CRUSHER FORWARD Devin Mantha breaks past the Otters defense in Junior A action in Huntsville on Friday night. Photo/MIKE MALONEY The Orangeville Crushers are finding out that learning curves has ups and downs.

After posting a pair of wins the week before, Orangeville found themselves on the wrong side of the score sheet this past weekend, dropping games to both Huntsville and Collingwood.

Friday night had the Crushers in Huntsville for their third meeting with the division leading Otter.

In each of their previous outings, Huntsville had taken advantage of momentary lapses by the Crushers to take a lead in what was otherwise an evenly matched game and this game would be no different.

Robert Visca opened the scoring for Orangeville just under four minutes into the opening frame. Planted in the slot, Visca shoveled a pass from Nikolas Matwijszyn under Otters goalie Jeff Dawson to take an early lead.

Refusing to let the visitors have their way before a packed house, Huntsville would respond in kind, twelve seconds later.

Kurt Zdrilich combined with Visca to score a short handed marker late in the period making the score 2-1 heading into the second.

Midway through two, Huntsville capitalized on a hooking penalty to Nick Hearn to again even the score.

It was play in the third that saw the momentary lapse which would make the difference. Otters Jon Whitelaw snapped a pair 15 seconds apart past Crusher cager Steve Zoffranieri off the top to take a 4-2 lead which they would hold on to for the win.

Saturday night it was back home for the Crushers and a rematch with Collingwood, one of the two teams, they had beaten the weekend before.

Again it was Orangeville getting off to an early lead, this time with Matt Crilly doing the honours on a powerplay with assists going to Visca and Chris Chidwick.

The Blues would draw even in the final minute of first period play, ruining the home debut of Neil Clelland between the Crusher pipes.

Both teams garnered chances through the second but it was not until the third that Collingwood would exact some revenge for their previous loss, scoring two unanswered goals while holding Orangeville at bay to take the win by a final score of 3-1.

The weekend ahead promises to be both busy as well as more challenging for Orangeville.

Thursday night sees the team in Stoufville up against the Spirit for their first meeting of the season then it's back home to the Alder Street Community Centre at 7:30 p.m., both Friday and Saturday night for dates with Newmarket and Aurora respectively.