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WINONA, Minn. — New day.

New arena.

New opponent.

Same result.

For the third time in as many days, the Saint Mary's University men's hockey team had the lead, then let it slip away, as UW-Eau Claire rallied from a 3-1 first-period deficit to beat the Cardinals 6-4 in a nonconference game at the SMU Ice Arena Friday evening.

"I don't know what to say," said SMU coach Don Olson, whose team couldn't hold a 4-3 lead in tying UW-Superior 4-4 in their season opener a week ago, then squandered a 4-1 first-period advantage the following night in losing to St. Scholastica 7-4. "We don't seem to want to compete when the going gets a little tough. We're fine when things are going our way, but when we run into a little adversity — when our opponent puts in a goal or two — we just seem to hang our heads.

"If we are going to be successful at all this season, that has got to change," Olson added. "This team has got to decide if we are going to be good only when things are going our way, or if we are going to fight through those stretches of adversity and play hard for a complete 60-minute hockey game."

Thus far this season, playing a complete 60-minute game has been their Achilles' heel.

Take Friday evening, for example.

After giving up a powerplay goal six minutes into the opening period, SMU responded with goals on three of their first five shots, as Eric Dahl (St. Cloud, Minn.), Mike Glaesmer (Traverse City, Mich.) and Jeff Miller (Portage, Mich.) all beat UW-EC goalie Tyler Brigl in a four minute span to give the Cardinals a 3-1 advantage.

An two-goal advantage that lasted five minutes.

UW-EC's Bryan Plaszcz cut the Cardinals' lead in half with the Blugolds' second of four powerplay goals, and Tony Janssen made it 3-3 with powerplay goal No. 3 10 minutes later.

The Cardinals regained a one-goal lead  when Deven VanHouse (Silver Bay, Minn.) netted his first of the season before the second period ended, but the third period was all UW-Eau Claire, as the Blugolds' beat SMU goalie Dan Smith (Rochester, Minn.) twice — including Dan Fina's game-winner directly off a face-off with less than four minutes remaining in regulation. The Blugolds added an empty net goal by Sean Garrity, as UW-Eau Claire kept the Cardinals winless on the season, and extended SMU's winless streak to 10 (0-9-1), dating back to a 5-4 overtime win vs. Hamline on Jan. 26, 2007.

"It's disappointing, because I thought we did some nice things — especially early on," said Olson, whose team was outshot 46-15 and gave up four powerplay goals on nine chances. "Hopefully this game was a wake-up call for our guys — we have got to find a way to play in the third period, the way we play in the first period, We have to keep that energy for 60 minutes.

"If we don't, it could be a long season."