Those who have watched Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference men’s basketball the past two years had a pretty good idea what was coming in Tuesday’s league award announcements.
The obvious choice became official early Tuesday afternoon, as Fort Lewis College senior guard Joshua Blaylock was named the RMAC Player of the Year. Blaylock was also named the RMAC’s Preseason Player of the Year and last week’s Offensive Player of the Week for the second time this season. He is the first Fort Lewis College player to win Player of the Year outright since Joel Tribelhorn in 1986. Blaylock was also named to the All-RMAC First Team.
It was a good all-around day for the Skyhawks, as Riley Farris was named co-Freshman of the Year, junior forward Rasmus Bach was named to the All-RMAC First Team and Will Morse earned All-RMAC Honorable Mention.
“This was a long time coming for Josh, and we felt like he could have gotten it last year as well,” Fort Lewis head coach Bob Pietrack said. “He is hands down the best player in this league. He’s so humble that he won’t want to talk about it much, but that’s the type of guy he is. He earned this.”
Blaylock leads the RMAC with 20.1 points per game and plays a league-high 34.6 minutes per game. The left-handed guard has been on a tear lately. He scored 30 or more points in two of the last three games and has scored in double figures in 27 of the team’s 28 games.
“I’m completely humbled and speechless,” Blaylock said. “I worked hard to be good at this game. When you come from where I came from, you don’t think about this kind of stuff. The accolades are nice, but you just want to work hard and play the game you love, and that’s what I’ve done. If it wasn’t for the other guys on the team, this definitely wouldn’t be possible.”
One of the other guys, Bach earned All-RMAC First-Team honors. Bach earned Freshman of the Year in his first season, All-RMAC Second Team last year and a well-deserved All-RMAC First Team honor this season. He is tied for fourth in the league with 18.5 points per game and 12th with 6.3 rebounds per game.
“Rasmus is a classic RMAC basketball player,” Pietrack said. “We feel like he is one of the top five players in this league and he should be a candidate for Player of the Year next season.”
Farris, a redshirt freshman from Hutto, Texas, has come off the bench to average 8.8 points per game. His 57.2 shooting percentage is ninth in the RMAC and he is second on the team with 13 blocked shots. He missed a few games around the holidays with an injured knee but returned much faster than expected.
Morse has been sidelined with an illness for the last two games, and his value has been evident as FLC dropped one of them. He is the league leader in assists, with 5.4 per game, and assist-to-turnover ratio (3.2).
“If Riley didn’t get injured this year, he would have walked away with the award outright,” Pietrack said. “And Will might be the MVP of this team, especially when you see the trouble we’ve had without him. His value goes unnoticed, but as a point guard that leads in assists and assist-to-turnover ratio, we felt that he deserved better than just an honorable mention.”
Colorado Mines coach Pryor Orser was named the RMAC Coach of the Year for the RMAC regular-season champion Orediggers. CSU-Pueblo’s Nelson Kahler was the Defensive Player of the Year, and Farris shared his award with Regis’s Christian Little and South Dakota Mines’ Jake Heath.
jfries@durangoherald.com
