WINONA, Minn. — The Saint Mary's University of Minnesota women's basketball team went into Saturday's regular-season finale against Macalester looking to build a good head of steam heading into next week's Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Playoffs.
 
And that's exactly what the Cardinals did, as Saint Mary's steamrolled past the Scots—outscoring Macalester 37-18 over the game's final 20 minutes en route to a 68-46 conference victory at the Saint Mary's Gym.
 
With the win, the Cardinals (11-7 MIAC, 17-8 overall) finished in a three-way tie with Gustavus and Concordia for third place in the conference standings with an 11-7 record—and put the MIAC tiebreaker criteria to the test.
 
Along with tying in the conference standings, all three split their head-to-head season series and finished 2-2 against one another to wipe out the first criteria. Concordia claimed the No. 3 seed thanks to its 1-3 record combined against the top two teams in the standings (UST and Bethel), while the other two remained even as they were winless against the Tommies and Royals. That meant they had to descend down the MIAC standings in order to break the final tie, and Saint Mary's 2-0 record vs. Hamline was better than Gustavus' 1-1 mark vs. the Pipers, giving the Cardinals the No. 4 seed and No. 5 to the Gusties.
 
Which means the Cardinals will host the Gusties in Tuesday's playoff quarterfinal at the Saint Mary's Gym at 7 p.m.
 
The Cardinals needed a half to get their offense clicking on all cylinders against the Scots. Saint Mary's build its lead to as many as 13, 27-14, in the opening half, only to have Macalester use a 14-4 half-ending run—highlighted by a 9-0 burst—to cut the Cardinals' advantage to three, 31-28, at the break.
 
In the second half, however, Saint Mary's turned up the heat, scoring nine of the first 11 point build the lead to 10, 40-30—and the Cardinals never looked back in winning for the second straight game.
 
Emma Schaefer (Falcon Heights, Minn.) and Shelby Auseth (Wanamingo, Minn.) led the way for the Cardinals, scoring 12 points each. The Cardinals, who shot 40 percent from the field (26-for-65)—including six 3-pointers—got at least two points from all 12 players who saw the court.
 
Annie Drabot finished with a team-best 10 points for the Scots, who closed out the season 0-18 in conference play and 3-21 overall.