On Friday night, the Colorado Mesa University (CMU) Women’s Basketball team entered into conference play for this season. They opened up with two exciting games at home, but unfortunately went 0-2 on the weekend.
After beating Fort Lewis College 78-61 last week, the women’s basketball team aimed to carry their offensive momentum into Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference play. However, the team was stifled losing to Colorado School of Mines (CSM) 55-67, and to Metro State University (MSU) 52-54.
Junior Laura Gutierrez shot 9-25 from the field while making three free throws, to give her 19 points off the bench. Gutierrez is a redshirt transfer student from Adams State University, and has seen a steady increase in floor time as the season has progressed.
She started the night off with a 3-pointer to push CMU ahead with just over three minutes left in the first quarter, and she just took off from there.
From the outset, CMU struggled all night to grab rebounds on offense. Throughout the entire game, the team only managed to get five offensive rebounds, which put them at a severe disadvantage the longer the game went, because CSM grabbed 18 offensive rebounds.
“I know they’re taller than me. So I should be the one pushing them back… like coach said, creating more space. I’ll have a better chance if I’m pushing them back more than I am,” sophomore forward Lauryn Deede said.
The next three quarters for CMU did not go as well as the first. They quickly fell behind in the second quarter, and CSM’s suffocating defense did the rest, holding CMU to 55 points on the night. The team finished the night shooting 25-62 on the floor and 11-13 from the free throw line while also grabbing 25 rebounds and 13 assists.
“We do what we do in practice; we just run to the rim and then it just goes over the top of us. There are ways to come up with boards, and there are gonna be those ones that have a wicked bounce and we don’t get it. But I put that on me because we don’t obviously emphasize that enough.” Head coach Taylor Wagner said.
With a chance to rebound Saturday night against MSU, the team started out strong, battling back with a 12-5 scoring run to win the first quarter 12-9. CMU was able to carry that momentum back onto the court to start the second quarter, holding onto a one-point lead at half.
The last half of the game stayed just as close and competitive as the first half had been, with CMU doing a better job controlling the rebound game. The Mavericks pulled down more than 40 on the night, and only gave up 33 boards to MSU all night.
Unfortunately, CMU was not able to hold onto their lead, as MSU pulled ahead with a 3-pointer with just nine seconds left in the game. Although CMU had a chance to regain the lead, they were unable to secure the win, leaving them with a 1-7 record moving forward.
The team now travels to the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs on Dec. 9 at 5:00 PM, and to Regis in Denver on Dec. 10 at 3:00 PM for their next slate of RMAC games.
