Bob Pietrack knows what it feels like to have a top-25 ranked team and go on the road. It’s a stressful experience for a head coach.
So, when No. 19 Dixie State University (16-3, 11-2 Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference) comes to Whalen Gymnasium at 7:30 p.m. Friday to play the host Fort Lewis College Skyhawks (13-6, 7-6 RMAC), Pietrack said his team will play loose and try to put all the pressure on the visiting Trailblazers.
“When you’re playing No. 19, you have your team’s best game,” the FLC head coach said. “We will be ready to play. We’ve been there. We’ve been the ranked team and gone on the road in this extremely difficult conference. Surely, the pressure is on them. The pressure is not on us.”
A loaded Dixie State team is in its final year in NCAA Division II before a transition next season to Division I in the Western Athletic Conference. The Trailblazers have a roster that reflects that of a mid-level Division I team, too. Dixie State opened the season with a massive regional win against Texas A&M Commerce and kept it rolling into the conference season with a big 109-108 overtime road win at New Mexico Highlands (13-5, 8-5 RMAC) and a landslide 76-54 home win against second-place Black Hills State (14-5, 11-2 RMAC).
Dixie State would lose two RMAC games in a row, though, with an 80-79 overtime loss to Colorado School of Mines and a 60-57 road loss at Metro State. Since that loss Jan. 10 in Denver, the Trailblazers have won five in a row with a big 74-68 home win last weekend against Colorado Mesa included.
Pietrack, who is 105-40 as head coach of the Skyhawks, is looking forward to the matchup against the Trailblazers, coached by Jon Judkins, who is 278-129 during his time with Dixie State.
“We’re ready to go,” Pietrack said. “It’s a great opportunity. I feel confident in the fact we are going to compete hard. We have guys who are competitors. They understand the quality of team we’re gonna face Friday. We know who we’re playing. We know we have to be at our best. When you know your best is what you need, people come to the gym ready to go.”
Two of the RMAC’s best big men will be on display Friday. FLC’s Riley Farris is the leading scorer in the conference and seventh in all of D-II with 24.9 points per game. Hunter Schofield of Dixie State has averaged 16.8 points per game. Both have averaged more than six rebounds per game. Pietrack said he doesn’t expect Schofield to guard Farris in the post, at least initially.
“I think (Jarod) Greene will start on Farris,” Pietrack said. “They’ve gone with two bigs to start, and Greene guards the inside guy. Farris will get a ton of attention like he does every game. We expect a lot of bodies on him.”
The point guard matchup will be an intriguing one. Dixie State’s orchestrator is Jack Pagenkopf, a 6-foot-2 senior from Brooklyn. He has averaged 13.4 points and six assists per game. He has 2.23 assists per every turnover.
“He’s probably been the MVP of the league to this point,” Pietrack said. “With Dixie in first and how much he means to their team, he’s been excellent. We have to make it hard for him and hope he has an inefficient night. With a great player like him, you’re not going to stop him. The hope is to contain him and hope he doesn’t have a great night. We have to run different people at him and see if we can make him take longer shots.”
FLC point guard Logan Hokanson is rounding into form, evident by a 20-point performance last Saturday against Colorado Christian. Though he will be oversized by Pagenkopf, FLC will look to Hokanson to continue to play well down the stretch, and he has been big in FLC winning three of the last four games.
The Skyhawks will also need rounded scoring around Farris. Freshman guard Akuel Kot is coming off a big weekend and has 13.4 points per game. Will Wittman will need to avoid foul trouble, as he has averaged 10.2 points per game and grabbed 5.2 rebounds per contest. FLC senior Danny Garrick will also hope to continue to bounce back from a shooting slump that he emerged out of last Saturday. He has averaged 9.8 points per game.
FLC will also get a chance to play a bigger lineup, which it is more suited to, with Brenden Boatwright and Brendan La Rose likely to get more than their average minutes.
“Our roster is designed to play with a bit more size on the front line, but the style of the opponent and the game flow will dictate more of who you’re gonna play,” Pietrack said. “There’s a chance this Friday to play bigger against a Dixie team with very good size across the board. Up and down their roster, nobody is smaller than 6-2.”
Pietrack knows Dixie State has real weapons off the bench in players such as Andre Wilson and Cameron Chatwin. Pietrack said a key will be to not let them make 3-pointers and limit the role players of Dixie.
Though it is Snowdown weekend in Durango, Pietrack has urged fans to get to the game Friday, and Saturday against Westminster College, too. The Skyhawks have had solid attendance numbers, but the fans have not been engaged and vocal during games this year. Pietrack knows a great home crowd can be the difference in a great game. He hopes whatever fans do skip Snowdown events Friday and Saturday night to come to Whalen are active participants in the game.
“You don’t get a nationally-ranked team to come to your building very often,” Pietrack said after last week’s win against Colorado Christian. “It will be a great challenge, but a challenge that our team will be ready for.
“I hope our crowd will be ready for it a little bit more. This team is working really hard. We’ve won three out of four. This is the stretch run, and we need some energy from the crowd. It’s just how college basketball works. ... I really challenge, and I haven’t done this before, but I really challenge our crowd to be better Friday.”
jlivingston@durangoherald.com
RMAC
Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference
Men’s Basketball
Note: NABC ranking in parentheses
TEAM OVERALL RMAC
Dixie State (19) 16-3 11-2
Black Hills State 14-5 11-2
Colorado Mines 13-7 9-4
N.M. Highlands 13-5 8-5
Colorado Mesa 12-7 8-5
Fort Lewis 13-6 7-6
Westminster 12-7 7-6
UCCS 11-7 7-6
CSU-Pueblo 9-10 7-6
Regis 11-8 6-7
Metro State-Denver 10-9 6-7
S.D. Mines 9-10 6-7
Western Colorado 7-12 4-9
Adams State 6-13 4-9
Chadron State 3-16 2-11
Colorado Christian 1-18 1-12
