#14/17 Mines vs. UCCS, Friday, 8 p.m. [Live Video] [Live Stats]
 

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THE WEEKEND AHEAD
The end of the regular season comes Friday as #14/17 Colorado School of Mines takes on UCCS for a single game this weekend. Although the Orediggers have already wrapped up the RMAC regular-season championship, the game remains important to both teams as Mines looks to keep its third seed in the regional rankings, while UCCS is trying to potentially get a home RMAC Tournament quarterfinal with a top-four seed.

THE CHAMPS ARE HERE
Colorado School of Mines won the outright RMAC regular-season championship two weeks ago with wins over New Mexico Highlands and CSU-Pueblo, and despite suffering their first RMAC loss of the season last weekend, remain five games ahead of second-place Dixie State and Regis. The Orediggers won their fifth title under head coach Pryor Orser and will be the RMAC Tournament's #1 seed.

IN THE RANKINGS
Mines remained third in the second edition of the NCAA South Central regional rankings this week, trailing St. Edward's and West Texas A&M. Texas A&M-Commerce, Angelo State, Dallas Baptist, Lubbock Christian, and Dixie State rounded out the top eight. The regional rankings help select the field for the NCAA Championship following the completion of conference tournaments. In the national polls, Mines dropped to #14 in the NABC (from #11) and #17 in the D2SIDA (#14) polls.

SENIOR NIGHT
Friday's game will be senior night for Ben Clare, Luke Golter, and Ben Sonnefeld as they play their final regular season game at Lockridge Arena. The trio graduate as two-time RMAC champions (2017, 2019); Clare and Sonnefeld also contributed to a regular-season title during their redshirt year in 2015. Clare has appeared in 101 games with 63 starts in the post, scoring 795 points with 490 rebounds in his career. Golter, in three seasons, has appeared in 71 games scoring 140 points with 82 rebounds. Sonnefeld has taken care of the point in every game of his career, starting 123 times and scoring 1,186 points with 436 assists and 418 rebounds.

SONNEFELD NAMED ACADEMIC ALL-DISTRICT
Ben Sonnefeld was named to the Google Cloud/CoSIDA Academic All-District team for the second consecutive season last week. Now a graduate student, Sonnefeld holds a 3.73 cumulative GPA having earned his bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering last December, and he is now pursuing his master's degree in engineering and technology management. This season he is having a career year with 14.2 points, 4.4 assists, and 4.2 rebounds per game.

LAST TIME OUT
Mines increased its program-record win streak to 22 games with a 73-69 win at Black Hills State last Friday, but saw their hot run come to an end with a 67-58 loss at South Dakota Mines the next night. At BHSU, Mines hit a 13-4 run midway through the second half to take the lead and win as Mason Baker scored 15, Ben Clare had 14, and Ben Sonnefeld 13. At SDSMT, Mines suffered a season-low 34.5 percent shooting night as the Hardrockers took control early and never let off the gas. Sonnefeld scored 19 to highlight Mines' night.

ON THE LINE
Mines has been especially outstanding at the free throw line this season, leading the RMAC at .773 and ranking among the national leaders in free throws made (471, 12th) and percentage (25th). Since Mines set the RMAC single-game record going 24-for-24 at the line earlier this season against Fort Lewis, the Orediggers have shot .800 or better from the stripe in nine of 12 games; in that 11-game span, Mines is shooting .833 at the line in that span and is getting there an average of 23.5 times per game.

OREDIGGERS HONORED FOR ACADEMICS
Earlier this month, four Orediggers were named to the RMAC All-Academic teams for their classroom performance. Ben Clare and Ben Sonnefeld were each named RMAC All-Academic First-Team, while Michael Glen and Luke Golter were named to the RMAC All-Academic Honor Roll.

MINES NEWS AND NOTES
Mines' RMAC title is their 10th regular-season crown all-time, and fifth this decade under head coach Pryor Orser (2011, 2012, 2015, 2017, 2019) … Only Northern Colorado (11) has won more; Mines is now tied with Colorado Mesa for the most among active members … The Orediggers are 12-0 at home and have won 15 straight dating back to last season … Across all sports, Mines teams have already won six RMAC regular-season and two RMAC Tournament championships this year; that marks the most regular-season titles ever in a year for Mines Athletics and has already tied the total RMAC championships in a year at eight, set in both 2015-16 and 2016-17 … Despite being the #2 scoring team in the RMAC (83.1 ppg), Mines has no individual in the RMAC top-10 in scoring and only Mason Baker and Ben Sonnefeld in the top 25 … The Orediggers' +13.9 point differential per game is nearly double that of the next closest RMAC team, Dixie State (+7.8)

EARLIER THIS SEASON
Mines and UCCS met all the way back in the RMAC opener on Dec. 1, and the Orediggers pulled out an 87-82 in in the Springs. The Orediggers led by as much as 17 points in the second half, but the Mountain Lions erased it with a huge run to take the game down to the wire. Five Orediggers scored in double figures led by Ben Sonnefeld's 18, and Mason Baker and Ben Clare each drained 17. Brendan Sullivan had 16 while Austin Means had 10 off the bench. Blend Avdili had 18 for UCCS, and Padiet Wang scored 17.

SCOUTING THE COMPETITION
UCCS enters the final weekend of regular-season play at 17-10 overall and 14-7 in the RMAC, currently tied for fourth with Black Hills State. A win over Mines would give UCCS as least the fourth seed in the RMAC Tournament. Padiet Wang leads the team with 13.2 points and 5.8 rebounds per game, while Dalton Walker (12.3 ppg), Blend Avdili (11.8 ppg), Brandon Malone (11.4 ppg), and DaRaun Clark (10.5 ppg) shoulder a distributed scoring offense for the Mountain Lions.

LOOKING AHEAD
Mines will host a quarterfinal game in the RMAC Tournament on Tuesday at a time to be announced on Saturday. Should Mines advance in the tournament, it will host the semifinals and final on March 8-9.