Roadrunners On Deck North Central Regional  First Round–March 14 Metro vs. Fort Lewis College Noon North Dakota vs. St. Cloud State 2:30  p.m. South Dakota State vs. Fort Hays State 6 p.m. Nebraska-Kearney vs. Minnesota-Duluth 8:30p.m.  Semi-finals–March 15 Semifinal #1 Metro/Fort Lewis College vs. North Dakota/St. Cloud State  5 p.m. Semifinal #2 South Dakota State/Fort Hays State vs. Nebraska-Kearney/Minnesota Duluth 7:30 p.m.  Regional Title–March 17 Semifinalist Meet at 7 p.m. March 14-16 Baseball at Northwest Nazarene Tournament (Idaho) WEEKLY RESULTS March 9 Men’s Hoops wins RMAC Championship beating  Fort Hays State 79-69 March 8 Men’s Hoops beats Fort Lewis College 76-61 Baseball lost to University of Missouri-St. Louis 0-16 Baseball lost to Central Missouri State 4-13 March 6 Baseball beats Washburn 4-2 Baseball lost to Pittsburgh State 4-7 March 5 Men’s Hoops beats Mesa State 87-64 Women’s Hoops lost to Mesa State 53-62

After setting a tournament record with 11 assists in Metro’s 79-69 win against Fort Hays State for the 2003 Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Championship, Clayton Smith helped out the media by getting Patrick Mutombo’s attention for an interview. As two cameras rolled and about four reporters surrounded the tournament MVP for star-worthy quotes after Mutombo tied a career-high with 34 points in the victory, Smith turned away from the spotlight. Even when No. 55 (Smith stands at 5-foot-5) was announced as a member of the All-Tournament team, the Fort Hays faithful, already quieted in despair, worked up enough anger to dispel the selection.

“Who the hell is that!” “Who is Clayton Smith!” “Who is that guy!”

“Well,” Smith said afterward, “hopefully, they know now.”

That the media rarely notices and nobody in the opposing stands knows about Smith or what his 4.46 assist-to-turnover ratio actually stands for means that the senior point guard is doing his job.

The truly best point guards run the show, they don’t steal the show. Not that Smith should bow out secretly or receive zero credit, but the senior is

quietly happy with his diminutiveness and letting

others get the acclaim.

“I’m the type of person that thinks pass first,” Smith said. “It’s just my personality. You can’t

really change it.”

Metro won its fourth RMAC Championship title in five years, after losing in last year’s semifinal to Fort Lewis College.

In the first round of the 2003 tournament, Smith recorded a career-high 15 assists, to go with 11 points, three steals and one turnover as the Roadrunners coasted to a 87-64 win over Mesa State March 5 at the Auraria Events Center. In the 76-61 semifinal win over Fort Lewis March 8, Smith scored eight points. He also had eight assists against two turnovers. What that means is that he takes care of the ball and rarely coughs it up.

“I don’t think we would have as many wins as we would without him,” said junior center Lester Strong, who recorded two double-doubles in

tournament play. “He gets us started on defense and on offense….Without him we would probably be struggling right now.”

In practice last week, Dunlap asked for a third scorer to make life easier for leading scorers Mutombo and Kendall. Against Mesa (15-12), all five starters scored in double figures for the newly ranked No. 2 Roadrunners (26-4), who moved up five spots in the national polls. Mutombo and junior Luke Kendall led the way with 24 and 21 points, respectively. Jamar Bohannon scored 13, hitting three treys. Strong pulled down 11 rebounds and scored 11.

The semifinal match against second seeded Fort Lewis moved to The World Arena in Colorado Springs. This time four Roadrunners hit double digits in points, with Mutombo (20 points) and Kendall (15 points), Metro’s All-American nominees, leading the charge.

There was minimal celebration after beating Fort Lewis and the stat sheet was still warm when the Roadrunners began planning their next foray in the championship battle against Fort Hays. The fourth-seeded Tigers knocked off top-seeded Nebraska-Kearney (27-2) 86-82 in the other semifinal. The Tigers (23-7) are the only team that has beat the Lopers this season.

