The Ohio State men’s ice hockey team secured home ice for the first round of the Central Collegiate Hockey Association playoffs.The Buckeyes did not get home ice the way they wanted to get it. The Bucks needed to win both games this weekend to be at home for the playoffs, or they needed to win one game and hope Notre Dame lost both of its games. The Buckeyes beat Ferris State 4-1 Friday night and Notre Dame lost. Saturday night last place Alaska-Fairbanks beat the Buckeyes 3-2 in overtime; fortunately for the Bucks, Notre Dame lost, securing home ice.In Friday’s game the Buckeyes came out flying as OSU’s defenseman Ryan Jestadt took the puck and buried it past Ferris State goalie Vince Owen two minutes into the game. Less than five minutes later senior Chris Richards took advantage of a power play and slammed the puck into the net after Owen gave up a rebound to a wide open right hand side. Eric Meloche and Hugo Boisvert had assists on Richards’ goal. Six minutes later senior Brian Morrison scored his second goal of the season while the Bucks were on a power play. Richards and Andre Signoretti assisted on the Bucks’ third goal. The Buckeyes scored again in the second period when Richards took the faceoff in the Ferris State zone, sidestepped the Ferris center and beat their goalie Osaer.OSU relaxed a bit in the remainder of the second and third periods. OSU coach John Markell said his team was fortunate to have scored early because the way it played in the second and third periods, they could have easily lost.”I thought we played our game in the first period, then we let it get away from ourselves,” Markell said. “We leave ourselves open for a comeback when we kinda shut it down like we did tonight.”At Saturday’s game against the Alaska-Fairbanks Nanooks the Buckeyes honored the seniors: Brandon Lafrance, Neal Rech, Brian Morrison, Chris Richards and Dan Cousineau. The Buckeyes found themselves behind the eight ball early into the game. The Nanooks scored just after the five-minute mark on a shot from the point that was redirected in front of OSU goalie Jeff Maund. They added a second goal on the power play. The Bucks weren’t going to go down without a fight and on a power play Jean-Francois Dufour scored on a blistering shot from the point. The Buckeyes tied it up 16 minutes into the first period when senior Dan Cousineau took the puck around one Nanook and right up the middle, gave Marvel the old one-two and backhanded it home. The Bucks and Nanooks exchanged chances to break the tie in the third period. The Nanooks scored three and one-half minutes into overtime to upset the Buckeyes.After the game Markell was upset with his team. He said he didn’t want to be negative toward the end of the season but he was almost at a loss for words. He said he felt his team was playing well enough to just hang on.”It happened again. We’re not learning from our mistakes,” Markell said. “We’re successful against good teams, we don’t apply our systems against the teams we think we can just go out there and lollygag around and that’s exactly the reason why we lose.”