The Colorado Mesa women's basketball team will compete against the Adams State Grizzlies on Saturday in Brownson Arena. The Mavericks defeated the Grizzlies 66-38 earlier this season in Alamosa prior to the NCAA mandated winter break.
 
WEEKEND ROUNDUP
Colorado Mesa made the long trip to Rapid City, S.D. for a single game against the South Dakota Mines Hardrockers last Friday. The Mavericks came away with a 61-57 victory behind a team-high 17 points from Natalie Bartle and a career-high 13 rebounds from Val Desreumaux.
 
The Mavericks also made up their game with Western Slope rival #14 Western Colorado this week on Tuesday evening. Colorado Mesa led by three with 1:55 to play but couldn't hold onto the lead in a 53-51 loss to the Mountaineers in Gunnison. Bartle finished with 15 points while Kylyn Rigsby finished with 14 points.
 
SENIOR CONTRIBUTER
Senior Valentine Desreumaux has stepped up in a big way the past week. In the matchup with South Dakota Mines, she scored a career-high nine points and pulled down a career-high 13 rebounds in the win.
 
As the season has progressed, her minutes have increased and spiked at a career-high 24 minutes against the Hardrockers.
 
NEW REGION
Last weekend, the NCAA shuffled the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference into the West Region for the season to help balance the regions out across the country. In the West Region, the CCAA conference canceled their season and the GNAC only has a limited number of schools competing.
 
Now the region is comprised of the 14 RMAC schools, 11 schools from the PacWest, and currently two schools from the GNAC. The GNAC has had a number of schools schedule teams as of late and will apply for the minimum games exemption.
 
The top six teams will qualify for the NCAA Regional at a site to be determined prior to the championship selection, yet another change this year.
 
HISTORY AND SCOUTING THE GRIZZLIES
Colorado Mesa has won 18 straight games against the Grizzlies dating back to the March 1, 2011 in Alamosa and are 46-9 all-time in matchups with Adams State. The Mavericks are 24-3 at home in those matchups with the largest margin of victory coming in 2017, an 83-45 win.
 
The Grizzlies have played just two games since January 7 due to postponements. They are 1-1 in those games with a big win over Black Hills State in Alamosa on February 5.
 
Redshirt junior Kaitlyn Bell leads the Grizzlies at 7.1 points and 5.4 rebounds per game this season. She had a season-high 15 points against Regis last weekend and a season-high 12 rebounds against South Dakota Mines on December 12.
 
HEAD MAN
Head coach Taylor Wagner enters his ninth season as the head of the women's basketball program. He has led the program to five RMAC regular season championships and five NCAA South Central Region Tournaments. The Mavericks won the regional tournament in his first season (2012-13) sending the program to the NCAA Elite Eight for the first time.
 
In three of the five regional tournaments, the Mavericks have made it past the first round and have accrued a NCAA Tournament record of 6-4 during the Wagner era.
 
During this season, Coach Wagner captured his 200^th win with Colorado Mesa after an 89-57 win over UCCS on January 4. He currently sits in second in program history in wins as a coach.
 
FREE YEAR
With uncertainty rampant during the college basketball season this year, the NCAA granted all winter sports student athletes (Basketball, Wrestling, Indoor Track, Swimming & Diving) an extra year of eligibility similar to what took place during the fall season with football, volleyball, soccer and cross country.
 
What does that mean to the Mavericks women's basketball team? All eight seniors could return for a fifth year of eligibility if they would like to.
 
THE RMAC
The Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference will look a little different this year in terms of the standings. With every team not able to play the same amount of games this year, the conference decided to implement the NCAA Ratings Percentage Index (RPI) or Performance Indicator (PI) to determine the standings this year.
 
Here is a quick rundown of how the RPI or PI works:

• Teams will earn points based on their opponent and whether they win or lose each week. The better the opponent the more points you earn whether you win or lose.
• The breaks for opponents occur at .250, .500 and .750 winning percentages and can change all year long.
• Once a team has their points, they will be divided by the number of games that have been played this year to get their RPI or PI number.
• The highest RPI or PI will be the conference champion.

WHAT'S NEXT
Colorado Mesa will be on the road for the final time during the regular season next weekend on the Front Range. They will play at Regis on Friday at 5pm at the Regis Fieldhouse followed by a Saturday tilt with Colorado School of Mines at 5pm in Golden.
 
QUICK HITTERS
*The RMAC is scheduled to release the RPI standings this week (Jan. 25) but have yet to see them. Once those are released, we will update you in the weekly previews.