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ARDEN HILLS, Minn. — With four games remaining in the regular season, the Saint Mary's University of Minnesota baseball team found itself battling Carleton for the fourth and final Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference post-season tournament invitation.
 
The Knights were finished with conference play, boasting a 12-8 record in its 20 MIAC games. SMU, meanwhile, were sitting at 9-7 but still had four league games to play — two against second-place and tournament-qualifier Bethel on Sunday, and two more against St. Olaf on Tuesday.
 
To oust the Knights from that No. 4 spot, the Cardinals needed at least three wins in its final four games.
 
In other words, the Cardinals had to win at least one of its two contests against Bethel Sunday — or Tuesday's regular-season finale against St. Olaf would mean nothing.
 
Mission accomplished — times two.
 
Kevin Miley (St. Paul, Minn.) delivered a two-run, sixth-inning single to break a 1-1 tie, and a double dose of Ben — Ben Johnson (Brooklyn Park, Minn.) and Ben Dobosenski (Westmont, Ill.) — on the mound proved to be the perfect combination for Saint Mary's coach Nick Winecke, as the Cardinals collected a 3-1 victory in Game 1 of the teams' MIAC doubleheader.
 
And the Cardinals had so much fun recording a two-run win in the opener, they decided to do it again in the nightcap, scoring four runs in the sixth inning to erase a 4-2 Bethel lead and lift Saint Mary's to a 6-4 victory.
 
With the wins, the Cardinals improve to 11-7 in conference play with two games remaining. A win in either game of their final regular-season doubleheader against St. Olaf on Tuesday and Saint Mary's locks up that fourth and final conference tournament invitation. First pitch in Northfield, Minn., on Tuesday is set for 2:30 p.m.
 
"It was great to see the guys come up with two very big wins against one of the top teams in the conference," said Winecke, whose team pushed its winning streak to four straight with the sweep. "We talked before the day started that we have to approach this home stretch game-by-game, pitch-by-pitch — you can't control what happens in the future, and you aren't going to be successful driving the car always looking in the rearview mirror.
 
"I thought we did a great job of playing the games pitch-by-pitch," Winecke added. "We got some big hits when we needed them, and our pitchers did a great job. It was an outstanding performance all the way around."
 
The Cardinals got on the board first in the opener, breaking a 0-0 stalemate with a solo run in the fourth, as Jon Schlemmer (De Pere, Wis.) delivered an RBI single. The lead lasted less than three outs, however, as Bethel answered with a single run of its own in the bottom of the fourth to make it a 1-1 game.
 
Saint Mary's regained the lead in the sixth, as Miley laced a one-out two-run single up the middle, scoring Ben Buerkle (Roseville, Minn.) and Kevin Gannon (Roselle, Ill.) to give the Cardinals a 3-1 cushion.
 
And three runs proved to be more than enough with Johnson and Dobosenski on the mound. Johnson went the first five innings to earn the win, allowing one run on seven hits, with Dobosenski picking up his first collegiate save, limiting the Royals to just one run — while striking out three — over the game's final two innings.
 
Miley and Willie Doll (Amherst, Wis.) each had two hits for the Cardinals, with Gannon, Schlemmer and Paul LaNasa (Mahtomedi, Minn.) accounting for Saint Mary's other three hits in Game 1.
 
Saint Mary's again scored first in the nightcap on a Tyler Lursen (Maple Grove, Minn.) run-scoring single in the second, but Bethel would have an answer, scoring twice in the bottom of the second to take its first lead of the afternoon, 2-1.
 
A fourth-inning bases-loaded walk plated the Cardinals' second run of the game to tie the game at 2-2, but the Royals put together their second two-run inning of the game in the bottom of the inning for a 4-2 advantage.
 
Then came momentum-swinging sixth, in which Saint Mary's erupted for four runs — highlighted by David Barry (Apple Valley, Minn.) run-scoring double and an RBI single by Doll — to grab the lead for good, 6-4.
 
Saint Mary's eight Game 2 hits came from seven different players, with Taylor Thelemann (Bloomington, Minn.) the only Cardinal with more than one hit, going 2-for-4. Doll, LaNasa, Buerkle, Schlemmer, Lursen and Barry all had one hit.
 
Steph Scatassa (Westchester, Ill.) picked up the Game 2 pitching win, allowing four runs — only two of which were earned — on five hits in five innings. Dobosenski, Jake Merkle (Mahtomedi, Minn.) and A.J. Redders (Middleton, Wis.) worked the final four innings, blanking the Royals on three hits.