We study emotion regulation in a distant CABLe (Collaborative Argumentation Based-Learning) setting at university. We analyze how students achieve the group task of synthesizing the literature on a topic through scientific argumentation on the institutional Moodle's forum. Distinguishing anticipatory from reactive emotional regulation shows how essential it is to establish and maintain a constructive working climate in order to make the best out of disagreement both on social and cognitive planes. We operationalize the analysis of anticipatory emotional regulation through an analytical grid applied to the data of two groups of students facing similar disagreement. Thanks to sharp anticipatory regulation, group 1 solved the conflict both on the social and the cognitive plane, while group 2 had to call out for external regulation by the teacher, stuck in a cyclically resurfacing dispute. While the institutional digital environment did afford anticipatory emotional regulation, reactive emotional regulation rather occurred through complementary informal and synchronous communication tools. Based on these qualitative case studies, we draw recommendations for fostering distant CABLe at university.