The ACHA postseason started this weekend with tournaments across the country, including the CSCHL tournament, which featured the ISU hockey squad. Although the Cyclones went into this past weekend with a depleted team, they showed great poise in finishing third.”I think it was really good for us,” ISU forward Scott Steinkamp said. “The teams that we played against didn’t expect much from us, but we expected a lot from ourselves.”Friday night, the ‘Clones battled against Kent State — a team that tied them earlier this year in Ames. The Cardinal and Gold jumped on top with a goal by Chris Leyen midway through the first. The game was tied after the first stanza due to a goal by Joe Widing.Iowa State controlled early in the second period, going up 4-1 on scores by Paul Roberts, Mike Gilbertson and Glenn Detulleo. Kent State closed the gap with three minutes to go in the period. Mario Durant and Rich Wiland helped their squad back to a 4-3 deficit going into the intermission.The Golden Flashes completed their comeback in the third with a goal by Durant. However, with under nine minutes left, Leyen made good on a power play chance to give the ‘Clones a 5-4 victory.Iowa State squared off with Michigan-Dearborn in the semifinals Saturday. The Cyclones needed overtime to win at Dearborn last semester.The host school scored the only goal of the first frame when Brett Logan placed the puck past Ramyleo Abujobarah to put the Wolves up 1-0.Brent Hojnicki tallied a goal early in the second to give the home squad a two-goal advantage. Detulleo cut the Dearborn lead in half, but that would be the only good news for the Cyclones in the game. Logan and Jeff Bancroft increased the margin to three after the second.Brent Estevez ended the scoring in the third, putting Iowa State in the consolation game with the Cyclones’ 5-1 loss.Sunday, the Cardinal and Gold got a chance to settle the season series with their rivals from Illinois. The two teams split four games this season, each winning two on their own ice.Tom Grimwood and Eric Tofte got the ISU offense on the board before Mark VanZandt could counter for Illinois to send the ‘Clones to the locker room with a 2-1 lead.Todd Chrustowski tied the game after two minutes into the second, but the Cyclone offense would fire it up again. Grimwood, Gilbertson and Steinkamp would light the lamp around freshman J.E. Lagueux, who tallied his first goal of the season during the barrage.”It’s great to finally get that bagel off from under the goal scores,” Lagueux said. “It’s nice to just be out on the ice and helping the team win.”Steve Cichocki tried to salvage a rally, making the score 6-3 after two periods.Leyen scored five minutes into the third to give Iowa State its four-goal lead back. VanZandt made the score 7-4, but Nate Dahlen would shut down the Illini offense as the Cyclones won by that same score. The victory gave the cardinal and gold third place overall in the tournament.According to the players, the team played well despite missing six players and head coach Al Murdoch.”We didn’t play a bad game [Saturday], but we didn’t get the bounces,” Lagueux said. “We showed Illinois that we could beat them with any team.”Any time you’re missing six players of that caliber, you’ll be hurting. You just have to play hard and gritty and get the job done.””I thought overall, we did a really good job,” Steinkamp said. “It was definitely a good finish to the weekend. I think that Saturday, it just wasn’t there for us. We just didn’t have the flow. For Illinois, we wanted to finish on a good note for the weekend. “Even though it wasn’t the championship game, we wanted to finish with something.”With a week before the national tournament in Tucson, Ariz., the team will play one last tune-up series against Northern State this weekend. The USA team members will make return to Iowa State in this series.”Now that those guys are coming back, we’ve proved to ourselves that we have more depth,” Steinkamp said.