Game Summary

ST. PAUL, Minn. — The Saint Mary's University women's hockey team controlled their own destiny heading into their regular season-ending series against St. Thomas.

Problem was, achieving that destiny was going to be anything but easy.

The Cardinals entered Friday's opening game needing a win to clinch a spot in the five-team Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference tournament — and they were coming off a rather disappointing 0-1-1 series against St. Olaf the previous weekend.

Add to that the fact that Friday's opponent was none other than league-leading St. Thomas — a team that was unbeaten in conference play (14-0-2) — and the Cardinals' backs were most definitely against the wall.

They may have been down, but they certainly weren't out.

Led by junior sharpshooter Emily Kearns (Hopkins, Minn.), the Cardinals came out with guns a blazing against the Tommies, scoring three second-period goals — including the game-winner by Kearns 16 minutes into the second period — as SMU locked up a berth in the conference tournament with a 3-2 win.

"Everyone played well, and that's what we needed — a total team effort," said SMU coach Duncan Ryhorchuk. "St. Thomas is a good team, and they played a good game. We started out a little slow in the first period, but we really picked it up in the second."

The Cardinals fell behind 1-0 after the opening period, but SMU regrouped between periods and turned up the heat in the game's second period. Kearns pulled SMU even, 1-1, with her team-leading 21st goal. The two teams then swapped goals — SMU's coming off the stick of Tasa Kostel (Rochester, Minn.) — before Kearns netted her game-winner at 16:38 of the period.

"Offensively, we did a nice job," said Ryhorchuk, whose team's three-goal outburst was its highest offensive effort since a 3-0 win over St. Benedict on Feb. 9 — and just the 10th time in the Cardinals' 24 games that they have scored three of more goals. "It was good to see (our offense) play like that."

Yet, as happy as Ryhorchuk was about his team's showing on Friday, he wasn't about to get too excited.

After all, the Cardinals want to go into post-season play on a high — and a repeat performance would accomplish that nicely.

"The key for us is not to have a letdown," said Ryhorchuk. "It's going to be tough. It's Senior Day, which gives us one more thing to worry about. Hopefully we can use that to give us an additional boost — but the bottom line is, we can't afford any kind of letdown.

"St. Thomas is a very, very good team — if we don't play our best, we're going to be in trouble."