The Colorado School of Mines men’s soccer team defeated the UCCS Mountain Lions by a score of 4-0, Friday at the CSM Soccer Stadium in Golden, Colorado. With the win, the Orediggers clinched the No. 2 seed and a first round bye in the RMAC tournament.
Mines, now 11-4-2 and 8-3-2 in the RMAC, scored first in the thirty-sixth minute when Zach Page-Belknap headed an Alex Nass free kick into the back of the net. At halftime, the Orediggers maintained their lead with the score remaining 1-0 at halftime. Coming out of the break, the Orediggers looked to extend their lead and succeeded by scoring three goals in eight minutes.
The second goal of the game came in the fiftieth minute when Tesho Akindele found the back of the net off of a Jace Dinkel pass. The next goal came less than three minutes later off of a give-and-go between Baski Baker and Akindele to make the score 3-0. But, the Orediggers were not done yet, and in the fifty-eighth minute, Akindele scored again, heading a Nass free kick to secure his third hat trick of the year. The final goal sealed the game at 4-0 as Mines closed out the remaining 30 minutes in the near-freezing weather to record a solid victory heading into the conference tournament.
With his hat trick in Friday’s game, Akindele has scored 19 goals this season and is CSM’s all-time leading goalscorer with 54 total goals. Nass recorded his ninth and tenth assists of the year in the game. This was the Orediggers ninth shutout of the year. Overall, mines outshot UCCS 19-10, and 8-3 on shots on goal. The team will no doubt be looking forward to the RMAC tournament set to begin at the end of the week.