By DONNY NADEAU
Saint Mary's Sports Information Director
 
ARDEN HILLS, Minn. — The first time the Saint Mary's University of Minnesota women's basketball team squared off against Bethel this season — just 13 days ago — the Royals used a pair of 20-point quarters in pulling away from the Cardinals, 86-68 at Robertson Center Gym.
 
Fast-forward 13 days and the Cardinals and Royals were once again squaring off at Robertson Center Gym.
 
And, unfortunately for first-year coach David Foley, it was another 20-point quarter that did in his Cardinals.
 
Bethel erupted for 25 points in the game's final 10 minutes, as the Royals dealt the Cardinals a season-ending 66-52 setback in a Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Tournament quarterfinal Tuesday evening.
 
The Cardinals took a bend-but-don't break approach to the game's first three quarters.
 
• A 7-2, game-opening Bethel run … no problem, answer by scoring six straight points.
 
• An 11-1 late-second quarter Royal burst … no sweat, score the final four points of the half to cut the deficit to five.
 
• Trail by four midway through the third quarter … rattle off six unanswered points to take a two-point lead.
 
But when the Royals scored eight of the first 10 points to open the fourth quarter, the Cardinals' "bend" broke, as Bethel outscored Saint Mary's 25-14 to earn a spot opposite second-seeded Augsburg in Thursday's MIAC Tournament semifinals.
 
After falling behind 7-2 to open the game, Saint Mary's rattled off six straight points — capped by a Rachel Kedl (Lamberton, Minn.) field goal — to grab its first lead of the game, 8-7. Bethel, however, scored four of the final six points in the quarter to take an 11-10 lead after 10 minutes of play.
 
Bethel pushed its lead to five, 17-12 early in the second quarter, only to have Saint Mary's again come storming back, getting a three-point play from Kirsten Keefe (Chatfield, Minn.) for a 20-19 Cardinal lead with 5:04 to play in the half.
 
The lead did not last long, however, as Bethel used an 11-1 burst to take its biggest lead of the half, 30-21. Saint Mary's closed the second quarter with a field goal by Kedl and a pair of free throws from Keefe to make it a five-point game, 30-25, at the break.
 
After going 0-for-5 from behind the 3-point line in the first half, the Cardinals heated up from long range in the third quarter, knocking down three 3s — two from Brooklyn Paulson (Holmen, Wis.) and another from Brandi Blattner (Eyota, Minn.) — to regain the lead, 36-34, with less than three minutes remaining. Bethel closed the quarter with a 7-2 burst to claim a slim, three-point, 41-38 advantage heading into the fourth quarter.
 
And what a quarter it was — for the Royals.
 
Bethel scored nine of the quarter's first 11 points to push its lead to 10, 50-40, and the Cardinals could not come up with an answer in falling to the Royals for a second straight time this season.
 
Blattner — one of three seniors playing their final collegiate game — finished with a game-high 18 points and added eight rebounds, while Paulson chipped in 14 points, and Keefe, another of those three Cardinal seniors, added 10.
 
Saint Mary's — which closed out the season 13-13 overall — shot 38.1 percent from the field (16-for-42) with four 3-pointers, while going 16 of 19 from the free throw line. Bethel, meanwhile, went 25-for-60 from the field (41.7 percent) with seven 3-pointers, and finished 9 of 14 from the charity stripe.
 
Taite Anderson netted a team-high 17 points to lead four Royals in double figures. Haylee Barker chipped in 16 points, with Makenna Pearson and Tessah Anderson scoring 11 and 10 points, respectively.