Besides Smith’s performance, there are a lot of other fine points in this game of basketball that rarely make SportsCenter. With Kendall struggling to find his shot (he was 4-of-13 from the field at halftime) in the final, he along with Strong and Bohannon deferred to Mutombo, the alpha male with a 52 percent marksmanship from the floor and unparallel jumper.

“It’s good to have a guy like that to carry us through tough patches,” Smith said. “When he gets going it makes it easier for everybody else.”

Down 9-4 early on, Mutombo drilled five straight 16-foot jumpers off curl picks and tic-tack-toe screens along the baseline to put Metro up 21-13. It was a lead that swelled to 15 points and Fort Hays never overcame. By the midway point Mutombo had scored 18 points. But his all-court game doesn’t come without help.

Photo by - Joshua Lawton The Metro Roadrunners basketball team poses with the RMAC Championship trophy presented to the team for beating Fort Hayes State 79-69 in Colorado Springs March 9 at the Wells Fargo Shootout. Patrick Mutombo gives signal of four for the fourth RMAC title for Metro.

“I give credit to my teammates,” Mutombo said. “They set some great picks and all I had to do was put the ball in the hole. Guys were constantly hunting my man down. I got those picks and those picks got me open looks.”

Later Mutombo was asked how hard it is to reach the 30-point plateau.

“When you have teammates that I have, it’s all right, it’s all right,” he said smiling. “It’s not cake. I don’t think the emphasis should be there, because this win was definitely a team effort.

“Luke wasn’t really going into the first half, but he was out there grabbing some tough

Watch the coverage of the Roadrunners winning the RMAC Championship. CLICK HERE

rebounds and setting some tough picks. He got me open most of the time and he played hard defense. Nobody will see that, but as a team we know that a lot of people contributed.”

Photo by - Joshua Lawton The Metro Roadrunners basketball team poses with the RMAC Championship trophy presented to the team for beating Fort Hayes State 79-69 in Colorado Springs March 9 at the Wells Fargo Shootout. Patrick Mutombo gives signal of four for the fourth RMAC title for Metro.

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Photo by - Joshua Lawton Metro senior Patrick Mutombo cuts a piece of the net off after defeating Fort Hayes State in the RMAC championship game. Mutombo was named MVP of the tournament, and tied his carreer high in points with 34 in the championship game.

After four years of U.S. culture, the gulf between Patrick Mutombo and his African roots are not as far and wide as one might think.

The senior forward, whose slender frame is somewhere between bantam and lightweight, has spent so many hours shooting balls into baskets since he first took up the game at 14 years-old, when his family moved from Congo to Belgium, France, that now his jumper rains supreme.

Having turned 23, and feeling “old” as ever, the senior forward leads the defending champs back into the NCAA Division II National Tournament with a 19.3 scoring average in the No. 2 Roadrunners (26-4) newly tweaked offense.

“It was a little tweak,” senior point guard Clayton Smith said of the changes that include at least two new set plays. “It is just a good time for it. Basically, you have seen what every team has to offer right now. So we decided to bring something new and it worked for us.”

Metro captured the No. 3 seed in the North Central Region and will take on Fort Lewis College (19-11), the No. 6 seed at noon CST March 14. The regional is hosted by top-seeded Nebraska-Kearney (27-2), who takes on the Minnesota-Duluth (19-11). The other contests feature No. 4 seed South

Photo by - David Merrill Lester Strong dunking over players during game.

Dakota State (26-3) against No. 5 seed Fort Hays State (24-7). If Metro gets by the Skyhawks in the first round, they’ll face the winner of the North Dakota (20-8) and St. Cloud State (25-4) game at 5 p.m. CST March 15.  The regional championship game is slated for 7 p.m. March 17, with the winner headed to the Elite Eight in Lakeland, Fla., March 26-29.

