MOORHEAD, Minn. — The Saint Mary's University of Minnesota women's hockey team headed into its final four games of the regular season needing one win to secure a spot in the five-team Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Playoffs.
 
After Friday's 3-2 loss to Concordia, a game in which the Cobbers rattled off three unanswered power-play goals in the game's final 24 minutes, the Cardinals' magic number remained at one—with just three games remaining.
 
Make that two games.
 
Kelsey Vandegrift scored a pair of goals for the second straight game, leading the Cobbers to a 2-0 victory over the Cardinals—completing the two-game conference sweep and leaving Saint Mary's still searching for that playoff-clinching victory.
 
"We played so much better today," said Saint Mary's coach Terry Mannor. "Our systems were working, we were moving our feet and competing—they just capitalized on two of their scoring opportunities, where we failed to capitalize on ours.
"There nothing for this team to hang their heads about—other than controlling the game and coming up empty."
Vandegrif—who scored the Cobbers' first two goals in Friday's 3-2 win—netted her team-leading 10th of the season at 3:07 of the opening period, and waited until the three-minute mark of the second to net her second of the game and 11th of the season.
That would be all the offense CC goalie Andrea Klug would need, as she stopped all 26 shots she faced in recording the shutout. Tori Herrmann (Elk River, Minn.), meanwhile, finished with 16 saves for the Cardinals.
The Cardinals (8-5-2 MIAC, 10-9-3 overall)—who close out the regular season with a home-and-home series against Hamline, beginning Friday in St. Paul, Minn.—head into those final two games sitting in fourth place in the conference standings, one point ahead of Bethel and four points up on Augsburg.