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Cardinal Roster
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Cardinal Statistics
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Cardinal Schedule
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MIAC Standings
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MIAC Statistics
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| 2005-2006 Records: 7-6-3 MIAC, 10-10-3 Overall |
| Last Week's Results: Saint Mary's 3, St. Olaf 1 / Details Saint Mary's 4, St. Olaf 3 / Details |
| Upcoming Events: Fri., Feb. 24: Bethel at SMU, 7:05 p.m. Sat., Feb. 25: SMU at Bethel, 7:05 p.m. |
| Cardinal News and Notes: With the Cardinals' sweep of St. Olaf, SMU extended its unbeaten streak to eight straight (7-0-1). … The Cardinals have outscored their opponents 23-11 during their eight-game run. … Heading into the final weekend of the regular season, SMU is currently in fourth place, two points back of this weekend's opponent (Bethel), one point ahead of St. Olaf and two points in front of Augsburg. … SMU has qualified for all five MIAC playoffs. … Amy Madden (East Grand Rapids, Mich.) and Rachel Harrison (Madison, Wis.) each scored two goals vs. the Oles and Harrison added an assist for a team-leading three points in the two-game series. … Amanda Gage (Lino Lakes, Minn.) and Nikki Jung (Inver Grove Heights, Minn.) teamed to stop 61 of the 65 shots they faced vs. the Oles. … Melissa Mondo (Vadnais Heights, Minn.) — who led the team in goals (8) and points (14) a year ago — already has surpassed those numbers with her team-leading 10 goals and 19 points. … With her two assists vs. St. Olaf, Laura Mueller (St. Paul, Minn.) pushed her team-leading assist total to 10. … Mondo and Mueller (16 points) are two of five SMU players with at least 10 points. … The Cardinals have played seven overtime games — one short of the school record eight set in 2002-2003 — going 3-1-3 in those games. |
latest conference sweep keeps SMU in playoff hunt
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Who's Hot?
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Rachel
Harrison 2 G, 1 A vs. St. Olaf |
When the final horn sounded last Saturday evening, the red-hot Cardinals had leapfrogged into fourth place — leaving both the Auggies and the Oles eating their dust.
SMU completed its Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference sweep of St. Olaf Saturday, getting goals from four different players en route to a 4-3 win — a win that, coupled with Augsburg's two losses to Gustavus, put the Cardinals in the driver's seat in their quest for a sixth straight MIAC playoff appearance.
"It was a good weekend for us," understated SMU coach Terry Mannor, whose team got goals from Madeline Loftus (Parsippany, N.J.), Amy Madden (East Grand Rapids, Mich.) and Rachel Harrison (Madison, Wis.) in dropping the Oles 3-1 at home on Friday — while pushing its unbeaten streak to eight straight with the back-to-back wins over the Oles. "We're not getting too hyped up about the playoffs, because there's still way too much work ahead of us.
"We've talked about it a little — I've explained the obvious, which is we've put ourselves in a position to make the postseason, but we can't afford to get too caught up in it," continued Mannor. "We have to focus on taking it one game at a time — all we can worry about is controlling what we can control, and that's how we play."
And how the Cardinals played on Saturday was impressive.
After what Mannor tabbed "a sluggish start," in which St. Olaf jumped out to a 2-1 first-period advantage, the Cardinals took control, scoring three times — on goals by Madden, Rachel Harrison (Madison, Wis.) and Melissa Mondo (Vadnais Heights, Minn.) — in the first three minutes of the second period, to take a 4-2 advantage.
The Oles would cut the lead to 4-3 on Lindsay Weier's second goal of the game at 16:41 of the third period, but that was as close as they would get as SMU pushed its record to 7-6-3 in the MIAC and 10-10-3 overall.
"(St. Olaf's rink) is a tough place to play, and we came out a little sluggish. But when we came back out (for the second period) we just dominated," said Mannor, noting that the Cardinals were outshot 16-5 in the game's first 20 minutes, but made good on three of their nine second-period shots. "Everything seems to be clicking right now — hopefully that will continue."