In the first two games of postseason competition, the Blugold men’s hockey team dropped both to No. 3 UW-River Falls on Friday and Saturday. The 1-3 and 3-6 losses extinguished the team’s hope of moving on to the Northern Collegiate Hockey Association semifinals.

“It just wasn’t our weekend,” coach Matt Loen said. “We had some critical mistakes and River Falls capitalized on them.”

When the puck dropped for the first of the two quarterfinal games, it was River Falls who came out strong. The Falcons scored just over two minutes into the game to kick off the offensive action and then again about three minutes later to go up by two points.

In the second period senior Brant Marple, assisted by freshman Bryce Wilcox and senior D.J. Clark, converted on a power play to put Eau Claire on the board. But the Falcons notched another goal early in the third, handing the Blugolds a 1-3 loss.

Loen said River Falls is a very skilled team, but thought the Blugolds could matchup well with them. Though the Blugolds lost the game, Loen said he thought Eau Claire even outplayed the Falcons at times.

Heading into Saturday night’s game, the Blugolds looked to win, then forced the 20 minute mini-game to determine which team would advance to the NCHA semifinals. But River Falls had a different agenda for the evening.

The Falcons again struck first, scoring two quick goals at the 4:14 and 6:44 minute marks. Freshman Kurt Weston capitalized on a power play midway through the first, but the second period brought disaster for Eau Claire.

River Falls netted goals three times throughout the first 10 minutes of the second, putting them up by four goals. But the Blugolds started to narrow the gap in the third. Weston tallied another goal 5:53 into the period and sophomore Tyler Romasco found the back of the net less than two minutes later. But the comeback ended there, as River Falls would notch another goal and put a stop to the Eau Claire scoring. The Blugolds lost 3-6, ending the 2009-10 season.

“Obviously a couple of tough losses to end the season,” Romasco said. “I thought the effort was there.

“There were some mental mistakes, mental errors that cost us the game.”

Eau Claire finished with an 8-15-4 record overall and a 4-10-4 record in the conference, which represents one more NCHA win than last season. Senior Joe Bluhm led the team with 21 points for the season while Marple and freshman Isaiah Bennis came close with 19 and 16 contributed points, respectively.