Kansas City, Missouri – The Colorado Mesa University Men's Basketball Team would earn preseason recognition this year as in the National Association of Basketball Coaches NCAA Division II Men's Basketball Rankings they would earn the #21 spot in the Pre-Season Poll, released on Oct. 29.
In the Poll CMU would earn 91 points. They would conclude last season ranked #6 nationally before falling in the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament to West Texas A&M.
Colorado Mesa enters this season ranked alongside two other RMAC schools with both Colorado School of Mines and Fort Lewis being ranked in the top-25. Mines would earn the #8 spot with Fort Lewis coming in at #22 behind CMU. Metropolitan State University Denver would receive votes but miss out of the top-25.
Minnesota State would bring in the first-place spot in the Poll after finishing last season as National Champions. Nova Southeaster, the National Runner-Ups would take second place, with South Central Region foe, West Texas A&M sitting in third place.
Another South Central Region opponent, Dallas Baptist, was selected #5 in the Poll.
Following last season's success, the Mavs have an entirely new look this year as they only return four players from last year's squad and are led by an entirely new coaching staff as well.
They return the quartet of Ty Allred, Austin Thyne, Christopher Speller and Eric Pollert from last year's team, while adding 11 new players to complement them. Nine of those 11 are Freshman.
Speller and Allred return the two most minutes to the team with Speller appearing in 32 games last season and being selected as a RMAC Honorable Mention member. Allred would see time in 19 games last season before an injury sidelined him for most of the year.
Thyne and Pollert saw limited time last season but will look to be bigger parts of this year's team given the team's youth.
New Head Coach, Mike Dunlap, also takes over the team after being hired back in the spring. He is accompanied by a new staff as well. Coach Dunlap is an RMAC Hall of Fame member and has won two National Championships while being an RMAC coach with MSU Denver in 2000 and 2002. He boasts 44 years of coaching experience and will look to lead the Mavs after having one of their most successful seasons in history in 2023-24.
