Box Score

WINONA, Minn. — Just when coach Jeff Halberg thought his Saint Mary's University men's team had turned the corner, the Cardinals ran into yet another road block.

A day after SMU took two giant steps forward by snapping a season-high five-match losing streak with back-to-back wins over Northwestern (9-0) and Minnesota State-Mankato (6-3), the Cardinal men took a step backwards on Sunday, as St. Scholastica dealt Saint Mary's a 5-4 nonconference setback at the SMU Tennis Center.

"We played very well — for about an hour — and then we seemed to fall apart," said Halberg, whose women's team did not have any more success against the Saints, as St. Scholastica rolled to an 8-1 victory. "The guys came out and played pretty well, but we had a couple of matches get away from us — we won the first set at both No. 2 and No. 6 singles — and lost both.

"That proved to be the difference."

Unlike Saturday, in which the Cardinal men won three, three-set affairs in beating Minnesota State, SMU was 0-for-2 in three-setters vs. the Saints.

Tom Vollman (Oak Park, Ill.) opened with a 6-3 win over Ryan Antony at No. 2 singles, but Antony rallied for a 6-4 second-set victory and outlasted the SMU senior in the third and final set, eventually posting an 11-9 win. It was more of the same for David Reckase (La Crosse, Wis.) at No. 6 singles, where the Cardinal freshman opened with a 6-2 win, lost in a second-set tiebreaker, 7-6, then dropped the third set 10-7.

SMU did pick up straight-set singles wins from Adam Solseth (Shakopee, Minn.) and Tony Miller (Rochester, Minn.), as well as doubles wins from Steve Grundhoefer (St. Paul, Minn.)-Vollman at No. 1 and Solseth-Steve Clements (La Crosse, Wis.), but it wasn't enough.

After dropping all three doubles matches against the Saints, the Cardinal women ran out of gas, dropping five of the six singles matches. Val Meschke (Pine River, Minn.) was the only SMU player to win, as the Cardinal sophomore improved to 11-1 overall with a three-set, 6-1, 4-6, 10-8 win at No. 3 singles.

"If there's one thing I learned this weekend, it's not to schedule an opponent as tough as (St. Scholastica) for the day after a doubleheader," said Halberg. "We just ran out of gas, it was that simple. We played some great tennis, we just didn't have anything left in the tank."