GRAND JUNCTION, Colo.— The Colorado Mesa University women's lacrosse team will begin the 2025 season this week with a trip to Missouri for two NCAA Division II Midwest Region games.
 
The Mavericks are coming off an 11-6 2024 campaign, which saw them take second in the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference standings before advancing to the RMAC Tournament Championship Game for the fourth straight year.
 
The Mavs will open up the 2025 campaign at Rockhurst University in Kansas City on Friday afternoon at 4 p.m. CST (3 p.m. Mountain) and will then head just north to St. Joseph for a Sunday afternoon (Noon Mountain/11 a.m.) encounter at Missouri Western State.  That game has been moved up and hour and indoors to the Griffon Indoor Sports Complex.
 
Both opponents will be playing their first games when they meet the Mavs.
 
Live Coverage
 
The Rockhurst game will be streamed for free on the GLVC Sports Network and are accessible at the links above.  However, because of the location change, the Missouri Western State game will no longer be streamed.
 
Live statistics for both games will also be available at the links above.
 
Full game recaps will be posted on www.cmumavericks.com on Friday and Sunday evenings.
 
In the Polls
 
After taking second in the RMAC standings for the third time in four years while winning a 2023 co-championship, the Mavericks have unsurprisingly been picked second in this season's RMAC Preseason Coaches' Poll.
 
The poll, which was released on Jan. 21, had the Mavericks receiving 20 points in the polling of the conference's six head coaches, who were asked to rank their opposition 1-5 without voting for their own squad.
 
The Mavericks also received the first place vote from Regis, which made the semifinals of last year's NCAA Division II Tournament after winning the RMAC Regular Season and Tournament titles.
 
The Rangers, who were 20-2 a year ago, received all five of the other first place votes and topped the poll with 25 points.
 
UCCS finished third in the poll with 16 points while Westminster (14), CSU Pueblo (8) and Fort Lewis were in the bottom half of the poll.
 
Players to Watch
 
In conjunction with the poll, the RMAC also released a Players to Watch List, made up of returning first and second team all-conference selections.  Teams that did not have any returning all-conference picks were also permitted to add a single player to the list.
 
CMU's two selections are attackers Justine Anderson and Cardon Dickey.
 
Anderson, a junior from Colorado Springs, was named as the RMAC Attacker of the Year last season and has been on the First Team All-RMAC squad in both of her previous collegiate seasons.  She scored 54 goals last season, the fourth highest total in CMU history, and led the RMAC in goals per game (3.18) last year.  She also earned Honorable Mention All-America honors from the USA Lacrosse Magazine and was a Second Team IWLCA (Intercollegiate Women's Lacrosse Coaches Association) All-Midwest Region pick.
 
Dickey, a junior from Murrieta, California, was named to the Second Team All-RMAC squad in 2024 after finishing second behind Anderson in scoring with 38 goals and 48 offensive points.
 
Both players were also named to the RMAC All-Tournament Team in 2024.
 
Preseason All-American
 
Justine Anderson has also been tabbed as a Third Team Preseason All-American by the USA Lacrosse Magazine, after receiving the honorable mention plaudit from the publication last year.
 
New Faces
 
The Mavericks will have 16 new faces on their large 37-person roster this year, including 14 true freshman and a pair of transfers from other NCAA Division II institutions.
 
Attack Mikki Brown will spend her final collegiate season at CMU after playing within the RMAC for the past three seasons at Fort Lewis.  The Newbury Park, California native led the Skyhawks with ten assists last year and was second on their squad with 17 goals and 27 offensive points.
 
Redshirt sophomore attack Kenzie Streby also joins the CMU program this season after transferring from Division II power Florida Southern.  Streby, a member of the Polish national team, hails from Gahanna, Ohio.  In limited playing time (6 games) at Florida Southern in 2023, Streby had a goal, an assist and a groundball.
 
Of the 14 freshman, who come from seven different states, eight are expected to travel to Missouri and could make their collegiate debuts.  There are four new Mavs from both California and Minnesota and two from Colorado.  Delaware, Maryland, Utah and Texas are also represented in the freshman class.
 
Plenty returning
 
The Mavericks also return 22 players from last year's team on to their large 2025 roster.
 
Eight of those 22 started ten or more games a year ago, including senior goalie Shannon Murphy senior attack Emme Rezoski, CMU's main draw taker in 2024, and junior defender Olivia Turk, who all started all 17 contests in 2024.  Justine Anderson, Carson Dickey, Ella Freemon and Caroline Ohngemach all played in 17 games last year as well and made a combined 51 starts between them.
 
Ali Bryant, who played in 16 games while making 12 starts, also returns for her senior season after fighting through injuries last year.  She was an IWLCA All-Midwest Region pick in 2023 and was the RMAC Midfielder and Freshman of the Year in 2022.
 
