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WINONA, Minn. — If Tuesday evening's Saint Mary's University-UW-Superior men's soccer game were a heavyweight boxing match, the bout would have gone the distance, with the Cardinals and Yellowjackets standing toe-to-toe in the center of the ring trading punches.

Unfortunately for the Cardinals, UW-Superior landed two blows they could not recover from, as the Yellowjackets scored once in each half in handing SMU a 2-0 nonconference setback at Ochrymowycz Field.

“We played a lot of good soccer out there tonight — not quite good enough to come away with the win, but the effort was definitely there,” said SMU coach Pete Watkins, whose team had entered Tuesday's game on the heels of their first Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference win, a 3-2 decision over Concordia on Saturday. “UW-Superior is a very good soccer team and I thought we gave them everything they could handle.

“It was a good collegiate contest.”

The Cardinals showed early on that they were ready to rumble, as Jacob Bina (West Salem, Wis.) narrowly missed putting SMU on the board in the game's second minute, as UW-S goalkeeper Matt Elder made a diving stop in his early game header.

And in the second half, Elder robbed both Bryan Neu (Hoffman Estates, Ill.) and Juamaine Vetner (Rochester, Minn.), corralling a laser of a shot by early in the half, while kicking out Venter's point-blank attempt in the game's 50th minute.

The Yellowjackets connected for the game's first goal at 24:47, as Logan George broke behind the Cardinal defenders and threaded a shot past SMU goalkeeper Chris Williams (Chicago, Ill.).

Thomas Shuldheisz gave UW-Superior a little breathing room with less than three minutes remaining in regular, as his shot from the right wing eluded Williams and caught the inside of the left post for a 2-0 Yellowjacket advantage.

The Cardinals, who fall to 2-7-1 overall, return to conference play on Saturday, traveling to St. Paul, Minn., for a 1 p.m. contest against Hamline