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WINONA, Minn. — One down, one to go.

In a season that has seen more downs  than ups, the Saint Mary's University men's soccer team had a simple approach to their final two games — win both.

Thanks to Thursday's 3-2 nonconference victory over Upper Iowa, the Cardinals are halfway there.

SMU scored three unanswered goals — including career-firsts from #D.J. Prideaux# (Eden Prairie, Minn.) and Connor McHugh (Stillwater, Minn.) — as the Cardinals snapped a two-game losing streak with a 3-2 nonconference win over the Peacocks Thursday at Ochrymowycz Field.

"It's been a tough season, and these guys have been through a lot," said SMU coach Chris Dembiec, whose team improved to 4-12-1 overall — with all four wins coming at home. "It's nice to see them come away with a win like this.

"This will certainly give the guys a huge boost of confidence heading into (Saturday's) game against Bethel."

The end result may have earned the Cardinals that confidence-boost, but there was a time early Thursday that Dembiec wasn't feeling too confident — especially after Upper Iowa's Ken Andersen put a shot past SMU goalkeeper Jon Szafranski (Barrington, Ill.) less than three minutes  into the game.

"When they scored that goal, I wasn't sure what to think," admitted Dembiec. "It was almost like, 'Oh, no, here we go again.' "

Unlike their previous two games — when SMU was outscored by a combined 11-1 — the Cardinals used the Peacocks' early goal as a wake-up call.

And wake up they did.

Jovenel D'Haiti (Evanston, Ill.) pulled SMU even with his second goal of the game at the 17:36 mark, and Prideaux would give the Cardinals the lead for good less than two minutes later. McHugh then pushed that Cardinal lead to 3-1 with his first collegiate goal five minutes into the second half, before the Peacocks made things  interesting as Josh Andersen beat Szafranski to cut the gap to one, 3-2.

"We came out a little flat, but once (Upper Iowa) scored that goal, it seemed to wake us up," said Dembiec. "We didn't make it easy on ourselves, that's for sure,  but overall, I thought we played pretty well.

"Hopefully we can put together the same type of effort (Saturday) against Bethel."