vs.
5		10

Game 1 Box Score / GameDay Online

ST. PETER, Minn. — Sometimes, Saint Mary's University baseball coach Nick Whaley must wonder what he ever did to anger the baseball gods.

First, there were two solid performances — perhaps the best two, back-to-back games the Cardinals had put together — in conference losses to league-leading St. Thomas last Saturday.

Then there was the first game of Monday's Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference doubleheader against Gustavus, in which SMU stood toe-to-toe with the Gusties — one game back of St. Thomas in the conference title chase — for five innings, only to give up five runs in the bottom of the sixth in falling 10-5.

And, then there was Game 2, a game in which SMU appeared to be well on its way to winning, as the Cardinals raced out to a 7-1 fourth-inning lead, only to have Mother Nature rain on their parade — literally, as torrential rains force the suspension of the game to a date to be determined.

"It's frustrating, because we were playing so well — but what can you do? It's baseball in the spring in Minnesota," said Whaley, whose team dropped its fifth straight in the opener. "We have been playing some pretty good baseball of late. We played very well against St. Thomas (on Saturday) — probably two of our better games of the season — but came up a little short.

"And then we played very well again (in Game 1 Monday), only to have one inning cost us."

One inning, and one unstoppable rain storm.

"Hopefully we'll get a shot at (Gustavus) again before the season ends," said Whaley, noting that the teams are not sure when the game will resumed — if at all. "We'll just have to wait and see how the rest of the season unfolds."

The Cardinals jumped out to a 2-0 first-inning lead, getting two-out RBI doubles from Brady Knudsen (Racine, Wis.) and Andrew Warren (Stillwater, Minn.). Gustavus answered back with a single run in the second and two more in the third to take a 3-2 advantage. A pair of Gustavus errors in the fourth allowed SMU to knot the game at 3-3, only to have the Gusties regain the lead, 5-3, in the bottom half of the fourth.

The lead didn't last long, however, as Kevin Black (Mahtomedi, Minn.) delivered a two-out single in the top of the sixth to tie the game once again, 5-5.

Then came the bottom of the sixth,  when the Gusties put the game out of reach, getting a two-run single off the bat of Ai Woitus and a three-run double by S. Campion to turn the 5-5 deadlock into a 10-5 runaway.

"One inning, that was the difference," said Whaley, who got a 2-for-4 effort from Warren to pace the Cardinals' seven-hit attack, while Knudsen accounted for another of those hits, extending his hitting streak to 17 straight. "We came up with clutch, two-out hits all afternoon, we just couldn't quite get over the hump.

"It's tough to feel too disappointed — we played pretty well," said Whaley, whose team returns to action Tuesday, traveling to St. Olaf for a 2:30 p.m. conference doubleheader. "We just have to keep plugging along."