WINONA, Minn. — If there was one thing that the Saint Mary's University volleyball team could rest its hat on heading into the postseason, it was that the Cardinals had not lost three straight matches all season.

Twice this season, the Cardinals had lost two in a row — and twice, SMU responded with a convincing 3-0 victory.

Last Tuesday evening, the Cardinals entered the first round of the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference tournament against St. Benedict having lost back-to-back matches to St. Olaf and Gustavus.

But, with history on their side, Tuesday's tournament-opener should have been another 3-0 cakewalk for the Cardinals, right?

Not quite.

The Cardinals' run through the postseason ran into an opening-round roadblock, as St. Benedict got 14 kills from a trio of players — and took advantage of SMU's sluggish opening two games — to hand the Cardinals a 3-0 (30-26, 30-20, 25-30, 30-20) setback.

Ashley Dingels (Gibbon, Minn.) recorded a match-high 19 kills — the 24th time this season the SMU senior has tallied more than 10 kills — and Kirstan Rouzer (Comstock, Wis.) chipped in 14, but it was not enough, as the Cardinals closed out their season with their first three-match losing streak of the season.

"It's a tough way for the season to end," admitted SMU coach Mike Lester, whose team closed out the year with a 21-10 overall record — the most wins since the Cardinals went 27-8 and qualified for the NCAA Tournament in 2000. "This team had high expectations, and obviously, right now, they are pretty disappointed.

"But this team has nothing to hang their heads about, they had a great season," continued Lester, noting that eight of the Cardinals' 10 losses — including their setback against St. Benedict — came against teams ranked in the AVCA Top 25 at one time or another this season. "We had a tough, tough schedule — playing several nationally ranked teams — and I thought we did a very nice job. "

SMU hit just .170 in the opening game against the Blazers, then managed just 12 kills in 50 attempts (.020) in the second game. SMU rebounded with an 18-for-38 (.368) performance in the third game, but it was too little, too late, as St. Benedict closed out the match with a second 30-20 win.

"I actually thought we played very well in that first game — we were up 16-9 and playing pretty solid," said Lester. "We just made too many errors, and let (St. Ben's) creep back into the match.

"Overall, I thought we played pretty well … really well, actually," continued Lester, whose team had beaten St. Benedict 3-2 in the team's regular-season meeting. "We knew it was going to be a tough match — a match that could go either way. Unfortunately, this time, it just didn't go our way."