When the Fort Lewis men’s and women’s basketball teams return to competition after the break, both teams will be busy with a trio of road games in their first week back.
The Skyhawks will first travel to Rapid City for Tuesday showdowns with South Dakota Mines’ Hardrockers.
FLC then will compete on the Front Range, taking on Metropolitan State University of Denver on Friday and Colorado Christian University on Saturday.
For the FLC men, the games will be an opportunity to stay near the top of the conference leader board.
For the FLC women, the contests will be against three teams also in the bottom half of the league standings, giving FLC a chance to add to its win total.
The Fort Lewis men finished the first part of the season with an 8-4 overall record and 4-2 conference mark, which has them tied with Colorado Mesa (10-5, 4-2) for third-place in the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference, behind Black Hills State (8-3, 6-0) and Regis (10-1, 5-0). FLC will play Mesa twice and Regis once more, but won’t face Black Hills again in the regular season.
Regis and Black Hills State were scheduled to play Friday, but the league announced the game was postponed in accordance with its COVID-19 protocols. Regis’ game Sunday against Chadron also has been postponed. Two weekend games for the CCU women also were postponed because of COVID-19 protocols.
South Dakota Mines and CCU are both 1-4 in the league, but Metro is 3-2 in the RMAC and 9-2 overall, and only a half game behind FLC.
Leading the Skyhawks this year has again been Riley Farris. He averages 20.8 points per game, shooting .864 from the line and blocking a team-high 13 shots. Brenden Boatwright averages 12.5 points per game, but the team’s next leading scorers, Akuel Kot (12.5 ppg) and Will Wittman (9.4 ppg) were hurt in the team’s first clash with Regis and missed the following game against Colorado School of Mines. FLC, however, managed to win the game without Kot and Wittman, beating Mines for the first time since 2016.
The FLC women are 2-10 overall and 1-5 in the RMAC. South Dakota Mines is 0-11, 0-5; Metro is 6-4, 2-3; and CCU is 5-6, 2-3 with one of its losses against FLC.
Sydney Candelaria averages 17.8 points per game to lead the Skyhawks offense while adding a team-high 17 steals on defense. Kelsey Sorenson averages 11.2 points per game, and Alyssa Adams is at 10 points per game.
The following week, FLC will play in front of its home fans again when the teams host Chadron State College on Jan. 14.
