LAKE FOREST, Ill. — For nearly 59 minutes Saturday afternoon, the Saint Mary's University men's hockey team found itself embroiled in yet another nail-biting, one-goal affair in its nonconference rematch against Lake Forest.
 
Over that final 1:02, however, the Foresters netted a shorthanded goal and added an empty net tally to turn that one-goal contest into a 3-0 Lake Forest victory Saturday, and a sweep of the Cardinals in their two-game series.
 
Saint Mary's, which scored three goals in Friday's season-opening 4-3 loss to Lake Forest, mustered plenty of offense on Saturday — peppering the Forester net with 40 shots — but could not solve goaltender Nick Wiencek, who stopped everything SMU threw at him in recording the shutout.
 
After a scoreless first period, Lake Forest finally broke the ice midway through the second period, as Jared Gerger beat SMU goalie Matt Sankner (Pennington, N.J.) for the game's first goal at the 10:08 mark.
 
It appeared as if the game would end a 1-0 decision — until the final 1:58, over which time Lake Forest got a shorthanded goal from Will Lebel and Brendan Coughlin added an empty-netter with seven seconds remaining to seal the win.
 
Sankner, making his first collegiate start, recorded 33 saves in goal for the Cardinals, who went 0-for-10 on the power play, after scoring a pair of power-play goals on Friday.
 
The Cardinals (0-2-0 overall) are back in action on Wednesday, kicking off a busy home week with a 7 p.m. nonconference game against Lawrence. SMU will then welcome both UW-Superior and UW-Eau Claire to the Saint Mary's Ice Arena next weekend for back-to-back 7 p.m. nonconference contests.