MOORHEAD, Minn. — It was a tale of two halves for the Saint Mary's University of Minnesota women's hockey team.
 
The first period and a half belonged to the Cardinals, while the second period and a half was all Concordia.
 
And, unfortunately for the Cardinals, the Cobbers' half was one goal better, as Concordia rallied from a two-goal deficit with three unanswered goals in handing Saint Mary's a 3-2 Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference setback Friday evening at the Moorhead Youth Rink.
 
"At no time tonight did we play with any sense of urgency," said Saint Mary's coach Terry Mannor. "We also never got ride of our bus legs—it just wasn't one of our best performances all the way around."
 
The Cardinals got out of the gates quickly, as Breanna Peterson (Macomb, Mich.) scored her sixth goal of the season—off assists from Kassie Lien (Grantsburg, Wis.) and Ingrid Curwin (Duluth, Minn.)—just 51 seconds into the opening period.
 
Lien and Peterson would switch roles 11 minutes later, as Lien netted her fifth of the year, with an assist from Peterson, to give Saint Mary's a 2-0 lead after the game's opening 20 minutes.
 
Concordia would break through with the only goal of the second period, as Kel;sey Vandegrift beat Saint Mary's goalie Marah Shields (Milford, Mich.) at 16:46 of the middle period.
 
Vandegrift would added her second of the game—the second of three straight powerplay goals by the Cobbers—eight minutes into the third period, and Madison Gendreau completed the come-from-behind effort with her seventh of the season less than three minutes later.
 
Shields finished with 33 saves in goal for the Cardinals, while a pair of Cobber netminders stopped eight of the Saint Mary's shots they faced.
 
Despite the loss, the Cardinals remain in control of their own destiny in their quest for one of the five MIAC Playoff berths. Saint Mary's is currently fourth, one point behind the Cobbers, three points in front of fifth-place Bethel, and four points up on sixth-place Augsburg.
 
The Cardinals (8-5-2 MIAC, 10-9-2) will get another shot at the Cobbers on Saturday, as the two teams return to the Moorhead Youth Rink for a 2 p.m. showdown in the second game of their two-game conference series.