“This year the faces have changed,” Metro head coach Mike Dunlap said, “but the challenge is still the same: to play in a way that by the time you are done you can say, ‘Hey, we were well prepared and we competed and we took chances.’ And I think that is the key: to take some chances.”

Despite the additional plays in the offensive repertoire, one thing that remains constant is Metro’s tenacious trapping defense, which is ranked third in the country in fewest points allowed at 57.3 points a game. Without their defense the Roadrunners admit they would be a mediocre team, swimming at .500.

“In Africa there is a proverb that says, ‘Don’t every forget the person that put you in the position you are in.’ Our defense has gotten us where we are,” Mutombo said. “Without our defense we are just an ordinary team. Every time that we step away from our defense that is when we get in trouble. The way we get after the ball separates us from the pack.”

Photo by - Joshua Lawton

Mixing half-court and full-court presses, with zone presses and sideline pins, the Roadrunners emphasize communication, quickness, jumping to the pass and the smarts of knowing who and where the shooters are at all times. Plus, center Lester strong said Metro’s “defense leads to our offense.” After stealing a loose ball from Fort Hays’ Jonathan Raney, Smith scurried up the court and whipped a pass right over Dominique Townes’ left shoulder to Strong who flexed down a jam in the 79-69 win over the Tigers. Smith is one termite sending goose bumps up opposing guards’ sleeves, averaging 2.7 steals a game. Luke Kendall is averaging 2.6 steals, not to mention 18.6 points.

While the Roadrunners have momentum after snatching the conference title, Nebraska-Kearney hasn’t lost at home in 17 games. But last season, Metro had to overcome South Dakota State’s undefeated home win streak en route to the national title.

“Ultimately, in a game that is close, the pressure turns on (Nebraska-Kearney) and that is the wonderful thing about playing at somebody else’s venue,” Dunlap said.

Metro will face a Fort Lewis team looking for revenge, after the Roadrunners beat them in the conference semifinals. Fort Lewis head coach Bob Hofman might throw a new set of tactics and new looks at Metro, but Dunlap doesn’t expect anything drastic at this point in the season.

“I don’t think they will deviate too much from their system,” Dunlap said. “They can change match-ups, they can play a little bit more zone, but because of our multifaceted preparation, in terms of what we do day in and day out with practice, we are ready for anything they can throw at us.”

Photo by - Joshua Lawton Metro's Lester Strong and Fort Hays State center Melroy McKelvey wait for the ball to come off the rim in the RMAC championship game at the World Arena in Colorado Springs March 9. Metro won 79-69 to capture its fourth RMAC title in five years.

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The Metro women’s basketball team has been walking a tight rope all season with its here one minute, gone the next performances.

In the first-round game against Mesa State March 5, the Roadrunners grabbed a 46-45 lead for the sixth time in the ball game on junior Rachel Grove’s made basket with five minutes and 41 seconds left. They proceeded to blow a golden chance to dance to the semifinals held at The World Arena in Colorado Springs, when they were outscored 17-7 from that point until the final buzzer as the Mavericks won at home 62-53 in the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Championship Tournament.

Mesa eventually lost its repeat conference title hopes when Regis beat them in the semifinals. The Rangers went on to stun top-seeded Nebraska-Kearney in the championship game for the silver plate.

In a low scoring first half, Metro and Mesa went into halftime in a 20-20 deadlock. Both teams shot poorly; the Roadrunners hit 35 percent of their attempts, the Mavericks made 30 percent.

“From a defensive standpoint I believed we played about as good as we can play,” Metro head coach Dave Murphy said. “I guess the sad part is we were empty on the offensive end...But you take what you get when you shoot on the road in front of a hostile crowd.”

In the second half, Mesa shot 50 percent and out-rebounded the Roadrunners (13-15) by 17, which includes 20 offensive rebounds, many converted into easy points that Metro never answered.

“You just can’t do that with a team like Mesa,” Murphy said. “If you give up 12 offensive boards and are not shooting the ball, it’s basically a turnover…. If you are not shooting the ball very well then you got some issues.” 

