BOZEMAN, Mont.—The Colorado Ski Team finished third but more than any meet this season were in the hunt for the title until the end and came up just short as the 2020 RMISA Championships came to a close Saturday here with classic races at Crosscut Mountain and slalom races at Bridger Bowl. 

The Buffs entered the day in third but just 6.5 points behind Utah and a half-point behind Denver.  When it was all settled, Denver swept the women's slalom race in dramatic fashion to win the championship with 688 points to Utah's 678 while the Buffs took third with 643.5.  There was then almost 200 points to fourth place with Montana State finishing fourth with 449 points and Alaska Anchorage fifth with 427.  

The good news for both the Buffs and Pioneers is Utah is coming off one of the most dominant regular seasons in RMISA history, scoring three of the top four point totals under the current scoring system on its way to three blowout wins at the CU, DU and Utah Invitationals.  Now, heading to the postseason, things will get even more interesting because teams can only travel with a maximum of 12 skiers for the NCAA Championships, now less than two weeks away.

Action got underway in the men's 20K classic race, and the Buffs and Utes battled it out early while Denver struggled a bit.  Senior Ryan Jackson finished second in a sprint for the individual championship, just a half-second behind race winner Ola Jordheim from Utah.  Utah skiers took third and fourth, then freshman Magnus Boee finished fifth and junior Sondre Bollum sixth, giving the Utes and Buffs the top six finishers.  Denver's top skeir was ninth and the Buffs found themselves 18.5 points behind Utah and 31.5 head of Denver.  

In the women's 15K classic race, the Pioneers got back into the thick of things by finishing first and second.  Junior Hedda Baangman then took third, leading a group of six skiers from Colorado and Utah from third to eighth.  Freshman Anna-Maria Dietze finished fifth and senior Anne Siri Lervik eighth.  The overall race tightened back up with Utah leading with 517 points followed by CU (501.5) and Denver (480).  

As can happen in slalom, some teams get luckier than others.  Even with Filip Forejtek, who continued his brilliant late-season skiing with a second place, he finished just one-hundredth of a second out of first place, the closest he's been to winning a race in his career.  Behind Forejtek, Joey Young was 12th and Teddy Takki 15th.   The Buffs were a little down, moving behind Denver into third, but not out as all three teams were within 23.5 points, with Utah (597) leading and Denver (577) and CU (573.5) still within 3.5 points with one race remaining.  

The bad luck continued for the Buffs in the women's race.  Aside from Stef Fleckenstein's fourth place finish, Mikaela Tommy was going all-out on her second run trying to get on the podium and made a mistake, finishing 16th.  Andrea Arnold was 13th and Kaitlyn Harsch 17th.  CU's other three skiers didn't finish the first run. 

"As it goes in slalom sometimes, one team can be extremely lucky and others not as lucky," CU Coach Richard Rokos said. "It's not a matter of preparation, we just weren't as lucky.  In the end, DU had a great day on both sides and swept the podium in the women's race, getting ahead of Utah. Filip and Stef had two solid runs.  Mikaela was charging, trying to take a podium, and our other women had some bad luck in the first run.  In the end, coming to NCAAs at the same place, this was still a good way to see what our potential is.  Hopefully we got all of the bad luck out of the way and we'll take the positive side from here on out." 

Next up for the Buffs is the selection of the NCAA Championship team as half of the team is now done for the season.  That will happen Monday and then the Buffs will prepare for a few days in Boulder before returning to Bozeman next Saturday ahead of the Championships, which take place Wednesday through Saturday, March 11-14.  

WHAT IT MEANS: Bad luck aside, the Buffs can take a lot away from their performance in Bozeman, and the 12 skiers that make up the NCAA squad should come back to Bozeman knowing that they will all make a big impact on the final result and other teams will be on more equal footing, also only bringing up to 12 skiers.  The Buffs have multiple skiers in each gender and discipline capable of placing very high in each of the eight races at the championships. 

TEAM NOTES: 

• The only other time under the current scoring system that three teams hit the 600-point plateau in the RMISA Championships was in 2017.  That season, Colorado beat Denver by 7.5 points, 672-645.5, while Utah also hit the mark with 601 points. 
• The Buffs finished second in both classic races, the men to Utah and women to Denver, and third in both slalom races behind those two teams.  
• The Buffs didn't lead any points category but finished second in both alpine and Nordic.  

WOMEN'S NORDIC NOTES: 

• Baangman rebounded from her worst finish of the season on Friday, taking 14th in the freestyle race, to her best on Saturday, hitting the podium for the first time in third place.  She has nine top 10s and four top fives in her 10 races this season.  
• Dietze hit the top 10 for the fourth straight race and fifth time this season, all in the last six races. 
• Lervik is recovering from a mid-season illness attempting to get back to her early season form when she started the season with four top four finishes.  She got back to the top 10 for the first time and has five top 10 finishes in eight races this season. 

MEN'S NORDIC NOTES: 

• Jackson had the best finish of his career in second and his first career podium.  He just missed the podium in the first classic race of the season, taking fourth in Steamboat.  He has four top 10 finishes, three in classic, and he's hit the top 10 twice in a row since the start of the postseason.
• Boee had his first top five finish in the last four races after racking up six straight top five finishes to open the season. 
• Bollum took sixth, his best classic finish of the season and first top 10.  Coming off his career best finish of second on Friday, he has two of his best five career finishes at this meet this weekend. 

MEN'S ALPINE NOTES: 

• Forejtek continued his upward trajectory here at the end of the season.  The last eight days covering six races and two meets, he has finished as a runner up three times to go with one third place and one fourth place.  
• He was also disqualified in the other race after having posted what would've been another runner-up finish.  Prior to these four podiums in the last six races, he had just one in the first 14 races of his career. 

