GRAND JUNCTION, Colo.— Coming off two big road wins and having played six of their first seven games on journeys to Missouri, Florida and Colorado's Front Range, the Colorado Mesa University Maverick women's lacrosse team will begin at 3-game homestand on Saturday when they take on the Westminster University Griffins.
The Mavericks, 3-4 overall, lead the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference standings, at 2-0. The Griffins will enter Saturday's game with a 2-4 overall record and are 0-2 in conference play.
First draw for Saturday's game Community Hospital Unity Field is slated for 11 a.m., an hour earlier than originally announced.
The game can be seen on the
RMAC Network and
live statistics can be seen here.
Tickets are also available here.
Last Time Out
The Mavericks claimed one of the biggest wins in program history on Friday at nationally-ranked Regis and then followed that up with another key win at UCCS on Sunday to begin Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference play with a 2-0 record.
Friday's 16-11 win at Regis, ranked 11
th at the time in the IWLCA Division II Coaches' Poll, was the Mavs' first in 19 all-time road games against the perennial powerhouse Rangers, who were in the semifinals of last year's NCAA Division II Tournament. It was also just the second in 34 all-time tries against the Rangers, who had defeated the Mavs in each of the last four RMAC Tournament Championship games.
Courtney Havel scored a career-high six points and also added two assists while
Justine Anderson also scored four times to lead the Maverick attack.
Havel and
Caroline Ohngemach then scored five goals apiece in Sunday's 18-15 win at UCCS, a team the Mavs have defeated in the RMAC Tournament semifinals in each of the last four years.
Freshman goalkeeper
Heather Hawkins made 11 saves in each of the two victories and also registered a career-high seven groundballs in the win over UCCS.
Full recaps of both victories can be seen below.
Awards Sweep
The Mavericks swept the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Player of the Week awards for the second time this season on Monday as
Courtney Havel (Offensive) and
Heather Hawkins (Defensive) were recognized for their efforts in helping lead the Mavs to their 2-0 road trip.
Both awards were the first of their respective careers.
CMU had also swept the Week. 1 awards on Feb. 18 when
Caroline Ohngemach and
Ali Bryant.
Havel finished the Mavs' road trip to Regis and UCCS with 11 goals and three assists, good for 14 offensive points. Hawkins made 11 saves in each of the two games, recording the first two goalkeeping wins of her career. She also had nine total groundballs over the weekend.
National Recognition
Courtney Havel was also
named as IWLCA's (Intercollegiate Women's Lacrosse Coaches Association) NCAA Division II Co-Offensive Player of the Week on Tuesday.
With her 11 goals during the Mavs' 2-0 sweep, she has taken over the RMAC lead for goal scoring with 26. Havel has scored two more goals in all seven of the Mavs' games this season.
The Lake Oswego, Oregon native has already more than doubled her career goal total entering the season and has now scored 44 career goals. She had 14 as a freshman in 2023, earning honorable mention all-conference plaudits. She then scored four goals in seven games at the start of last season before missing the remainder of the 2024 campaign due to injury.
Generating the Offense
The Mavs had their best two offensive outputs of the season in last week's trip, scoring a season-high 18 goals in Sunday's win at UCCS after putting up 16 in the win over Regis. The Mavs had been held to ten or fewer in their three previous games, all losses.
The 18 goals on Sunday were the most they have scored in a conference game, since Apr. 29, 2023 when they posted an 18-7 win at Westminster, the team they play on Saturday.
Eight different Mavericks scored goals last weekend.
First Two as a Mav
CMU senior
Mikki Brown, who spent the three previous seasons at Fort Lewis, scored her first two goals in a Maverick uniform in last Friday's win over Regis. She had scored 28 times in her three years as a Skyhawk and was second on the 2024 FLC squad with 17.
Scoring Streak puts Anderson on verge of Century mark
Maverick junior
Justine Anderson continued her impressive scoring streak last weekend, scoring four times against Regis before adding a goal and four assists in the Mavs' win over UCCS in her hometown of Colorado Springs.
The Air Academy High School product has scored at least one goal in seven games of this season in each of her last 12 dating back to 2024, when was named as the RMAC Attacker of the Year after pacing the conference for goals per game (3.18).
