The Colorado Mesa University football season is on the horizon and the buzz of the gridiron is starting to stir up in the Grand Valley. The Mavericks are trying to repeat for a third year in a row as RMAC champions in the 2017 season.
The 2016 football season was greeted with some naysayers due to the Mavericks having to share the RMAC title with CSU-Pueblo and Colorado School of Mines. They did beat those two teams in the regular season. However, the Mavericks did lose some winnable games against teams with a losing record in Black Hills State and Dixie State.
Despite that, CMU was still able to call themselves “champions,” but it did leave some doubt in the air. The team did advance to the national playoffs but eventually lost to Texas A&M-Commerce to end their season.
This season, the Mavericks have many key components returning to both sides of the ball who were responsible for the success the team achieved last season.
Senior running back David Tann will lead the Mavericks offense from the backfield, where the 5-10, 215 pound running back rushed for 20 touchdowns and 1,067 yards. Due to his performance, Tann made the All-RMAC conference team.
“We got a lot of threats,” Tann said. “We’re going to even them out and keep the defense guessing.”
The rest of the backfield will look the same as well. Jonathan Beverly will serve as the 1-2 punch combo with Tann. Beverly played in 10 games last year and rushed for 328 yards on 57 carries.
Eystin Salum will be taking the reins under center for the Mavericks. The junior from Denver served primarily as the backup for starter Sean Rubalcaba last season, but managed to get his share of opportunities in which he threw for 851 yards and 8 TD. Having been a part of the team last season, Salum understands what the team is going to have to do to be successful again this year.
“We have to do it for four quarters every game, then we will accomplish our mission,” Salum said.
Head coach Russ Martin is entering his sixth season with the Mavericks where he has established a 34-22 overall record as head coach. Martin believes heavily in his team and is excited for the challenges this next season will present.
“Part of that ‘Leave No Doubt’ goes into that standpoint that this team wants to come out and win a conference championship done right,” Martin said.
The team has been issuing scrimmages, which wrapped up this last week, and the biggest positive coming out of them is there were no significant injuries sustained to any of the players.
CMU will debut the new season on a Thursday night, as opposed to their normal Saturdays, against a western slope rival, Western State Colorado University.
“I think it’s going to be a night with a great football game, phenomenal crowd, and it’s going to be a great way to kick off the season playing somebody like Western,” Martin said.
Last year the Mavericks opened up the season against the Western State in Gunnison and came away with a hard fought 34-14 victory.
CMU has not lost a season opener since 2012.
