With another penalty set to be called on the Cougars, Derek Stella took a long pass from Cam O'Neill and tucked a backhand between the pads of Nick Luise for a 1-0 lead.

Half a minute later, the Spartans struck again as Bobby Mullins finished off a Julian Yourawski pass at the left post and St. Mary's headed to the first intermission up two and in complete control of play.

"We've had to play from behind in a lot of our games so it was nice to come out and get a couple early," Lee said.

The second period seemed to play out much like the first did ... only this time the Spartans would wait until the final moments to capitalize.

Each team missed converting on a pair of power plays in the period before St. Mary's scored a backbreaking goal with 1:55 left on the clock as Jordan Manthorne scored on his third whack at a Tim Aylward rebound to make it 3-0.

"It seemed like there were a lot more blue jerseys than white ones out there at times," Finocchiaro said. "And that was because they wanted it more than we did and outworked us."

Austin (4-2-1, 2-1-1) came out and put together a solid third period but the Spartan defense and goalie Donald Hesse kept the Cougars pinned along the boards for most of the final 15 minutes. AP would come closest to breaking up the shutout late when Tim Benedetto rang a shot off the right post.

"I feel like Donald is one of the best goalies in the state and we expect this from him," Lee said. "Our defense played outstanding. We did a great job of covering in front of the net and keeping it clear