Match Summary vs. Augsburg / GameDay Online / Photo Gallery

WINONA, Minn. — A year ago, Augsburg handed the Saint Mary's University volleyball team a 3-2 setback that officially eliminated the Cardinals from Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference tournament contention.

Friday evening, the Auggies once again blocked the Cardinals' path to an MIAC tournament berth — literally.

The Auggies, fueled by 26 blocks, rallied from a 2-1 deficit to beat SMU 3-2 (19-25, 25-23, 24-26, 25-20, 15-9) for the second straight year — and put the Cardinals' backs to the wall in their quest for a conference tournament spot.

“This was a great collegiate volleyball match — unfortunately, we came out on the losing end,” said SMU Mike Lester. “The atmosphere in our gym was incredible — probably the best atmosphere to play in in my years here. It was just a great match all the way around that was decided by the team who maintained the momentum the best.”

And, unfortunately for the Cardinals, that was the Auggies, who recorded seven of the last nine points to win Set 4, 25-20, then rattled off nine of the last 12 points after Set 5 was tied 6-6 to ice the win.

“I certainly can't fault our effort — this was a high intensity match from start to finish,” said Lester, whose team falls to 4-5 in the MIAC and 16-11 overall. “(Augsburg) blocked very well, but in the games that we won, we blocked well, too. It was just one of those games that could have gone either way, and, unfortunately, in in the end, it didn't go our way.”

Jessica Mate (St. Charles, Ill.) led the way for the Cardinals, banging out a match-high 20 kills — marking the second time this season the SMU junior has eclipsed the 20-kill mark — while adding 11 digs and two blocks. Courtney Runge (St. James, Minn.) finished with 14 kills, 10 digs and three blocks, while Sarah Gardner (Rochester, Minn.) and Amy Kujak (River Falls, Wis.) chipped in 12 and 11 kills, respectively. Brittany Cherwinka (Faribault, Minn.) dished out 43 assists and Theresa Perrini (Fairway, Kan.) tallied 41 digs in the losing effort.

“We knew coming into this match that, if we wanted to assure ourselves a spot in the (MIAC) tournament, we needed to win two of our last three conference matches,” said Lester, whose team closes out the conference season with home matches against Carleton (Wednesday) and Gustavus (Saturday, Nov. 1). “We still need to win two — now it's just got to be two out of two.

“It's not going to be easy — but it's certainly possible.”