DENVER, Colo. – Looking to close out non-conference play with win Thursday night, the Colorado School of Mines men's basketball team made the short drive over to Denver for the first of two meetings this season with Regis at the Regis University Fieldhouse. The Orediggers (11-3) scored first and never trailed in a wire-to-wire win as Majok Deng led three players in double figures in a 93-79 victory over the Rangers (7-6), running their winning streak to a season-long seven games with the result.
 
After a miss by each team to start the game, Riley Schroeder scored the first points of the night as Mines opened the game on an 8-0 with four points coming from Alex Romack during the stretch. Back-to-back three-pointers from Eddy Egun and CJ Reed made it a two-point game, but the Orediggers answered right back with another run, this time of the 9-0 variety capped by a trey from Schroeder to make it a 17-6 game with 14:44 in the opening half.
 
The hot shooting continued for Mines as the half went on, as after Chase Mayo Harman tried to swing some momentum back in favor of the home team, Schroeder drained another three before Deng hit a jumper and a three of this own to push the lead all the way to 25-9 at the 13:08 mark. The lead never dropped below 12 for the balance of the half, as just about every shot by the Orediggers kept finding nylon. A layup from Juani Dassie followed by a Reagan Koch three-pointer doubled up the Rangers 34-17 inside nine minutes to play. Just about five minutes later, Koch flushed home another trey to push the lead to 20 for the first time at 43-23 at the 4:45 mark as the Mines offense could seemingly do no wrong in the opening period.
 
The Rangers never got closer than 15 over the final four minutes before the break, as the Orediggers carried a 54-38 lead after 20 minutes of action.
 
The teams traded baskets in the first two-plus minutes of the second half before a quick 5-0 burst from Mines featuring Romack, Schroeder and Cade Mankle pushed the lead back to 19 at 61-42 with 15:17 in regulation. Nearly two-minutes of game time elapsed without any change to the scoreboard until Egun drilled a three-pointer to make it a 16-point game, which keyed off a 9-2 run that saw the Rangers close the gap to 11 at 63-52 with just under 12 minutes remaining, but Deng brought that to an abrupt end and all but sucked the air out of the building with a deep three-pointer despite getting fouled and converting the ensuing free throw to convert the four-point play.
 
Sam Beskind got his running in and scored four points in 10-2 run starting around the nine-minute mark as he looked more like a running back coming downhill charging for the endzone instead of a point guard taking it to the rim, earning a bloody nose for his efforts as his assist on a two-handed slam by Romack at 6:48 pushed the lead back to 21 at 77-56. Deng kept his foot on the gas as the clock wound under five minutes, connecting on a trio of three-pointers to end his night as his final make made it 90-72 with 1:54 left.
 
The Orediggers emptied their bench in the final minutes and saw Caleb Clark close out scoring for the visitors with a fall away corner three to beat the shot clock in the closing moments. Egun hit his fifth three-pointer of the night on the final possession, but it did little to affect the outcome and just served to pad stats at that point as Mines started the new year off on the right foot with a 93-79 win.
 
NOTABLES
-Deng went for 25 points on 8-14 shooting including 6-8 from beyond the arc; he now has four 20-points games in his first season at Mines
-Romack finished two rebounds shy of his fourth double-double of the season, ending the night with 17 points and eight rebounds while going a perfect 7-7 from the floor; he now has four games on the season where he's been perfect shooting the ball from the field, raising his field goal percentage to 69.6% on the season
-Schroeder went 6-9 from the field and 2-3 from deep to finish with 15 points while adding five rebounds and a career-high four blocks
-Koch turned in one of his best outings of the season, scoring nine points off the bench on 3-4 shooting
-Beskind turned it on in the second half to finish with eight points while also dishing out nine assists and hauling in six rebounds; he now has 199 career assists in his time between Stanford and Mines and has now recorded 19 assists in a two-game stretch on two occasions this season
-10 different players scored for the Orediggers who shot a blistering 62.9% (22-35) from the field in the first half and finished the night shooting 55.4% (36-65), including a 61.1% (11-18) night from three-point land
-The 11 three-pointers made Thursday night are the second-most in a game this season, while the 61.1% three-point rate is the highest of the year
-Mines finished the night with 41 rebounds, marking the fifth time this season they've hauled in at least that many
-The 93 points scored matches the season high total, which came on Sunday against Northern New Mexico; it is the first time the Orediggers have scored the same number of points in consecutive games since the 2021-22 season, when they scored 78 in back-to-back losses to Western Colorado and Fort Lewis while the last time they scored the same number of points in back-to-back wins was in the 2020-21 season, scoring 79 against Fort Lewis and Chadron State
 
UP NEXT
The Orediggers jump back into RMAC play Saturday at 3 p.m. against Colorado Christian at Lockridge Arena.

Fans can keep up with Mines men's basketball on X and Instagram at @minesmbb. They can also keep up with Colorado School of Mines Athletics all year long on Facebook, X and Instagram using the handle @MinesAthletics.