The Park road warriors finally ran into a team they couldn’t handle.

Host White Bear Lake was bigger, stronger and faster than Park Saturday in an 8-2 win at TCO Sports Garden.

The contest was Park’s 11th road game in 12 games so far this season and Park’s fourgame winning streak was snaped with a thud.

The game was still competitive through two periods as white Bear Lake led 4-2 after two periods. But the Bears dominated in the third period, outscoring Park 5-0.

Park slipped to 7-5 on the season and 2-3 in the Suburban East Conference. White Bear Lake improved to 7-5 overall and 4-1 in the conference.

The Wolfpack came into Saturday’s contest off four straight wins, beating Northfield, Southwest Christian/ Richfield, Irondale and Forest Lake in the streak. Park average win in the run was 6-3.

“I hate to say it but part of it is who you play,” said Park head coach Jay Moser. “We recently have been playing teams that are similar to us and we’ve show resolve at the right time. And we’ve been fortunate to score some goals. But even in our recent run of victories we’ve still been giving up too many goals. And against better, bigger stronger, faster, higher-caliber teams like this if you can’t get the puck out of your own net you’re not going to win too many games.”

That was White Bear Lake on Saturday. The Wolfpack found themselves up against a much tougher opponent and were eventually outgunned on both offense and defense. Park trailed just 3-2 midway through the second period, but the game got out of hand for the visitors after that. The Bears were up 4-2 with nine minutes to play in the second period then controlled the ice action at both ends of the rink the rest of the way.

“We need to learn from opponents like this that are better,” added Moser. “And these guys are bigger, they’re stronger and they’re faster – we don’t play or practice at a speed that allows us to be successful when we go to a game like this. We have to elevate our practice play. We have to be more mentally prepared to do some of the things that we don’t do well against better teams.”

Park 7, Forest Lake 5 Park outscored host Forest Lake (5-7-1, 2-4) 7-5 in a back-and-forth conference win Thursday at Forest Lake Sports Center. It was the Wolfpack’s fourth straight win.

Park trailed 2-1 after the first period but knotted the game at 3-all to start the third. Forest Lake took leads of 4-3 and 5-4 in the third but the Wolfpack scored the game’s last three goals to earn the win.

Noah Janski and Brady Strand each had a pair of goals to lead Park, with Janski scoring twice in the decisive third period. Also scoring for the Wolfpack were Samuel Janski, Mac Wohnoutka and Jackson Rudh. Rudh and Samuel Janski each had two assists in the contest.

Park goalie Alex Harden stopped 22 of 27 shots to earn the win in goal. The Wolfpack outshot the hosts 44-37.

After playing 11 of 12 games on the road to start the season, Park has another away non-conference contest Tuesday at Eastview (9-5). Then the Wolfpack are home for seven straight games, starting with a home date Thursday, Jan. 20, against Roseville (7-5, 3-3) at 7 p.m. Park plays nine of its last 11 games at Cottage Grove Ice Arena.

Park’s Nathan Donlan battles for the puck against a White Bear Lake opponent Saturday.Photo by John Molene