BEMIDJI, MINN. - The Niagara men's hockey team (2-9-1, 1-2-1 CHA) continues to play a challenging schedule, dropping its fifth game to a ranked foe, falling 8-2 to CHA rival No. 5 Bemidji State (12-2-1, 7-0-0 CHA) at the John Glas Fieldhouse on Friday night.

"Bemidji is a good team with the lead, especially at home when they can smell blood," head coach Dave Burkholder said. Consecutive even-strength goals in the second period put us in a bad spot."

The game remained scoreless until late in the first period, where Ian Lowe would score the first of his two goals against junior netminder Adam Avramenko (Strathmore, Alb.). The Purple Eagles would head to the locker room down by the slimmest of margins, 1-0.

The Purple Eagles would respond nearly four minutes into the second stanza, when senior Chris Moran (Buffalo, N.Y.) extended his point streak to seven games by sending a nice cross-ice pass over to senior Ryan Olidis (Uxbridge, Ont.), who one-timed it past Bemidji State netminder Dan Bakala. With the game-tying goal, Olidis also extended his point streak to seven games.

With the game tied at one, the Beavers turned up the offensive pressure and netted three goals to take a commanding 4-1 lead into the third period. Bemidji would make it 5-1 early in the third, before senior Egor Mironov (Thornhill, Ont.) would set up Moran on the man-advantage for Niagara's final goal of the night.

The Beavers put the game away with three power-play goals in a seven minute span. Moran finished with two points for his fourth multi-point game of the season.

The Purple Eagles are back in action on Saturday, when they finish their two-game series against the Beavers at 8 p.m. eastern time.