LAKEWOOD, Colo. – Opening Halloween morning with a win on the road, the Colorado Mesa University Men's Soccer defeated the Colorado Christian University Cougars this morning in a 4-2 decision at Trailblazer Stadium.
Earning their fifth win in their last seven games, the Mavericks are now 8-4-3 (5-1-2 RMAC) while continuing to battle for a top spot in the conference tournament. With the win they moved up to second place in the standings, owning 17 points now. The Cougars fell to 2-11-3 (2-4-2 RMAC) with the loss.
Scoring four goals in today's game, this was the Mavs sixth time this season totaling four or more goals against an opponent. Doing the scoring of those goals was three different players for the Mavs with the trio of Connor Chilson, Daniel Paulsson and Riccardo Legnante each finding the net. Paulsson led that group with two goals himself.
Playing to a five-goal first half, the Mavs opened their day scoring three straight times to begin the match with each of the goals coming in the first 15 minutes.
The first of those goals came just two minutes into the competition with Connor Chilson scoring after Colorado Mesa was granted the early corner kick. Chilson scored on a cross attempt from Matteo Bonelli who earned the assist.
Following in the 11th minute was then Daniel Paulsson with this being the first of two straight goals for the Senior.
Upon receiving a short pass from Manuel Ponce Casas over his head, Paulsson hammered the ball in from long range on the score to make it 2-0.
Just four minutes later in the 15th minute Paulsson then scored another goal with him rebounding his own shot off the woodwork and heading it past the goalkeeper.
The Cougars responded with a goal in 24th minute by Dylan Hall to bring the deficit to two, but the rally was short lived as Colorado Mesa once again scored in the 28th minute.
This time was Riccardo Legnante for the Mavs with his goal coming from less than 10 feet out as he received a pass into the box from Paulsson. This was Legnante's first goal this season while Paulsson improved to now having five points in this game alone.
In just the first 45 minutes, Colorado Mesa outshot the Cougars 10-5 with eight of their 10 shots being on goal. In addition, they had five corner kicks, including four in the first 10 minutes.
In the second half, the pace of play was much slower with only goal being managed as the Cougars scored just once in the 60th minute on a breakaway goal by Casey Devito.
The Cougars outshot CMU 12-8 in the second half but couldn't find the net past their one score as Alejandro Jimenez totaled four of his seven saves.
In total there were six yellow cards also drawn with CCU having four of them.
Returning to Grand Junction now for their final regular season home game, the Mavs take on MSU Denver this Sunday at Community Hospital Unity Field for a 2:30 P.M. start. Sunday's game will also be CMU Camp/Youth Club Day with any youth that has attended a CMU Soccer Camp in the past year getting free entry.
