Mike Eaves can see what might be coming for his Wisconsin Badgers men's hockey team.

"At the pro level, when guys go on road trips, that first game back is always a pain in a fanny for coaches because guys relax," Eaves said. "'Oh, we're home for eight games. We'll have it made now.'"

Eaves knows better, and now he and his coaching staff will try to make sure his players do, too.

After playing 10 of their first 14 games on the road, the Badgers have eight straight at the Kohl Center starting with this weekend's College Hockey Showcase against Michigan State on Friday and No. 14 Michigan on Saturday.

The stretch carries through a first-half-closing series against No. 19 Alaska Anchorage, the Badger Hockey Showdown on Dec. 27 and 28 and a nonconference series against Northern Michigan on Jan. 2 and 3.

As much as it might be natural to relax, the Badgers don't have that luxury because of the 0-6-1 hole they dug for themselves over the first seven games of the season.

After that start, they went unbeaten in five games before an ugly loss last Friday at St. Cloud State. But they followed with a 1-0 victory on Saturday to get back on track.

"We're kind of on a roller coaster," freshman winger Jordy Murray said. "We finally stepped up again, but we've got to keep this going now."

It was an important victory on Saturday to show the Badgers that they're not as bad as they appeared in the 6-2 loss a night earlier. With a 5-7-2 overall record, they gave themselves a realistic chance to get back even before the holiday break.

As much as the first four weekends were being highlighted on the UW schedule because all eight games were against ranked opponents, finishing the first seven weeks was like clearing a hurdle because of the number of road games.

"Although we're not quite .500, we did a pretty good job coming through this," Eaves said. "Our next eight are at home. We could look back at the end of the year and say this was a turning point of our season."

Too many, times seven

The Badgers are rapidly approaching an infamous, yet little-known program record.

They have been called for having too many men on the ice seven times this season, including once in each of the last four games. The season total is four shy of the record, set in 2002-03.

That's not a mark you'll find in the UW record books, but available data shows that only five Wisconsin teams in the modern era starting in 1963 had more bench penalties in a season than the 2008-09 squad already has registered.

The Badgers had eight in 1992-93, nine in 1995-96, 11 in 2002-03, nine in 2004-05 and eight in 2006-07.

Wisconsin leads the country in too-many-men penalties this season. Connecticut, No. 4 Northeastern and Sacred Heart have been penalized four times each to rank second.

"It's a frustrating thing from a coaching standpoint because it's something we talk about on a weekly basis, if not a daily basis," UW assistant coach Mark Osiecki said.