DENVER, Colo. – The No. 1 seed Regis University women's soccer team fell in a 2-1 upset to No. 4 seed Colorado Mesa University this afternoon as they dropped the semifinals round of the RMAC Women's Soccer Championship at the Regis Turf Fields.
The Rangers have now been eliminated from this year's tournament with them next seeing action when they hopefully make the NCAA Tournament as an at-large bid.
Regis suffers just their first loss since Sept. 3 as well with them having gone 14-0-1 since that date.
Overall, the Rangers now sit at 15-3-1 while the Mavericks, who earned a trip to the RMAC Tournament with the win, improve their record to 11-4-4.
CMU scored once in both halves of today's game while never giving up the lead since the 20th minute of play despite a late goal by the Rangers.
Ellie Duncan scored the first of those two goals for the Mavericks in the 20th minute, coming on a tight shot she squeezed off in a pile of Ranger defenders and into the perfectly placed top right corner of the night.
CMU was able to score again in the 53rd minute of play to build their lead, this time by Parker Mairs who tapped the ball in from short range after receiving a cross pass from Olivia Bariao-Arce.
The Rangers pressed to mount a comeback late however with their lone score happening in the 89th minute on a free kick by Fernanda Rodriguez from just outside the penalty area.
Rodriguez opted to shoot the ball straight up on her attempt with it sneaking by a wall of Mavericks and past a diving goalkeeper in the right side of the net.
The late goal provided Regis with a brief moment of life but with roughly just 90 seconds left to play the Mavs were able to play keep-away long enough to secure the win.
The Mavs ended the game outshooting the Rangers 16-7 while owning a large 9-1 advantage in the first half.
Paula Igual led the Rangers with two shot attempts herself while Rodriguez only took one on her scoring attempt. Her goal was also her 18th of the season with that ranking in the top 10 of program history for a single season.
Maggie Payne finished with three saves in the net while facing six shots on goal as well.
UP NEXT
The Rangers will now await their fate in the NCAA Tournament Selection Show which takes place next week on Monday, Nov. 9 with the South Central Region's top six teams making the Tournament.
Regis was most recently ranked third in the South Central Region on Monday's release of the NCAA Power Index with them being the highest ranking team of the RMAC as well.
