It was a rough start to the 2010-11 season for the Clarkson University Hockey team out in the Midwest as the Golden Knights lost to Nebraska-Omaha 8-0 in the first round of the Mutual of Omaha Stampede on Friday night.

Clarkson will look to find its stride on Saturday when the Green and Gold faceoff against 4th-ranked St. Cloud State at 5:00 p.m. EST at the Qwest Center in Omaha.

The Knights fell behind Nebraska-Omaha 1-0 just 66 seconds after the opening faceoff on Friday when the Mavericks’ Zahn Raubenheimer connected on a tip-in. Clarkson appeared to have an excellent opportunity to tie the game when a UNO player was called for a five-minute major penalty at 1:31, but just 24 seconds into the man-advantage Clarkson was whistled for the first of two back-to-back tripping infractions which wiped out the majority of the Knights man-advantage.

At 12:24, Matt Ambroz tallied on the power play to give the home team a 2-0 lead after the first period. The Mavericks added three more goals in the middle frame to hold a commanding 5-0 advantage through 40 minutes.

Nebraska-Omaha closed out their season-opening win with three more goals in the final stanza.

UNO outshot Clarkson 60-26. Junior Paul Karpowich (Thunder Bay, ONT) started in the Knights net and posted a career-high saves in a period with 23 in the first, followed by 14 more in the second for a two period total of 37. Junior Richie LaVeau (Arlington Heights, IL) played the third period for Clarkson and made 15 stops on 18 shots.

The Knights were 0-of-5 on the power play while UNO went 1-of-8 with the man-advantage.