WINONA, Minn. — The Saint Mary's University of Minnesota men's basketball team put three players in double figures—and knocked down nine 3-pointers—but it was not enough to keep pace with sixth-ranked St. Thomas Saturday afternoon.
 
The Tommies matched the Cardinals' long-range prowess—draining 10 treys—and pulled away in the second half to hand Saint Mary's a 91-61 Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference setback at the Saint Mary's Gym.
 
The Cardinals came out firing against the high-powered Tommies, as Aaron Romportl (Stillwater, Minn.) drained a 3-pointer to open the scoring and followed up with his second of the half three minutes later to make tie the game at 8-8.
 
The Tommies rattled off six of the next eight points to grab a six-point advantage, 14-8, but the Cardinals remained zeroed in from long range, as Quashingm Smith-Pugh (St. Paul, Minn.) dialed in from downtown to cut the deficit to three, 14-11.
 
St. Thomas again tried to pull away, pushing its lead to eight, 25-17, only to have Saint Mary's again respond on—what else?—a pair of 3-pointers, the first from Charlie Tayson (Prescott, Wis.) and the second from Kevin Gleason (Minneapolis, Minn.), to whittle the Tommie lead to tow, 25-23, with 6:30 to play in the opening half.
 
From there, however, the Tommies took control, using a 15-4 half-ending run to take a 13-point, 40-27 lead into the locker room at the break.
 
The Cardinals continued to use 3-point shooting to keep the Tommies within sight, getting a three from Romportl to cut the UST lead to 10, 49-39, with less than 16 minutes remaining.
 
Unfortunately, The next time Saint Mary's would score—on a Ferron free throw three minutes later—St. Thomas had rattled off 10 straight points to make it a 59-39 UST advantage.
 
And the Cardinals could not recover.
 
Romportl finished with a team-high 11 points for the Cardinals, who shot 37 percent from the field (17-for-46)—and made nine of their 17 field goals from behind the arc. Smith-Pugh and Ferron each chipped in 10 points, while Ferron also hauled in eight rebounds.
 
Cortez Tillman, the NCAA leader in 3-pointers, netted a game-high 21 points—including a 5-for-6 effort from 3-point land—while Ryan Saarela added 19 points and 10 rebounds, and Taylor Montero finished with 13 points.
 
The Cardinals (2-7 MIAC, 4-9 Overall) hit the road on Wednesday, closing out the first half of the conference schedule at Hamline. Game time is set for 7 p.m. at Hutton Arena.