GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. – On the road for the first of four straight matches away from the confines of Stermole Stadium, the Colorado School of Mines men's soccer team lined up Thursday night at Community Hospital Unity Field against Colorado Mesa in a battle of teams seeking their first league win. A scoreless first half was followed by a frenzied second half that saw each team score within five minutes of each other with around 30 minutes to play, but it was a wild sequence with nine minutes left that saw the Orediggers (2-9-0, 1-2-0) go ahead for good with a penalty kick from
Gabriel Rodriguez to knock off the Mavericks (3-5-2, 0-2-1) by a final score of 2-1.
CMU had a few dangerous opportunities in the early going with a pair of free kicks on the near side of the field from just outside the penalty area. The first in the eighth minute went nowhere off a mass of humanity that included more than a dozen field players combined from both sides, while an 18th minute kick from Dylan Hobson was handily saved by
Peter Saunders.
After
Quin Collins played the first shot of the night for Mines off target in the 22nd minute,
Gabriel Rodriguez tested reigning RMAC Goalkeeper of the Year Diego Chavez for the first time in the 26th but Chavez was able to make the save moving to his left.
No further chances materialized for the balance of the period for either the Orediggers or the Mavericks, as both sides matched one another fairly evenly over the first 45 minutes with no changes to the scoreboard.
Coming out of the intermission, Mines had a trio of looks from close in against Chavez within seconds of play resuming. Rodriguez's first shot was blocked before
Smith Russell and
Ayman Bushara each took aim off rebounds, but a pair of good saves kept things level and allowed the Mavericks to catch their breath momentarily.
In the 58th minute as the Mavericks were attempting to bring the ball back up field following a save by Chavez off a shot from Bushara,
Charlie Newberry forced a bad touch by CMU in front of the Mines bench with the ball finding its way to the feet of Russell. The freshman gathered it up and charged ahead up the far side, playing a cross from just inside the box to Rodriguez, who had no issues finishing off the attack from eight yards out with the one-timer off his right foot to take the lead.
Colorado Mesa responded not too long after in the 63rd minute, as Justin Ibrahim played a cross from the near corner to Marc Bonafe at the top of the six-yard box, where he finished with a leaping header into the upper corner of goal past Saunders to level things at 1-1.
The Orediggers had a chance to regain the edge in the 65th minute following a yellow card on CMU's Isaac Zamora against Bushara. Graham shops lined up to take the free kick to restart the action and played a strike at the net, but Chavez was there to make the save.
Things took a dramatic turn in the 81st minute following a Mines corner kick. A bicycle kick shot attempt from
Jimmy Koufidakis resulted in a handball inside the penalty area on CMU's Connor Chilson, who was subsequently assessed a yellow card. Additionally, Shane Bryan sent off with a straight red leaving the Mavericks down a man for the final nine minutes.
After the officials sorted things out, Rodriguez walked out to take the penalty kick awarded for the initial infraction. With Chavez doing his best to distract the senior, Rodriguez remained unfazed as he went top shelf with ease for his second goal of the night to retake the lead 2-1.
That PK ended up being the goal that mattered most as playing shorthanded, Colorado Mesa wasn't able to press their attack for a second equalizer, having to play more defense than offense as action resumed. Bushara and
Marc Zimmermann continued to fire away at goal for the Orediggers as time wound down and opening the road trip the right way with three big points in the standings with the winning effort.
NOTABLES
-Rodriguez turned in his second two-goal performance of the season in the winning effort, retaking the top spot on the clubhouse leaderboard with his third and fourth goals of the season
-The goals were the 14
th and 15th of the senior's career and raise his point haul to 35 since his arrival in Golden in 2021
-The Richardson, Texas product is the first Oredigger since Tristan Semelsberger in 2022 to record two or more matches with multiple goals in a season
-Russell joined his freshman mates
Kian Mueller and
Jaden Igarta by recording his first career assist on the Rodriguez goal while logging a season-high 66 minutes
-Saunders closed the night with three saves in goal
-Bushara led the attack with a season-best four shots, all of which were on goal
-Newberry logged the full 90 for the third consecutive match and fifth time this season to increase his team-leading minute count to 856
-Mines tied their season high of 16 shots in the match and finished with an advantage on the shot chart for the first time in 2024, doubling up CMU 16-8 while putting a season-high nine shots on goal while conceding a season-low of four
-With other results around the league and still more games to come on Friday before all teams convene again Sunday, the Orediggers now find themselves right in the thick of the standings in sixth, one point behind Colorado Christian and one point ahead of MSU Denver
UP NEXT
Mines is back on the road Sunday for the second leg of their four-match road trip when they head to Salt Lake City for a 1 p.m. contest against Westminster.
Fans can keep up with Mines men's soccer on X and Instagram at @minesmsoc and @mines_msoc. They can also keep up with Colorado School of Mines Athletics all year long on Facebook, X and Instagram using the handle @MinesAthletics.
