LAKEWOOD, Colo. – The Colorado Mesa University men's basketball team used a dominant rebounding effort and second-half push to overtake the Colorado Christian University Cougars this afternoon as the Mavericks earned their first win in conference play by a score of 57-43 at CCU Event Center.

Moving back to an even 4-4 record on the year, the Mavs are now 1-1 in their opening week of conference play. CCU moves to 3-5 (0-2 RMAC) with the loss as they dropped both of their games this week.

Colorado Mesa avenges last year's loss to the Cougars as well with them falling 75-65 in that matchup.

The Mavs trailed by as many as 14 points in the opening half of today's game with the Cougars hitting four three-pointers in the first 10 minutes. 

CCU led 18-4 to own the advantage early before Colorado Mesa stormed back with a 10-0 run to make it just a four-point difference.

The Mavs owned their first lead of the game at 24-23 with two minutes left in the half and would trail by just one point at halftime with the score being 27-26.

The Cougars were able to hit six three-pointers in the first half to bolster their early lead, but Colorado Mesa dominated the rebounding column owning a 22-11 advantage.

Building off their momentum they finished the first half with, the Mavs then began the second half outscoring the Cougars 17-4 through nine minutes of play and holding the hosts scoreless for over four minutes of that stretch.

Colorado Mesa ended the game going on a 7-2 run through the final four minutes as they ended up winning by the exact margin they trailed by in the early goings.

The Mavs held the Cougars to just 16 points total in the second half as CCU struggled from the field shooting 26.7 percent. They would shoot just 8.7 percent in the second half alone and only make one more three-pointer as they went 7-for-25 from beyond the arc.

Colorado Mesa shot 41.4 percent from the field and contributed much of their offense to the paint as they largely outscored the Cougars 42-10 in that category.

Ty Allred was the Mavs' leading scorer for the second game in a row finishing with 31 points and 13 rebounds. Allred is the first Mav to own a 30-point game since 2024, when Trevor Baskin did against Eastern New Mexico.

In addition, Allred now has four double-doubles this season.

Cohenj Gonzales added 11 points as the team's second highest scorer with only six players total recording a point. 

Conversely, every single player recorded at least one rebound in the game with the group of Allred, Clayton Jewell, Kap Laila and Wes Ball all having seven or more.

Returning home for their next game, the Mavs will play to just one contest this next week as they host Colorado School of Mines on Dec. 13 at Brownson Arena for a 3 P.M. start. Tickets can be purchased online at cmumavericks.com/tickets