GRAND JUNCTION, Colo.— A 5-goal start and an 8-0 run over a 15-minute span in the late third and into the fourth quarter was more than enough for the top-seeded Colorado Mesa University Mavericks to claim the 2025 Peach Belt Conference Rocky Mountain Division Tournament title by a 15-6 margin over No. 2 seed Concordia University Irvine here at Community Hospital Field.
 
The division's regular season champions have now won seven post-season titles since the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference first started sponsoring the sport in 2016, claiming each of the last four.
 
CMU, ranked 20^th in this week's USILA NCAA Division II poll, will now head to St. Augustine, Florida to face tenth-ranked Flagler College in the overall PBC Championship game on Friday (May 2) at 7 p.m. EDT (5 p.m. Mountain).  The winner will receive the PBC's automatic qualification spot into the NCAA Division II Tournament.
 
The Flagler Saints, seeded second in the Peach Belt Division Tournament, knocked off host and top seed Lander, 11-10 in that tournament championship game earlier Saturday and are now 14-2 on the season.
 
The Mavericks, who improved to 12-3 overall and to 5-1 at home this season, won all three meetings with the Golden Eagles (8-7) in 2025 and backed up their 13-12 overtime win in last year's Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Tournament title with the large runs after the visitors cut a 6-1 deficit to 6-4 and 7-6 with just under six minutes to go in the third quarter.
 
The Mavs' Deuce Kirschke then scored a key unassisted goal in transition just over 2 ½ minutes later sparking the title-sealing run.
 
JJ Brummett, who finished the day with four goals, then scored two more goals just seven seconds apart around a nice Mike Edwards faceoff win, groundball and pass to put the Mavs ahead 10-6 after the third quarter.
 
The Mavs then put the game away with three more goals in the first five minutes of the fourth quarter and a coast-to-coast Shawn Ferguson goal, the long stick midfielder/defender's first of the season.  The junior out of El Cajon, California also had three caused turnovers and two groundballs in the win.
 
Kirschke, who had his first two career hat tricks in the tournament,  then finished off the scoring with his third goal of the game. 
 
Connor Jensen also recorded a hat trick, his seventh of the campaign, and added three assist to finish with a game and career-high six points.
 
Meanwhile, sophomore net-minder Shaden Shields was phenomenal, matching his season-high by recording 20 saves.  He also had 20 in the Mavs' season-opening win over CUI back in February.
 
Edwards also shined at the faceoff dot, winning 16 of his 23 draws while scooping up six groundballs.  Many of his wins came over 2-time first team all-conference honoree Cade Poe, who was just 7-for-18 for the Golden Eagles.
 
CUI's Daniel Yang, the Rocky Mountain Division Goalie of the Year, was also solid in net and made nine saves while Chad McFadden and Jeremy Barnes, voted as the division's attacker of the year, scored two goals apiece to lead the visitors' attempted comeback.
 
The Mavs had stunned the Golden Eagles in the early going taking a 5-0 lead after just seven minutes of action as Kirschke, Ethan Points, Charlie Droitsch, Logan Smith and Jensen all scored.
 
CUI then got on the board just three minutes later through Noah Pillow before Brummett scored his first goal on a Droitsch assist with 46 seconds left in the opening quarter to give the Mavs a 6-1 lead.
 
Max Texter then connected with McFadden for the Golden Eagles' second goal a minute in to the second quarter before Barnes and McFadden scored man-up goals as CUI took full advantage of a pair of Maverick 30-second penalties cut the gap to 6-4 with a 3-goal run of their own.
 
The Mavs' then took another 2-minute unreleaseable penalty but were able to kill it off after CUI's Jake Cloutier was called for holding mid-way through that man down situation, erasing the Golden Eagle's extra man opportunity.
 
After both teams had returned to full strength, Brummett and Jensen then connected with 3:49 left in the second quarter to give the Mavs a 7-4 halftime lead.
 
However, CUI would not go away as Barnes and Parker Teel scored just 1:19 apart to pull the Golden Eagles within a goal a 7-6 with just under six minutes to go in the third quarter.
 
Both teams then had offensive opportunities before a blocked shot and ensuing scrum bounced into the stick of the Mavs' Ryan Garcia, eventually leading to a long Kirschke fast-break run and score the ricocheted off Yang and into the net, giving CMU an 8-6 advantage with 3:13 left in the third.
 
The Mavs then won the ensuing faceoff as Brummett scored the first of his two back-to-back goals to give the Mavs their 4-goal lead at the end of the third quarter.
 
Hathaway, a defender, then scored a long distance goal at the 13:35 mark of the fourth before Jensen scored two fourth quarter goals off Garcia and Julius Petersen assists to build the Mavs' lead to 13-6 with ten minutes remaining.