WOMEN'S ALPINE NOTES: 

• Fleckenstein finished fourth place, her 10th top five finish of the season in 12 race starts and 11 finishes.  Nine of those 10 top fives have been in the top four.  
• Tommy failed to hit the podium for the first time this season in a race she's finished.  She has nine podium appearances in 10 races finished on the season.  She's now finished four of six slalom races this season with two third place and one runner up finish. 

QUOTABLE:
RICHARD ROKOS: 
"As it goes in slalom sometimes, one team can be extremely lucky and others not as lucky.  Today was our not-as-lucky day.  It's not a matter of preparation, we just weren't as lucky.  In the end, DU had a great day on both sides and swept the podium in the women's race, getting ahead of Utah. 

"Filip and Stef both had two solid runs.  Mikaela was charging, trying to take a podium, and our other women had some bad luck in the first run.  In the end, coming to NCAAs ast the same place, this was still a good way to see what our potential is.  Hopefully we got all of the bad luck out of the way and we'll take the positive side from here on out."

"The other girls had bad luck in the first run, so we were down to the bare bones and didn't have many opportunities to take any chances."

"On the Nordic side, I know Andrew was sick this weekend but they're all fighting some kind of disease.  Yesterday or today was probably the first time a majority of them have been healthy.  I was hoping this would happen because they're capable of it.  It was good to see they were the cornerstone of our performance."  

UP NEXT: The season is over for the majority of the team, it's just a matter of who as the 12 skiers selected to represent the Buffs at the NCAA Championships will be announced early next week.   The Buffs look in solid position to field a full and strong team for the NCAA Championships, which will take place March 11-14 back here in Bozeman.  The teams will head back to Boulder Sunday, get a full week of school and training in and the 12 skiers and coaches will return a week from today on Saturday to start preparations.  

TEAM STANDINGS (FINAL): 1. Denver 688; 2. Utah 678; 3. Colorado 643.5; 4. Montana State, 449; 5. Alaska Anchorage 427; 6. Westminster 268.5; 7. Alaska Fairbanks 182; 8. Colorado Mountain 110. 

WOMEN'S 15K CLASSIC (30 collegiate finishers)—1. Eveliina Piippo, DU, 46:11.7; 2. Vera Norli, DU, 46:42.9; 3. Hedda Baangman, CU, 47:08.4; 4. Leah Lange, UU, 47:19.4; 5. Anna-Maria Dietze, CU, 47:40.4; 6. Mariah Bredal, UU, 47:54.4; 7. Karianna Moe, UU, 48:00.1; 8. Anne Siri Lervik, CU, 48:04.1; 9. Natalie Hynes, UAA, 48:16.5; 10. Guro Jordheim, UU, 48:19.5.  Other CU Finishers: 14. Ezra Smith, 49:36.0; 18. Quinn Lehmkuhl, 51:06.3; 21. Bridget Donovan, 52:12.6. 

MEN'S 20K CLASSIC (30 collegiate finishers)—1. Ola Jordheim, UU, 56:15.7; 2. Ryan Jackson, 56:16.2; 3. Bjorn Riksaasen, UU, 56:30.9; 4. Maximillan Bie, UU, 56:43.3; 5. Magnus Boee, CU, 56:51.8; 6. Sondre Bollum, CU, 58:10.0; 7. Sigurd Roenning, UAA, 58:13.2; 8. Espen Persen, UAA, 58:25.3; 9. Bernhard Flaschberger, DU, 58:32.1; 10. Tristan Sayre, UAF, 58:32.9.  Other CU Finishers: 24. Tyler Terranova, 1:01:40.9; 25. Wyatt Gebhardt, 1:01:40.1.  Did Not Start: Andrew Potyk

WOMEN'S SLALOM (22 collegiate finishers)—1. Amelia Smart, DU, 1:53.24; 2. Storm Klomhaus, DU, 1:54.17; 3. Katie Hensien, DU, 1:54.29; 4. Stef Fleckenstein, CU, 1:54.67; 5. Andrea Komsic, DU, 1:54.91; 6. Kathryn Parker, UU, 1:55.75; 7. Eleri Smart, DU, 1:55.86; 8. Kaitlyn Vesterstein, UU, 1:56.42; 9. Sona Moravcikova, UU, 1:56.64; 10. Tegan Wold, MSU, 1:57.04.  Other CU Finishers: 13. Andrea Arnold, 1:58.64; 16. Mikaela Tommy, 1:59.90; 17. Kaitlyn Harsch, 2:00.05.  Did Not Finish First Run: Emma Hammergaard, Olivia Gerrard, Isabelle Fidjeland.

MEN'S SLALOM (30 collegiate finishers)—1. Tobias Kogler, DU, 1:48.55; 2. Filip Forejtek, CU, 1:48.56; 3. Simon Fournier, 1:49.16; 4. Gustav Voello, UU, 1:49.35; 5. Joachim Lein, UU, 1:49.39; 6. Joachim Mjelde, WMC, 1:49.78; 7. Mikkel Solbakken, WMC, 1:49.85; 8. Cole Puckett, DU, 1:49.87; 9. Louis Muhlen-Schulte, MSU, 1:50.10; 10. Aage Solheim, MSU, 1:50.16.  Other CU Finishers: Joey Young, 1:50.52; 15. Teddy Takki, 1:51.12; 17. Max Bervy, 1:51.34; 21. Alex Birkner, 1:52.16; 27. Bobby Ryan, 1:53.03.