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WINONA, Minn. — The Saint Mary's University women's hockey team did everything coach Terry Mannor could ask of them during Saturday's Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference game against St. Thomas at the SMU Ice Arena.

Unfortunately, for the second straight game, the puck refused to bounce the Cardinals' way, as St. Thomas completed its MIAC sweep of SMU with a 5-1 victory.

“That definitely wasn't a 5-1 game,” said Mannor. “I thought we played pretty well last night (in a 4-1 loss to the Tommies) and I thought we played even better today. We had a lot of great scoring chances, we just couldn't seem to catch a break.

The Tommies, on the other hand, certainly proved to be opportunistic, scoring once with less than a second remaining in the second period and another when a shot clanked off the pipe, hit the back of SMU goalie Sarah Gustafson (Esko, Minn.) and trickled into the net.

“I'm not taking anything away from St. Thomas — they played very well,” Mannor said. “But you look at the final score and think it was a pretty lopsided game. But that wasn't the case at all.

“It's pretty disheartening — for me and for the players. We have played well enough to win week-in and week-out,” added Mannor. “The effort has been there, we just can't seem to get over the hump.”

The Tommies didn't waste any time getting on the board, as Christina Rozeske scored on UST's first shot just 46 seconds into the opening period.

SMU answered at 15:07, as Breanna Peterson (Macomb, Mich.) netted her team-leading sixth goal of the season off an assist by Mary DeBartolo (Chicago, Ill.), but Rozeske beat Gustafson for the second time in the opening period to give UST a 2-1 lead — and the Tommies never looked back.

Courtney Umland pushed the St. Thomas lead to 3-1 three minutes into the second period, and Rozeske beat Gustafson on a breakaway just before the period ended to complete the hat trick and give the Tommies a commanding 4-1 lead after two periods.

Gustafson finished with 21 saves in goal for the Cardinals, while Alise Riedel stopped 22 of the 23 SMU shots she faced, with Taylor Neisen coming on to kick out two shots in the game's final 7:29.

SMU (2-6-0 MIAC, 4-9-0 overall) returns to action Friday, when the Cardinals kick off a two-game conference series against Augsburg with a 7 p.m. showdown at the SMU Ice Arena. The two teams will then travel to Minneapolis, Minn., for a 7 p.m. game at the Augsburg Ice Arena on Saturday.