After going 28-4 last season, the best season Fort Lewis College Men’s Basketball has ever had, and losing six seniors to graduation, the expectations coming into the 2016-2017 season were varied.

 

Many did not know what was to come from this relatively young squad coming into the year, but after their first 25 games of the season, they are 22-3 and on a 30 game home winning streak.

 

With a win on Friday night against their rival and second place team Colorado School of Mines, they will all but clinch the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference championship for a second consecutive season. The Skyhawks would then have a two game advantage over Mines with only two games left to play before the start of the RMAC tournament.

 

“It would be the first time that our group has gone back to back in men’s basketball,” said Skyhawk head coach Bob Pietrack. “It’s very hard to win the regular season so I would be happy for our guys but it is a ways away.”

 

It truly will be strength against strength in this game. The Skyhawks have the RMAC’s highest scoring offense with 90.8 points per game facing off against Mines’ top ranked defense in the RMAC, only allowing 64.7 points per game.

 

“It’s a big game but we take it day by day, get better in practice and get ready for the game but we prepare like it is any other game,” said the Skyhawks leading scorer Joshua Blaylock.

 

Mines will not roll over and let the Skyhawks get the victory. Mines has the RMAC leading scorer in forward Gokul Natesan at 19.2 points per game and will surely lean on him for offensive output. But the Skyhawks lead the league in a multitude of different offensive categories including field goal percentage (53%)  and three-point percentage, (43%).

 

This has never been done in a non-Denver school so it would mean a lot to not only the school but to the Durango community, junior Rasmus Bach, fifth leading scorer in the RMAC, said.

 

“We have a bullseye on our back. They aren’t scared of us since we won by two last year so we better bring it or we are going to be in trouble,” Bach said.

 

The Orediggers finished last season in second place and do not want to finish in that spot for a second consecutive season which, with a loss to the Skyhawks on Friday, would be all but assured.

 

The Skyhawks were 3-0 against the Orediggers last season, including a hotly contested 73-72 matchup in the RMAC championship game. However, with Mines only losing two players from last season and the Skyhawks losing six, this year’s game will be completely different, Pietrack said.

 

Two RMAC titles would be huge for the school and for a group that has developed such close relationships as this one has, Blaylock said.

 

The Skyhawks are going to try to pressure Gokul and make every shot tough, Bach said.

 

“When you have a player that is as good as Gokul you have to manage the situation and if we can keep him under 20 points that is great,” Pietrack said. “It is unrealistic to think that we are going to completely stop him so we just have to manage the situation and hope he does not have his best game of the year.”

 

The Skyhawks did a great job last year at holding Natsean to under 20 points two out of three times and holding him to an average of 17.3 points in the three games.

 

“We think that we have the defensive scheme to stop Gokul but you have to give him the respect that he deserves since he is the best player on their team,” said Blaylock. “I feel like we just have to make him inefficient.”

 

The Skyhawks are ready to go and try to win another RMAC title. It is expected to be the biggest crowd at Whalen Gymnasium this season, with the first 2,000 students getting a free white T-shirt to support this game being a white out by the fans.

 

Many players have family coming in to watch the game and the Skyhawks cannot wait to try to push their home winning streak to 31 straight games, Blaylock said.

 

“We are going to do what we do and they do what they do,” Pietrack said. “We need to play one of our best games of the year if not our best game and I am sure they feel the same way.”

 

The game tips off at 7:30 pm on Friday at Whalen Gymnasium. The game will also be broadcast on Altitude 2 and Comcast Entertainment.