Phoenix, Arizona – March 25, 2026 – Closer contest, same outcome.
Grand Canyon University Women's Rugby closed down its regular season with a 34-13 win over Arizona State University Saturday at GCU Soccer Stadium on the GCU campus. The margin was narrower than in recent matchups, but the Lopes still found a way to extend their winning streak against the Sun Devils to 11 games while honoring graduating seniors
Angelique Schrock,
Maya Littell,
Micaiah Thornton and Jada Cooper before kickoff.
The match was intense from the start. After ASU struck first to take a 7-0 lead, GCU answered midway through the first half with a try from
Arianna Topping. From there, the Lopes settled in offensively, leading to tries from
Ixel Sanchez and
Carmandee Coghlan – the latter coming off a clean sequence of passes that cleanly moved the ball from one end of the try zone to the other. ASU's pressure late in the half helped them add a penalty kick to cut the Lopes' lead to 17-10 at halftime.
"ASU has been wanting to come for us, and they knew this was the year they could probably do it," said
GCU Head Coach Lindsey Mahoney. "Because of that, they got in our heads a little bit, but the girls fought through - even when things didn't go our way sometimes."
After an ASU penalty kick early in the 2
nd half tightened the score, the Lopes responded with a penalty kick of their own and spent much of the remainder of the match on the attack. Late tries from
Katrina Clark and
Mariah Tuitasi secured the Lopes' victory in one of the more competitive matchups between the two teams in recent years.
"I'm really proud of how the team handled it today and played cohesively," said Mahoney. "They earned the opportunity to play a program like Stanford – who we've seen in national championships before – so we're excited to see what challenge they bring us next week."
GCU will now face Stanford University in the College Rugby Association of America Regional Championships on Friday, March 27 at 1:30 PM in Palo Alto, California. If they win, the 6
th-seeded Lopes will advance to Sunday's Final Four.
