Penalties killed Eastern

Kevin Kenealy
Online Interactive Editor

After blowing out the Northern Illinois Huskies 9-3 in game one, Eastern took the hard loss 4-3 in overtime to split the series and go 5-3 on the season.

In a real physical bout for both sides, Eastern stayed right on the Huskies' toes in game two despite playing in a five on three for the entire third period.

EIU led NIU 3-2 with about six on the clock in the third in fact, but the Eastern defense that had been so strong up until that point fell asleep at just the wrong time as Northern squeaked one by the left side of Eastern goalie Eric Grap for the tie with 3:40 remaining in the third.

Later on, however, Eastern's defense and Grap's big save on the pile up shot in the crease near the end of the third forced the five-minute overtime.

Northern won the face-off on the five on four start of the fourth and it wasn't too much longer before the red jerseys gathered in celebration.

"We were playing good 'd,' but they caught a lucky break; one of our 'd' got caught flat footed," remarked forward Dale Michonski. "They flooded the net, got a lucky rebound and got the shot in the net. But we're gonna come back."

Grap had been near perfect after letting up two goals in the first, picking up save after save. And the Eastern offense generated enough momentum off a brilliantly meandered Dan Seachrist score on a five on three in the second and a Derek Hay breakaway off of Danny Delvecchio's assist in the third to keep the game tight at two a-piece.

But penalties, which included Elrod getting five for fighting and a game misconduct among others, led to Eastern's eventual downfall in game two.

"If we could stay out of the box a little more, I think it would have been a lot closer throughout the game and then we had to play some catch up," Grap said. "And then just coming into OT, we were already down 5-4 and that's just what killed us and they just scored right away. We just got to stay out of the box."

Despite the penalties, Eastern Head Coach Cameron Estes believed his team played a solid game.

"Nothing really went wrong today. We came out of here three out of four points on the weekend; that's a positive note on the road to be able to do that. Northern's not a slouch by any means. The penalties killed us, but when you play a whole period of hockey five on three, what do ya do?"