By DONNY NADEAU
Saint Mary's Sports Information Director
 
MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. — The Saint Mary's University men's hockey team entered Saturday's second game of its two-game Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference series against No. 10 Augsburg on the heels of a 7-1 victory Friday evening.
 
The Cardinals could have used a few of those season-high seven goals from Friday in Saturday's rematch.
 
Augsburg erupted for five unanswered goals to open the game, and the Cardinals never recovered, as the Auggies dealt Saint Mary's a 5-2 conference setback at Ed Saugestad Rink.
 
The Auggies didn't need much time to grab the upper hand — 15 seconds to be exact.
 
Charlie Parker scored on Augsburg's first shot on goal, beating Saint Mary's goalie Nick Nast (Oxnard, Calif.) just 15 seconds into the opening period. Seven minutes later, the lead climbed to 2-0 on a goal by Fritz Belisle — and the Auggies would tack on one more before the period would end, as they took a 3-0 advantage into the locker room after the game's opening 20 minutes.
 
And the Auggies picked up right where they left off to start the second period, getting goals from Austin Martinson and Jason Krych in the first seven minutes to push their lead to 5-0, before Jack Hatton (Naperville, Ill.) finally got the Cardinals on the board midway through the middle frame to make it 5-1 heading into the game's final 20 minutes.
 
Saint Mary's cut the deficit to 5-2 on a third-period goal by Robert Roslund (Vanersborg, Sweden) at 9:51, but that was as close as the Cardinals would get in settling for a split in their two-game conference series with the Auggies.
 
Nast finished with 15 saves in 26 minutes of work, while Al Rogers (New Haven, Conn.) stopped 25 of the 26 shots he faced in 34 minutes of relief. Danill Gerasimov finished with 29 saves in goal for the Auggies.
 
The Cardinals (5-5-0 MIAC, 7-9-1 overall) are back in action with a pair of conference games against Hamline next weekend. Saint Mary's travels to HU's TRIA Rink in St. Paul, Minn., for Friday's 7 p.m. opener, with both teams heading to the Saint Mary's Ice Arena for the rematch at 7 p.m. the following evening. The Auggies (8-3-1 MIAC, 13-6-1 overall), meanwhile, step out of conference play next Saturday, entertaining St. Norbert in a 7 p.m. nonconference game at Ed Saugestad Rink in Minneapolis, Minn.