by Bryce Reedy
Going into the weekend the Colorado Mesa University men’s basketball team was looking to extend their first win streak of the season, but they were going to have to do so in South Dakota. The first matchup was against Black Hills State, who came into the game with a 5-15 record on the year.
After falling behind early, the hill was too steep to climb as the Mavericks fell 73-61 against the Yellowjackets.
“I was pretty disappointed,” head coach Andy Shantz said. “I felt like we had been playing better as of late and we just didn’t do a very good job of executing. […] When you are playing on the road especially in our league, you got to be ready to go right from the tip.”
The Yellowjackets jumped out to a 10-point lead through the first nine minutes of action. CMU kept it within 10 for the remainder of the half to go into the locker room down 40-31.
In the second half the defense for the Mavericks improved, but offensively they were unable to get into any kind of rhythm. Black Hills State won the half 33-30 to come away with their third conference win of the season.
“They were a good defensive team,” Shantz said. “[…] We had a lot of open looks, we just didn’t shoot the ball well.”
The Mavericks shot 35 percent from the field including going 7-28 from behind the three-point line. Connor Nichols was the leading scorer for CMU with 13, followed by CJ Davis (1-8 from behind the arc) and Eimer Lopez who both finished with 10 apiece.
Black Hills State shot 47 percent from the field and got to the free-throw line a total of 17 times on the night. They were led by forward Fraser Malcolm who finished with 17 points and eight boards on the evening.
This was the first of two games for the Mavericks on the weekend, with their second matchup coming against South Dakota School of Mines. Going into the matchup, the Mavericks had to be able to go full speed from start to finish.
“We have to come ready to play for 40 minutes,” Shantz said. “[…] It is going to be a grind, so we are going to have to be ready to grind for 40 minutes.”
The Mavericks did just that as they were able to come away with the 63-60 victory thanks to a Lopez layup with 45 seconds remaining to take the lead. CMU’s offense still puts up less than stellar numbers, shooting only 36 percent from the field and going only 5-17 from behind the arc, but the defense stepped up in the contest. CMU scored 22 points off of 16 SDSM turnovers.
Davis led the way with 12 points on the night with Tanner Riley following close behind with 10 off the bench. Lopez finished with nine points and five boards to go with his game-winning layup.
The Mavericks now sit 12th in the conference with a 6-15 overall record and a 5-10 record in the conference. The team will now come home for two games against Western State University on Tuesday and Westminster College on Saturday. Both games are set for 7:30 p.m. tip off at Brownson Arena.
