U.S. AIR FORCE ACADEMY, Colo.—The host Falcons of Air Force held off a late Bellarmine rally and hung on for a 9-7 win in the regular season finales for both ASUN Conference teams on Saturday afternoon at Falcon Stadium. 
 
By virtue of their win, the Falcons earned the No. 3 seed in the upcoming ASUN Conference Championship, meaning the Knights will be the four-seed and face top-seeded Utah in the tourney's first game on Thursday in Huntsville, Alabama.
 
In today's contest, Bellarmine jumped out to 1-0 lead when Brayden Brown scored a transition goal on a feed from Jesse Roth about midway through the first quarter.  Unfortunately for the Knights, that was one of the few first half highlights as Air Force dominated play over the first 30 minutes in running out to a 5-1 lead by halftime.
 
In the first two quarters, Bellarmine totaled more turnovers than shots (10-8) and went 0-for-8 in faceoffs. The numbers kept going the wrong way for the Knights in the early stages of the third quarter as Air Force won the opening faceoff and scored less than a minute into the second half.
 
However, the Knights kept fighting and slowly got back into the game thanks in large part to their defensive effort.  Bellarmine was able to keep Air Force off the scoreboard for the remainder of the quarter, and it was the defense that scored the Knights' next goal.  Following a JC Higginbotham save, defenseman Jon Robbins scooped up the ground ball and went coast-to-coast for his third goal of the season to pull the Knights within 6-2 at the 5:33 mark of the third quarter.
 
Then, the Knights' offense capitalized on a man-up opportunity less than two minutes later when Tayo Oladunmoye found Christian Della Rocco for the score with 2:54 remaining in the third.
 
The fourth quarter saw Air Force re-capture the momentum with two quick scores to pad its lead to 8-3, but again, the Knights fought back to cut the deficit to three on goals by Denton Macdonald and Benjamin Hubbs. 
 
Air Force then came up with a crucial goal at to take a 9-5 lead with 5:22 remaining.  Bellarmine's Benny O'Rourk chalked up back-to-back goals to trim the lead to 9-7 to give the Knights hope with just over a minute and a half showing on the clock. However, on BU's next offensive possession, the Falcons picked off a pass with 52 seconds remaining and killed the remainder of the clock to preserve the 9-7 win.
 
Final statistics swung in favor of the host Falcons, but Bellarmine closed the gap in most categories with its second half performance.  Air Force finished with just an 18-16 advantage in shots on goal, and faceoffs finished 13-7 after the Knights won seven of 12 second half draws.
 
The Knights will now get a rematch with Utah in the first round of the ASUN Championship on Thursday.  The Utes swept through the ASUN Conference with a perfect 5-0 record after defeating Detroit Mercy today.  Bellarmine came closer to beating Utah as anyone in the league as the Knights fell by just one, 12-11, in the teams' regular season meeting last week at Bellarmine.
 
Thursday's semifinals will begin at 1 p.m. Central Time (2 p.m. EDT) at Huntsville's Milton Frank Stadium. The other semifinal game featuring Air Force and Robert Morris is set follow the Bellarmine-Utah game at 4 p.m. CDT.
 
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