GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. – For the third season in a row, the Colorado Mesa Mavericks are RMAC Tournament champions.

The Mavs were pushed to the brink by the hungry underdogs of Concordia University Irvine, who trailed by five at halftime yet rallied to take the lead with under four minutes remaining, but tournament MVP James Steinke's goal just seven seconds into overtime provided a walk-off winner in a 13-12 heavyweight fight that brought a close to the RMAC Championships from Community Hospital Unity Field in Grand Junction.

Mike Edwards, replacing an injured Dylan Checketts, won the season's most pivotal faceoff to begin overtime. Steinke scooped up the ground ball with a running start and ran straight at the cage, beating CUI goalie Daniel Yang into the top right corner. Steinke sprinted along the near sideline, removed his helmet and screamed before being mobbed in a dogpile of his teammates.

JJ Brummett and Logan Smith each scored four goals while Steinke completed a hat trick with the game winner as Colorado Mesa won its sixth RMAC Tournament championship in eight years of RMAC men's lacrosse. Luke Parrish made eight saves in the CMU cage.

Former Mav Matt Carresi scored a game-high five goals for third-seeded CUI, which knocked off one RMAC regular season co-champion in the semifinals and nearly beat the other on its home field in the final. The Golden Eagles marked their first season in the conference with a run to the tournament championship game and announced their presence as a possible contender for years to come ahead of another California team, Dominican, joining RMAC men's lacrosse next season.

For this year, the Mavericks are still the class of the RMAC. CMU prevailed in an instant classic which featured two lead changes and four ties in the fourth quarter before the swift end early in overtime.
The Mavericks got off on the front foot, scoring twice in the first minute-and-a-half of game time. Only 12 seconds in, JJ Brummett scored his 50^th goal of the season while Hunter Holcomb extended his RMAC lead with his 36^th assist. Holcomb's assist tied him with former teammate AJ Switzer for the CMU single-season program record.

Logan Smith added another immediate goal unassisted to put CMU up 2-0 with 13:30 left in the first quarter. Although CUI would score twice over the course of the opening 15 minutes to end the first tied 2-2, Brummett and Smith finding the net would become a recurring theme.

Both attackmen would complete their hat trick in the second period, scoring twice each as CMU outscored CUI 5-0 to take a 7-2 lead into halftime. Braden Lowe had two second-quarter assists while Steinke scored once and assisted Brummett on JJ's second goal of the day, which gave him the sole RMAC goalscoring lead.

Concordia showed immediate signs of life coming out of the break, scoring the first three goals of the second half to trim the lead down to two goals and demonstrate that this game was never going to be a blowout. Still, CMU responded with two goals in a 30-second span to seemingly wrestle control of the game back to the home team.

Deuce Kirschke was the beneficiary of a rebound to score CMU's eighth goal, with a shot from Philip Petersen ricocheting off the stick of Yang and straight to Kirschke, who tiptoed the line to stay out of the crease while finding a way past the CUI goalie. Smith scored his fourth of the game only 23 seconds later, sprinting over to the stands to fire up a lively home crowd after putting the ball in the net.

CUI found a separate gear in the fourth quarter, outscoring the Mavs 6-3 in the final 15 minutes of regulation. The Golden Eagles took advantage of a non-releasable penalty on CMU's Caden Hathaway to score twice on the extra-man opportunity, then tied the score for the first time since 2-2 when Jeremy Barnes, who entered the game with only two goals all season, completed his hat trick with 13:18 left in the game to make it 9-9.

From there, the game was a see-saw battle. After scoring four goals earlier in the game, Logan Smith turned into a playmaker to find Steinke for CMU's 10^th goal, but CUI responded with a pair of goals from Carresi to take an 11-10 lead.

The Golden Eagles lead lasted less than a minute, however, with JJ Brummett sprinting to a rebound and beating the goalie back to the net to tie the score before Dylan Checketts won the faceoff and scored unassisted with 3:08 to play to put the Mavs back up, 12-11. Checketts took a massive hit on the play while releasing the go-ahead shot, so CMU had to call on Mike Edwards, who had just recently returned from injury himself.

For most of the contest, the faceoff battle between First Team All-Conference faceoff selection Cade Poe and Second Team All-Conference selection Dylan Checketts took center stage, with Checketts finishing 16-for-24 in the circle and Poe finishing 11-for-28. Edwards had lost his first two faceoffs of the day but won two important ones down the stretch.

A late penalty call on Deuce Kirschke gave CUI a man-up situation for the final 38 seconds of regulation with the Mavericks clinging to a one-goal lead. CUI rode the hot hand, with Carresi scoring to tie the game with 11 seconds remaining for his fifth goal of the game and ninth goal of the tournament, more than any other RMAC player.

Despite the Golden Eagles' heroics in tying the game in regulation, however, it was over in a flash in the extra period. Edwards pushed the ball forward on the draw, Steinke reached the ball first, and seven seconds later, it was over.

Steinke was named the tournament MVP, with JJ Brummett, Dylan Checketts, Riley Fisher and Hunter Holcomb accompanying him on the All-Tournament Team. Also making the all-tournament team were Matt Carresi, Colin O'Connor, Cade Poe and Daniel Yang from CUI, Westminster's Christian Jones and Adams State's Brennan Morrisey.

CMU plays next against Division III power Colorado College while waiting to see if they will be selected for the NCAA Tournament. The Mavs and Tigers will face one another on May 4 at noon in Grand Junction, with the NCAA selection show the following day.