HANCOCK, Mich. — For the Saint Mary's University women's hockey team, it's not the quantity of goals they score that matters — it's the quality of those goals.

The Cardinals were held to two goals of less for the 12th time this season in Friday's game against Finlandia — and for the third straight time, SMU's low-octane offense proved to be more than enough.

Laura Mueller (St. Paul, Minn.) netted the game's only goal two minutes into the five-minute overtime period and Amanda Gage (Lino Lakes, Minn.) stopped all 25 shots she faced as the Cardinals notched a 1-0 victory over the Lions.

"It was a defensive battle, no doubt about that," said SMU coach Terry Mannor, whose team won its second straight OT contest — having dispatched of Concordia 2-1 in OT last Saturday. "Amanda played a great game — she stopped four or five breakaways and made several huge saves for us. Their goalie (Katie Markovich) played well, too. Those two pretty much stole the show."

Until the 2:32 mark of period No. 4, that is.

Mueller, who assisted on Melissa Mondo's (Vadnais Heights, Minn.) game-winning OT goal against the Cobbers last Saturday, traded places with her junior linemate on Friday — scoring her fourth goal of the season to help SMU improve to 6-10-2 overall.

"I thought we played pretty well," said Mannor, whose team's three-game winning streak — in which they have outscored their opponents 5-1 — is a season-high. "(Finlandia) is the strongest, most physical team we've faced this year, but we were the quicker team, so it kind of evened out.

"It was a pretty even game all the way around — we got a break (in the overtime) and capitalized on it and that was the difference."