GOLDEN, Colo. – Trevor Baskin scored 27 points with no turnovers and three other Maverick players finished in double figures as Colorado Mesa men's basketball fought off Colorado School of Mines to secure an 86-79 win in the Mavs' RMAC conference opener.

Ty Allred added a career-high 13 points plus a block while Isaac Jessup and Mac Riniker tallied 14 apiece. Reece Johnson grabbed a career-high eight rebounds while Owen Koonce's nine points, three assists and one steal all seemed to come in clutch moments.

The win moves CMU to 4-1 overall and 1-0 in the RMAC. The Mavs have won four in a row since dropping their season-opener to Dallas Baptist in Texas. It's also a much better start to the conference season than it was for last year's squad, which started the RMAC season 0-2 with losses to Mines and MSU Denver last season but rebounded to finish 18-3 in the RMAC and win a share of the regular season conference title.

Baskin scored 27 points on 11 of 17 shooting and added three rebounds and three assists. Just a game after going 14 of 14 from the free-throw line against Texas A&M International, Mac Riniker went 6-for-6 from the stripe while contributing defensively, as always, with six rebounds and two steals. Isaac Jessup shot 4-for-6 from three-point range while Allred was 3-for-6 from behind the arc. As a team, the Mavs shot 52.5 percent from the field and 42.3 percent from three-point range.

Slow starts continue to plague Colorado Mesa, but the Mavs turned on the jets a little earlier Friday night than in previous games. The Mavericks led by five at halftime, their largest lead at the interval this season and only the second time at all that CMU has been in front after 30 minutes during its opening five contests.

The halftime lead only happened after the Mavs were able to leapfrog out of an early hole. The Mavs trailed by 11 with 8:31 left in the first half (the only double-digit lead for either team for the entire game) and trailed by nine with six-and-a-half minutes until the break but ripped off a 16-2 run to close out the opening period.

Isaac Jessup keyed the run with a three-pointer before back-to-back layups from Mac Riniker made it a two-point game at 28-26. Owen Koonce tied the score with a layup before a Baskin jumper gave the Mavericks a 30-28 lead with 1:08 to play. After a Koonce steal led to a Ty Allred fastbreak layup, Mines halted the scoring run with a basket that cut the lead to 32-30, but Allred hit a three-pointer with 25 seconds left that was the final scoring of the first half and allowed Mesa to head to the locker room with all the momentum.

Mines went on a few scoring runs in the second half and briefly retook the lead, but an Allred three-pointer with 12:29 to play gave CMU the lead for good at 52-51, and back-to-back threes from Jessup and Allred stretched the Maverick lead to eight points at 64-56 with just under 10 minutes left. When Mines would cut the lead to under five points, Koonce hit two separate threes in the final four minutes to bump the CMU advantage back to seven or eight.

Colorado Mesa will face another test tomorrow by playing at No. 8 MSU Denver, who has taken down nationally-ranked opponents West Texas A&M and Fort Hays State so far this season. Tip-off is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. following the CMU/MSUD women's basketball game.