LAKE FOREST, Ill. – Saint Mary's University women's hockey coach
Terry Mannor felt that his Cardinals played well in their season-opening 5-4 nonconference loss to Lake Forest Saturday evening.
And the Cardinals' head coach thought they played even better on Sunday – even if the score said otherwise.
“I thought our overall performance today was better than what we showed Saturday,” said Mannor, whose team failed to score in Sunday's rematch with the Foresters, falling 4-0. “It was just one of those games where we weren't able to generate any real good offensive chances.”
Call it a Halloween hangover.
“I think mentally we never really recovered from Saturday,” said Mannor, whose team had jumped out to a 3-0 first-period lead, and led 4-3 heading into the third period, only to give up a pair of goals in the final 20 minutes. “That was a tough way to lose - to get up three goals like that and not be able to hang on.
“We just weren't able to respond to that loss the way we needed to.”
The Foresters jumped out to a 1-0 lead on a goal by Jessica Dare at 8:46 of the opening period. Lake Forest added another at 9:02 of the second, then closed out the scoring with back-to-back goals two minutes apart midway through the third period.
Kaye Collier (Hibbing, Minn.) – make her first collegiate start – finished with 39 saves for the Cardinals, while Alyssa Wintermute needed to stop just 13 SMU shots to record the shutout for Lake Forest.
The Cardinals are now off until Friday, Nov. 13, when they play their first home game of the season, hosting UW-Eau Claire in a 7 p.m. contest at the SMU Ice Arena.
