LEWISTON – The mood remained lighter in practice this week at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee, as the Lewiston Maineiacs prepared to head back out onto the road this weekend.

Why shouldn’t the mood have been light?

The Maineiacs, after suffering through three consecutive losses to the Drummondville Voltigeurs by a combined score of 28-9, visited Rimouski last weekend and escaped with a 5-2 win over the Memorial Cup host Oceanic.

Now, the team faces the unenviable task of calling upon the league’s best team Friday night when it takes on the Shawinigan Cataractes in the first game of two in two nights on the road.

“We need to try to put together a little bit of a string here of two or three in a row,” Maineiacs’ coach Ed Harding said. “That would help not only with our confidence, but it would give some of the younger guys some experience as well.”

The Cataractes are a solid team, top to bottom, featuring four of the league’s top 13 point-producers and the league’s second-rated goaltender in Timo Pielmeier (2.01 GAA, .939 save percent).

“We’re going to have to be mentally very tough against Shawinigan,” Harding said. “They’re very tough offensively, and they’re very good on their power play.”

Even the Cats’ younger players are among the upper echelon. Shawinigan has three of Central Scouting’s top 15 QMJHL players for the next NHL draft on its roster.

Lewiston, meanwhile, will face the unenviable task of slowing down the league’s top power play unit. The Cataractes man-up crew has averaged 36.4 percent on the season, easily the best in the league.

“They’ve scored about half their goals on the power play,” Harding said. “They have a very aggressive, very hard forecheck, very similar to Drummondville, and our success is going to depend a lot on how well we get the puck out of our zone.”

Lewiston’s PK unit, in addition to being one of the worst in the league, has been one of the more called-upon, though Harding said this week the past couple of games have been much better.

In the Maineiacs’ second game this weekend, the team travels to Gatineau to face the struggling Olympiques, who just ended a stretch of 13 consecutive losses. The Olympiques are the only team in the league this season to have amassed more penalty minutes than Lewiston.

Lewiston returns home next week for a pair of games surrounding Thanksgiving, hosting Shawinigan on Wednesday and Acadie-Bathurst on Friday following the holiday.