GRAND JUNCTION, Colo.— The Colorado Mesa University women's triathlon team is ranked 12^th overall and third amongst Division II institutions in the first regular season edition of the Collegiate Triathlon Coaches Association's, released this week by CTCA President Kyle Joplin, the head coach at the University of South Dakota.
 
Coach Jen Mathe's Mavericks, who have raced twice thus far, were also ranked third in the CTCA's Division II Preseason Poll.
 
The Mavericks have 456.12 points in the team rankings, which are made up by adding up the ranking points from a team's top five triathletes in the individual rankings.  Those individual rankings are based on each individual's best "score" from the season.

Teams and athletes that have not yet raced are not included in the rankings.
 
"The individual rankings are designed as our best effort to compare athletes across varying race types, distances, altitudes, and courses," Joplin said. Rankings are not exact predictions of performance on any given day.
 
Arizona State is the top-ranked team with 500.25 points, sitting just ahead of rival and defending national champion Arizona, which has 500.20 points.  San Francisco is third with 495.97 points.
 
Those three teams finished in that order at Sunday's Desert's Edge Collegiate Club that the Mavs hosted in conjunction with the Grand Junction Sports Commission.
 
Fifth-ranked TCU, No. 9 South Dakota and No. 10 Denver were also in the field along with the Mavericks and Black Hills State, which sits 14^th in the overall rankings and fourth amongst Division II squads.
 
Wingate, the reigning Division II national champions, are the top ranked team from the division, sitting sixth overall with 481.76 points.  Lenoir-Rhyne is the only other Division II team ahead of the Mavs and sits eighth with 476.01 points.
 
CMU freshman Alexandra Schipai leads the Maverick contingent in the individual rankings, sitting 63^rd out of 262 triathletes who have raced this season with a ranking score of 94.03 points.  She led CMU with a 32nd place finish and time of 1:08:20 at the Desert's Edge Collegiate Cup.
 
Shantelle Tupaz (91.50), Mackenzie Mayer (90.97), Nadine Klive (90.66) and Josie Williams (88.96) are all ranked inside the top 100 as well.  Tupaz, Mayer and Klive are ranked 80^th, 83^rd, and 86^th respectively with scores coming from the Desert's Edge race.  Williams is ranked 95^th with a score that came from her effort at the Southern Hills Collegiate Cup, where she led the Mavs with a 32nd place finish and a super sprint time of 35:02.
 
CMU will next race at the Prairie State Collegiate Cup in Dewitt, Illinois on Oct. 4.