Despite a furious second-half rally, No. 23 Dixie State was knocked out in the semifinal round of the 2020 RMAC Under Armour Men's Basketball Tournament by fourth-seed Colorado Mesa, 86-79, Friday night inside the Burns Arena.

The loss dropped DSU to 23-7 on the season, while the Mavericks (20-10) advanced on to play No. 3 seed Colorado School of Mines (22-9) in the RMAC Tournament Championship game on Saturday night at 7 p.m. Mines moved on to the RMAC title game thanks to a 76-59 triumph over #7-seed South Dakota Mines (17-13) in the first semifinal game of the night.

The winner of Saturday night's championship game will earn the RMAC's automatic bid to the 2020 NCAA Division II Men's Basketball Tournament.

The Blazers and Mavericks punched and counter-punched through two ties and four lead changes over the first 14-plus minutes of the first half, until a 9-0 run propelled Dixie State to a 31-26 lead with 5:33 to go in the first half. Jarod Greene, who sa his first action after missing the last five games to injury, scored four points in the rally, while Andre Wilson got the run started with a lay-in and free throw.

However that lead would be short-lived as CMU outscored Dixie State 15-6 to close the half to take a 41-37 lead into the halftime break.

The Mavericks continued to ride that momentum to open second half, extending to their largest lead of the night at 57-46 after a Kolton Peterson 3-pointer and free throw at the 13:33 mark. The Peterson three of one of three CMU trifectas to begin the period as the Mavericks hit seven of their first 10 from beyond the arc in the game overall.

Jack Pagenkopf answered with a 3-pointer of his own to trim the Blazer deficit to eight, but Peterson countered with his second trey of the half and CMU's eighth of the game to push the Maverick lead back to double digits.

Trailing 63-51 with just over 12 minutes to go, Dixie State scored 10-straight points as part of a huge 13-2 run over a near five-minute span to pull to within one point at 65-64 with 7:37 remaining. Pagenkopf poured in seven of those points with a mid-range jumper, followed by a steal and breakaway lay-in and a 3-pointer.

Jacob Nicolds followed by a fast-break lay-up of his own set up by Wilson steal, then after Maverick bucket, Dason Youngblood beat the shot-clock buzzer with a tear-drop jumper from the left elbow that cut the Maverick lead to 65-63. Hunter Schofield would later split a pair of free throws to make it a one-point game.

However Dixie State could not maintain the momentum as the Blazers came up empty on their next three offensive possessions, and CMU would capitalize with an 8-0 spurt to push their lead back to nine at 73-64 with 5:13 to go.

Dixie State mounted one final charge, outscoring CMU 11-2 over the next four minutes, with nine of those points coming from Pagenkopf, culminating with a huge 3-pointer to make a 77-75 game with 1:22 on the clock.

However that would be as close as the Blazers would get as Tommy Nuno knocked down a leaner in the paint on CMU ensuing possession, while the Mavericks hit 7-of-8 at the foul line in the closing moments to close out the win.

Pagenkopf led all scorers with a career-high 32 points, 25 of which came after halftime. The 2019-20 RMAC Player of the Year connected on 13-of-22 from the floor with four 3-pointers (4-of-10) to go with a game-high seven assists and five rebounds.

Schofield added 12 points, including seven of DSU's first nine points of the game, en route to becoming Dixie State's NCAA-era single-season scoring leader (492 points).

Dixie State lost despite shooting better than 50 percent from the floor for the fourth-straight game, finishing the night 52.5 percent (32-of-61) from the floor, which included a 6-of-19 effort (.316) from the perimeter. DSU also outrebounded CMU by a 29-27 count, 11-4 on the offensive glass, and turned the ball over just nine times on the night.

However the Blazers were done in at the foul line as DSU went just 9-of-17 (.529) at the charity stripe.

Jared Small led five Mavericks in double figures with 22 points. CMU shot 58.3 percent (28-of-48) from the field and connected on 53.3 percent (8-of-15) from downtown. The Mavericks also hit 22 of their 27 (.815) foul shots overall. 

The Trailblazers will now wait to learn their NCAA Tournament fate as the 2020 NCAA Division II Tournament Selection Show will be broadcast live on NCAA.com this Sunday night, March 8, at 8:30 p.m. (MT). DSU had entered Friday's RMAC semifinal ranked No. 3 in the South Central Region.