teams splitting the series 1-1. Coach Al Murdoch believes he knows why Missouri was able to get the best of them in one of those games.

“They played solid defense and had pretty solid goaltending. This year we need to keep coming at them,” Murdoch said. “We took them too lightly two seasons ago.”

The match up also features two coaches from Canada. Both Tigers coach John Lamond and Murdoch are from Canada.

“When you have two Canadian coaches going against each other, it’s going to be a fun series,” Murdoch said. “We’d much rather just take off the gloves and settle it on the ice. I’m sure he would feel the same way.”

A big part of Cyclone Hockey’s attack this year is going to come from their speed and quickness on the ice, while returning starters and seniors Bill Adolf and Mike Murtaugh will look to use their leadership and experience right away against Missouri.

“Our goal is to win two games,” Murdoch said. “I’m looking for our players to show us what speed they have, be attacking the net and jumping on rebounds,”

One of the Cyclones’ biggest question marks going into the season opening series is the goaltender position. Despite returning starter Erik Hudson and back-up Jim Stenson, the position is wide open for a new addition to come on and take the starting spot. Murdoch plans to split periods between three goaltenders for at least the first series to get a better idea of who the best option is to have in goal.

Sophomore forward Mike Lebler believes the key to victory is keeping everything simple this weekend.

“We got some new guys joining the team this year, so we just need to make sure we keep it simple and do our jobs. I think if we can do those things, we should come out with the victory,” Lebler said.

One of the areas Cyclone Hockey hopes is improved from last year’s team is what progress has been made off the ice, Murdoch said.

“We have a pretty good level of enthusiasm,” he said. “We did not have a lot of guys go to summer school, which is good because that means they got good grades when they were here in the fall and spring. I don’t want them here in the summer, I want them home digging ditches and getting stronger for the upcoming season.”

Right now, however, Murdoch is concentrating on this weekend’s series with the Tigers.

 “We split two years ago,” Murdoch said. “So I think it is going to be a great series.”