She has had at least one offensive point in 24 straight games.
Anderson is third on this year's Maverick squad with 14 goals and also leads the team and the RMAC with 13 assists.
She will enter Saturday's game with 95 career goals and could become just the fifth Maverick in program history to ever reach the century mark, a milestone she is on pace to reach sometime during the Mavs' upcoming homestand, if not on Saturday.
Now CMU assistant coach
Kiley Davis was the last Maverick to reach the milestone back in 2023. Davis ranks fourth in program history with 136 career goals.
Defending the CHUF
The Mavericks have been historically good at home, posting a winning record on their home turf at Community Hospital Unity Field in each season since and including 2015. The Mavs have gone 51-16 (.761) at home in the last ten-plus years and are 57-31 (.648) at home throughout the history of the program, which began in 2011.
They were 6-15 in the first four years.
The Mavs went 5-2 at home last season and were 6-1 in 2023 but are 0-1 at home so far this season after falling to Grand Valley State in their only home game to date on Mar. 4.
RMAC Records
With their two wins last week, the Mavs have an even better 67-20 (.770) record in RMAC games, including two forfeit wins over Adams State in 2021 and 2022 that are not included in the Mavs' all-time overall record, as those games were declared "no contests" by the NCAA.
Eighteen of the Mavs' 20 all-time RMAC losses have come to Regis, the only RMAC team to have beaten the Mavericks this decade. CMU has not lost an RMAC game to any other current conference member.
The Coach
The 2025 season is 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.
Including this season, Delaney has a winning 14-10 record as a head coach. The Mavericks are a combined 36-23 with her on the coaching staff.
She is 2-0 against Westminster and Griffin counterpart Jannel Snow as a head coach. The Mavs are 8-0 against the Griffins in Delaney's time with the CMU program.
Know Your Foe
The Westminster Griffins, who hail from Salt Lake City, also hold a 3-4 overall record but are 0-2 in RMAC play after falling at UCCS and Regis last weekend. They dropped a 16-12 decision at UCCS on Friday and then fell 18-6 to Regis on Sunday.
The Griffins have not yet played at home, other than a Feb. 1 scrimmage against the Mavs, but were able to claim wins on their first two road trips, going 1-1 in a Feb. 14-15 trip to San Rafael, California, where they beat Saint Michael's, 16-11. They then went 2-1 in a Feb. 27-Mar. 1 trip to Missouri, claiming 14-1 and 8-7 wins over William Jewell and Rockhurst, a team the Mavs dropped their season-opener to.
Jordan Williamson leads the Griffins with 17 goals and 19 points. Holly Shoughro and Grace Szwedko have each scored ten goals as well. Celia Fidanza has recorded ten assists.
Marianna Dick has been impressive on the defensive end as recorded 25 caused turnovers and 24 groundballs. Gabriella Dedes also has 20 groundballs while Riley Weldon has 14 groundballs and 13 caused turnovers.
Szwedko leads the team with 25 draw controls.
Gabriella Cheminant and Kaelyn Hart have split time in net, each playing in four games thus far although Hart started and went the distance in both of their RMAC games last weekend. She has a 11.69 goals against average and .479 save percentage. Cheminant has a 10.40 goals against average and .391 save percentage.
Series History
The Mavericks have dominated the all-time series against the Griffins, winning the last 19 and 20 of the 21 all-time games.
Westminster's lone win came on Apr. 6, 2012 by a 16-13 margin in Grand Junction.
The Mavs are 9-1 at home against the Griffins and have won nine straight home games since 2015, the year before the Griffins joined the RMAC.
The two teams have played a home-and-home series every season since 2015, other than in 2020 when both teams' campaigns were canceled early on due to the COVID pandemic.
Up Next
The Mavericks continue their homestand with two home games next weekend, hosting CSU Pueblo on Friday, Mar. 28 at 7 p.m. as the nightcap of a men's/women's lacrosse doubleheader. The Mavs then host Fort Lewis on Sunday, Mar. 30 at 1 p.m. to wrap up the first half of the RMAC double round-robin schedule.
