NEW ULM — For the first time in their history, the New Ulm Steel will play the Peoria, Illinois Mustangs in pair of weekend games this Friday and Saturday at 7:10 p.m at the New Ulm Civic Center.

Peoria, a 450-mile one-way trip, comes into this weekends’ matchup with a 16-12-1-2 mark in the Central Division, good enough for fourth place.

The Steel, 16-11-2-1 and in third place in the West Division, are hoping to earn four points this weekend.

“We are watching film on them early this week as we have no idea what type of team they are not having played them at all,” Steel coach Zach Stepan said.

One thing that New Ulm fans m notice is that the Steel are carrying four goaltenders.

Late last week they added Igor Samokhvalov as their fourth net minder. Samokhvalov is from Helsinki, Finland and had been playing with the NAHL Chippewa Steel.

“As of right now we are sticking with the four (A.J. Cohen, Zac Hattan, Jack Raymond and Samokhvalov),” Stepan said. “Igor has the credentials but nothing changes — he has to prove himself just like everyone else. We will give him a couple of weeks, see what he can do and then make some decisions after that.”

Stepan said that there are still possible to try and shake up the team.

“Trades in the NA3HL are a different monster and there is not as much opportunity to do that. If we do make a trade we want to make sure that it is a trade that is also good for the players hockey career too.”

Friday night is “$2 Beer Night” with Saturday night “North Star Builders Night” with a game hockey puck give-away.