MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. — It's been said that, no matter the sport, beating a team three times in one season is one tough feat.
 
The Saint Mary's University women's hockey team would beg to differ.
 
The Cardinals collected their third straight win over Augsburg this season, getting a pair of second-period goals and a 30-save effort from Celeste Rimstad (Richfield, Minn.) en route to a thrilling, 2-1 victory over second-seeded Augsburg Saturday afternoon at Ed Saugestad Arena.
 
With the win the Cardinals (19-5-2 overall) advance to the MIAC Playoff title game next Saturday — with an automatic berth in the NCAA Division III national tournament going to the victor. Saint Mary's will head to Gustavus's Don Roberts Ice Arena in St. Peter, Minn., for the 2 p.m. title game against the top-seeded and defending national champion Gusties.
 
The Auggies and Cardinals both took the ice Saturday afternoon heading into post-season play red-hot.
 
After starting the season 3-4-0 — including losses to nationally ranked Gustavus and UW-River Falls, and a pair of setbacks at the hands of Saint Mary's on Nov. 17-18 — the Auggies have rattled off 16 wins in their last 18 games, and enter post-season play on a six-game winning streak.
 
Saint Mary's, meanwhile, was just as hot, owning an 11-1-2 record in its last 14 contests — the lone loss in that span a 2-1 setback to Saint Benedict on Feb. 3. 
 
And the two teams certainly didn't disappoint the sellout crowd on hand.
 
Goaltenders stole the show in the opening period, as Rimstad and Augsburg's Chloe Stockinger put together highlight-reel first-periods, both coming up big on a number of occasions to keep the game scoreless through 20 minutes.
 
Stockinger may have been perfect in the first period, but the Cardinals had her number early in the second, as Allie Urlaub (Burnsville, Minn.) got SMU on the board just 47 seconds into the middle frame — on their first shot — to give Saint Mary's a quick 1-0 lead. Kennedy Kraus (Kasson, Minn.) and Kas Kingston (Black Diamond, Alberta) picked up the assists on Urlaub's seventh goal of the season.
 
Saint Mary's came within inches of claiming a two-goal lead with less than nine minutes remaining in period No. 2, only to have Sidney Polzin's (Chippewa Falls, Wis.) wrister beat Stockinger, but clanked off the crossbar, keeping in a one-score game.
 
The crossbar may have saved Stockinger on Polzin's wrister, but nothing would keep Jenna Kurkowski (North Branch, Minn.) from lighting the lamp, scoring an unassisted power-play tally with less than six minutes remaining in the second period to give SMU a 2-0 advantage heading into the second intermission.
 
The Auggies finally got one past Rimstad midway through the third period, cutting SMU's lead to 2-1 on a goal by Emily Cronkhite, and closed out the final two minutes of regulation on the power play — but Rimstad & Co. were up to the challenge, hanging on for the semifinal win.
 
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