WINONA, Minn. — It's becoming a trend that Saint Mary's University men's hockey coach Don Olson wishes would go out of style — and fast.

For the second straight game, the Cardinals outshot their opponent by nearly a 2-to-1 margin, but still came up on the short end.

St. Olaf scored a pair of third-period goals, including an empty-netter with just seconds remaining in regulation, as the Oles knocked off the Cardinals 5-3 in the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference opener for both teams.

"It's tough to lose like that," said Olson, referring to the fact that his Cardinals generated 44 shots on goal — but scored just three times — while St. Olaf converted on five of its 28 shots. "We're getting the puck on net, we're just not putting it in the net.

"It's very similar to what happened to us against Eau Claire," continued Olson, referring to SMU's 5-2 loss to UW-Eau Claire in their final nonconference game — a game in which the Cardinals held a 42-20 edge in shots on goal. "We need to find a way to get more offensive production from some of our guys — we can't keep putting 40-plus shots on goal and only have three goals to show for it."

St. Olaf scored the game’s first three goals, before SMU’s Sam Phillips (Red Wing, Minn.) netted a powerplay goal midway through the second period to cut the Oles’ lead to 3-1 after two periods. The Cardinals then knotted things up, getting back-to-back goals from Chad Damerow (Albert Lea, Minn.) and Morgan Buetow-Staples (Arden Hills, Minn.) to with just over 10 minutes remaining in regulation.
The deadlock was shortlived, however, as Ron Guild scored less than a minute after Buetow-Staples’ game-tying goal to give the Oles the lead for good.

"We came out a little flat in the first period — I don't know why. You would think with this being our (conference) opener, everyone would want to put their best foot forward, but we just didn't do that," said Olson, whose team plays host the Oles in the teams' second game of the two-game MIAC series Saturday night. "We played much better in the second and third periods, we competed a little harder, but we are going to need a much better effort (Saturday night), no question about that."