GUNNISON, Colo.  With Western Colorado's dominating 68-51 Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference victory Thursday night over visiting Westminster (Utah) University, the Mountaineers clinched a berth in the RMAC postseason tournament, doing so in front of home crowd on Senior Night at Paul Wright Gym.
JUST THE FACTS
Final score: Western def. Westminster, 68-51
Records: Western 14-9 overall (12-5 RMAC), Westminster 8-16 (5-13)
Location: Paul Wright Gym, Gunnison, Colo.
HOW IT HAPPENED

• Perhaps the most pertinent question is, when was it over?
• One could say it was Addison Harding's offensive rebound put-back that cut the Griffins' second quarter lead to 30-22. Why then?
• Because the Mountaineers, with the fire lit by Harding, went on a 13-0 burn to take the lead and never looked back, with Ivey Schmidt's 3-pointer giving Western's the lead at 31-30.
• By the time Jayda Maves started off the third quarter with a downtown 3-pointer, Western had gone on a 25-1 run to dispirit the Griffins.
• When the score was 49-35, at the 7:14 mark of the third, Westminster had not dropped in a field goal since Harding's put-back. It's four points had all come at the free throw line.
• The Griffins finally put in a field goal – going 12 minutes and 19 seconds since their last one – to make the score 49-37, only to have Maves, third in the nation in 3-point percentage, drain another triple.
• Since that early 30-20 deficit, Western would finish the second quarter with a 42-31 lead, an 11-point margin that wouldn't dip one point during all the third and completed the fourth quarter with a lead no less than 12 points.

COURT NOTES

• Schmidt led Western with 23 points on the night while Maves added 15, going 3-for-7 from behind the arc.
• Coming off the bench Harding pulled down a career- and game-high 12 rebounds and just missed her first double-double after scoring a career-best 8 points, also adding one block and three assists.
• Also coming off the bench was Jacy Chandler, who scored eight points, had three rebounds, one assist and one steal.
• Western dominated in rebounding, again, forging a 43-31 advantage off the glass, paced by Harding and seven more by Schmidt.

SENIORS
The program recognized three seniors in a pre-game ceremony as Schmidt, Chloe Daniels and Darcy Jardine were accompanied by family members and presented with framed jerseys in a mid-court ceremony before their final regular-season game at Paul Wright Gym.

RMAC TOURNAMENT

• The win clinched a top-eight spot in the RMAC regular season standings.
• The Mountaineers, with Thursday night's results in, sit tied for fourth place with UC Colorado Springs, which also clinched a tournament spot.
• UCCS owns the tiebreaker over Western via a head-to-head matchup, but the three remaining games on everyone's schedule still has the possibility to jumble things from second through sixth place.

THEY SAID IT


UP NEXT
Western looks to ride the momentum from Thursday night into Saturday afternoon when it will play a 1 p.m. game at fourth-ranked and RMAC champion Colorado Mesa University.