The Mavericks secure the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference (RMAC) Regular Season Championship with their 16-7 win over the Griffins on senior night.
Colorado Mesa University (CMU) will host the RMAC Tournament at Maverick Field on May 7 and 8.
Freshman midfielder Sergio Pelayo scored a career-high seven points along with career-highs with two goals and five assists.
“My teammates gave me confidence, and I just knew that on the backside somebody was going to come out and they were going to be there for me. That’s the biggest thing is pull somebody and dish the ball,” Pelayo said.
Westminster College’s (WC) goalies Jacob Miller and Jordan Penn had nine saves each through one half of play.
Spencer Whinery scored the first goal of the game for the Griffins with 12:53 left in the first quarter. Pelayo tied the game up four minutes later off an assist from redshirt freshman attackman/midfielder AJ Switzer.
Easton Albert gave WC the lead back as he was able to recover the loose ball off Quinn Lewis’s shot to quickly put it in the back of the net. CMU answered with two goals of their own to end the first quarter with momentum and a 3-2 lead.
Kyle Williams picked up an unnecessary roughness penalty which resulted in a one-minute trip to the penalty box just 33 seconds into the second quarter. Switzer capitalized on the opportunity as he scored his first goal of the day as he caught a pass with time and room to fire a shot past Penn.
Redshirt freshman faceoff man Cole Emmanuel cleanly won the faceoff and raced down the field to rip a shot over Penn’s head to give CMU a 5-2 lead. Redshirt freshman attackman Jed Brummett scored back-to-back goals with both goals coming off assists from Pelayo to give CMU all the momentum in the first half.
Switzer scored the final goal of the first half to give CMU an 8-2 lead going into the break.
“AJ can play midfield or attack for us, it’s really just what we feel like we need to get on the field at this time,” Head Coach Vince Smith said.
The Mavericks had a 26 to 12 advantage in the ground ball battle in the first half.
WC came out firing out of the break as they scored the first goal of the second half and scored another goal two minutes later to cut the lead down to five points. The Mavericks answered with six unanswered goals as they took a 15-4 lead into the fourth quarter.
Redshirt freshman attackman Braden Lowe scored CMU’s final goal of the game as he cut through the defense to catch a pass and quickly got it away to put it by Miller. WC scored three unanswered goals to end the game, but the burst of offense was too little, too late.
The Mavericks ended the game with a 47 to 23 advantage in the ground ball battle against the Griffins.
Brummett was CMU’s second-leading scorer as he scored five goals in the contest. Switzer and Steinke each finished with four points in the Maverick’s win.
Sophomore goalie Nolan Hoffman ended the game with eight saves through 45 minutes of play.
“I just told my guys to keep it outside and I got it all done, just watch cuts,” Hoffman said.
CMU’s game is the RMAC Tournament Semifinal on Friday, May 7 at Maverick Field.
