GUNNISON, Colo. – Blaise Threatt and Trevor Baskin have taken turns carrying the load for No. 14 Colorado Mesa this season. The Mavs got signature performances from both on Thursday.

Baskin had 28 points on 14 of 16 shooting while Threatt scored 24 and grabbed nine rebounds, helping Colorado Mesa pull away in the second half against a pesky Western Colorado team for an 83-67 win.

With the final two wins, the Mavericks have held up their end of the deal to potentially get the No. 1 seed and hosting rights for the RMAC Tournament. The Mavs need No. 5 Fort Lewis to lose either of its final two games against MSU Denver and No. 15 Colorado School of Mines to take the top spot, but CMU can now do no worse than a top-two seed. Also on Thursday, No. 10 Black Hills State lost to Chadron State, falling a game behind CMU and eliminating any potential three-way tiebreaker scenarios.

The Mavs owned the inside over the rival Mountaineers, outscoring WCU in the paint 56-26. CMU shot 60 percent from the field for the game, the second-highest team total of the season. Unlike Wednesday's game against Westminster when the Mavs took nearly half their field goal attempts from the three-point line, CMU went inside the arc on 79 percent of its attempts against the Mountaineers.

Western Colorado came out ready to play and was stride-for-stride with the Mavs for much of the first half, which featured five ties and four lead changes and saw the home team hold a lead as late as 4:09 remaining in the first period. When Threatt completed a three-point play just before the first-half buzzer, that gave the Mavs a 38-33 lead which was their largest of the half.

The Maverick second-half offense seemed to be shot out a cannon from the halftime locker room. Every Colorado Mesa possession ended with a basket or free throws for the first six-and-a-half minutes of the second half.

Baskin, Threatt (twice) and Riniker hit layups on CMU's first four possessions after halftime, with Riniker grabbing an offensive rebound to finish the putback and prompt WCU to call a timeout. Baskin got six points in 25 seconds out of the timeout, and after Threatt went 1-for-2 at the line and hit a layup, Christopher Speller found Michael McCurry for a three-pointer. Suddenly, the Mavs were up 58-40, and it would be a double-digit lead the rest of the way.

The Mavericks committed 11 turnovers and forced 17, coming away with seven steals to WCU's one. McCurry was CMU's third-leading scorer on the night with eight points, including a pair of threes, while Reece Johnson filled up the box score with five points, three rebounds, four assists and three steals.

The 28 points are a season-high for Baskin, who fell just short of a monster milestone with his dominant night. Baskin ended the game with 999 career points, meaning he is all but certain to pass the 1,000-point plateau during the RMAC Tournament quarterfinal in Brownson Arena next Tuesday.

The win puts a bow on a banner regular season for the program and sets the stage for a very promising postseason. Colorado Mesa wraps up its RMAC schedule with a 19-3 record despite starting the conference season 0-2. The Mavs are 24-4 overall, pulling even with the 1988-89 squad for the second-most single-season wins in program history behind last year's team with 26.

The Mavericks now have four full days of rest between now and their RMAC Tournament quarterfinal on Tuesday. No opponent has been sorted out for the Mavs, as 12 of the RMAC's 15 teams still play on Friday and/or Saturday. There is currently a four-way tie between UCCS, MSU Denver, Regis and New Mexico Highlands for the No. 7 and No. 8 seeds with South Dakota Mines and CSU Pueblo a game or less behind. A release with full RMAC Tournament details will come out Saturday night once the seeds are finalized.