Ohngemach and Rezoski both earned Honorable Mention All-RMAC honors last season.
 
Year No. 2 and 6
 
The 2025 season will be the second with Head Coach Ashley Delaney running the Maverick program. 
 
Delaney is no stranger to the squad and will be in her sixth year overall after serving as an assistant for the previous four seasons from 2020-23.
 
The Mavs went 11-6 last season with Delaney in charge and posted a 33-19 combined record in her four years as an assistant under two previous head coaches. 
 
The Mavs also won a share of the program's only RMAC Regular Season title in 2023 and have been in the RMAC Tournament Championship game in each of the last four years.
 
Alumni Filled Bench
 
Delaney will have a pair of former Maverick greats on the bench as her assistant coaches in 2025.
 
Kiley Davis has returned to CMU as Delaney's full time assistant after earning IWLCA Midwest Region and All-RMAC honors in all three seasons as a Maverick player from 2021-23. Davis then went to use her fifth season of eligibility at Division I Lindenwood University as a graduate transfer last year, earning Second Team All-Atlantic Sun honors while finishing second on the Lions' squad with 45 goals a year ago.
 
Davis' 136 goals and 167 offensive points in her time as a Maverick player are the fourth highest totals in CMU history. 
 
Meanwhile, Kelsey Viger, the top defender in CMU history, will also serve as a volunteer assistant coach for the Mavericks this season.   Viger is the program's only 2-time All-American, having earned first team honors in 2023 and third team honors in her fifth year season in 2024.
 
Expanded Tournament + AQ's
 
The NCAA Division II Tournament has been expanded from 16 to 24 teams for the 2025 season.  Six teams from each of the four region's from around the country will now be selected for the tournament, which begins on May 8.
 
This could be great news for the Mavericks, who have consistently been knocking on the door for one of four spots nearly every season since making their only NCAA Tournament appearance back in 2019, when they went on to reach the Midwest Regional final/National Quarterfinal.
 
With the expanded field, automatic qualification has also been added to women's lacrosse for the first time.  The tournament champions from the RMAC, the Great Lakes Valley Conference and the Great Midwest Athletic Conference will automatically qualify for the NCAA Tournament with three other teams selected at-large from those three leagues as well as the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference, which only has five members, one short of the cutoff of six to qualify for an AQ spot.
 
In total, there are 26 institutions from the Midwest Region, who are eligible for potential selection and head-to-head results is one of the main selection criteria, making this weekend's games against Rockhurst and Missouri Western as well as the Mavs' home opener against Grand Valley State critical to that process.
 
Know Your Foes
 
Rockhurst
 
The Hawks went 9-7 overall and 3-4 in Great Lakes Valley Conference play last season.  They have been picked fourth out of eight teams in the 2025 GLVC Preseason Coaches' Poll, released last Wednesday (Feb. 5).
 
They return 20 players and eight starters from last year's squad, including Reagan Danner, who scored 28 goals last year, the Hawks' second highest total from last season.
 
Molly McCourt is entering her 11th as the Hawks' head coach and has compiled an 80-71 record in her previous ten seasons.
 
Missouri Western State
 
The Griffins were picked third in the GLVC Preseason Poll and are coming off a program-best 10-6 season, which included a 4-3 GLVC mark.  They were the No. 3 seed in the GLVC Tournament last year and fell 11-5 to No. 2 seed and NCAA Tournament qualifier Indianapolis in the semifinal round.
 
Jessica Berg, enters her fourth season in charge of the program and returns a pair of First Team All-GLVC honorees in Grace Williams and Sam Pruitt, as well as Honorable Mention selections Brooke Tjernlund and Serah Ryals.
 
Pruitt scored 55 goals last year while Ryals had 37.  Tjernlund added 25 while Williams was second on the Griffin squad with 46 groundballs and 30 caused turnovers.

Berg is familiar with the RMAC, having played three seasons at Regis, where she earned all-America and 2021 RMAC Midfielder of the Year honors.  Her squads have compiled a 27-24 cumulative record in her previous three seasons.
 
Series Histories
 
The Mavs have won all 12 previous meetings with Rockhurst, who were former associate members of the RMAC.  Four of those wins have come in Kansas City, including a 13-9 win on Mar. 20 of last season.  CMU's Justine Anderson scored six goals in that game while Carson Dickey had three.
 
Sunday's game will be the first ever match-up between the Mavs and Griffins, who started their program in 2021.
 
Up Next
 
After this weekend's trip to Missouri, the Mavericks will return home to prepare for two out of region games in Florida.  The Mavs will play at Florida Tech on Thursday, Feb. 27 in Melbourne before playing against and in Saint Leo on Saturday, Mar. 1.
 
Saint Leo is ranked 14^th in the IWLCA Division II Coaches Poll, released for the first time on Monday. 
 
Florida Tech is ranked 21^st.