All year long, Metro has had a problem getting consistent performances from its bench and it is one big reason the Roadrunners weren’t among the top four teams in the conference. Metro certainly had its chance to claim such a distinction. After winning five straight during Christmas break, the Roadrunners were sitting pretty at 7-5 overall and 4-1 in the conference. From there, Metro traded wins and losses. They lost their final two conference games and ended the season with a 10-9 RMAC record and when they got a bid to the conference tournament, it was more relief rather than elation.

“I thought we definitely let some opportunities go by way before (the loss to Mesa),” Murphy said. “I thought we had an opportunity to host and that slipped by us and then it was just a scramble to see if we could get in (the RMAC tournament). I felt like for our seniors that was one of our goals, to make sure the seniors got a chance to get into the tournament one more time.”

The Roadrunners lose a top scorer and three-point threat in Malene Lindholm. The senior hit 42 percent from behind the arc and scored 11.1 points a game this season. For her career she averaged 12.8 points at Metro. Last season Lindholm dropped in 14.5 points a night and earned All-RMAC East Division honors. Metro also loses team leader Saree Meccage to graduation. Meccage dedicated the season to her father who died last May.

Now that Murphy’s first year and honeymoon period are complete, the concentration switches to reaching a higher level.

“We are trying to model our program in a lot of ways how the (men’s basketball team) respond to being competitive on a day-to-day basis, doing the things that it takes to be successful over here in the (RMAC) East (Division) and on the campus at Metro State,” Murphy said. “This year we probably did about two percent of what the men do. Our expectations will definitely be higher, our goals will be higher, and our athletes will have to perform at a much higher level day in and day out, from the first day of school till we hit summer.”

Murphy was hired last year from the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs to replace Mike Power. The Roadrunners had gone 21-32 in the last two seasons under Power and lost a grip as a top teams in the RMAC.

“We had to overcome a lot of habits that were not conducive to self improvement from a individual standpoint as well as from a team standpoint,” Murphy said. “Those need to be fortified and built on if we are going to take the next step. And our athletes are going to have to make a much bigger commitment to self improvement, not only on the floor but off the floor, if we are going to make that strive.”

Has Murphy ask the players for their commitment yet? No. But it is coming real soon.

“They get a two week break,” Murphy added, “and then will sit down and put the plan in front of them. Here’s what’s on the menu. Are you interested in eating or not? There will be no other options. It’s 100 percent or nothing. There will be no partial commitments.”
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The Metro baseball team lost three of its four games this weekend. 

The Roadrunners started off strong March 6, beating Washburn University 4-2 in  Topeka, Kan.  Game two ended bitterly with a 7-4 loss at Pittsburg State. Games three and four were both disappointing defeats at the Central Missouri State Tournament for Metro, getting shutout in the first game, 16-0,  by the University of Missouri-St. Louis and then losing in the final game, 13-4, to host Central Missouri State.

Metro (9-4) started the four game, three-day road trip on the right foot beating the Washburn University Ichabods (2-2). What clinched this game was the pitching; Metro junior Blake Eager pitched seven shutout innings, threw 13 strikeouts and only walked four to secure the victory. Brian Edwards knocked in a two-RBI double in the third to give the Roadrunners the lead.

Metro had to “control the baseball and be extremely aggressive”  said head coach Vince Porreco on the team’s ninth victory of the year.

Unfortunately for the Roadrunners, the next three games wouldn’t hold as much promise as the first. 

In game two against Pittsburg State (8-3) the Roadrunners tasted their first defeat since Feb. 16.  Metro had to play catch-up from the very beginning when Pittsburg put two runs up in the bottom of the first and three more in the bottom of the fourth. Edwards got a rally going in the top of the fifth with an RBI

double, then senior John Burney kept the rally going with a two-RBI double. 

When the inning ended, the Roadrunners had put up four runs; not enough to fend off Pittsburg who scored another two runs in the bottom of the sixth, pulling away with the

7-4 victory. 

Games three and four, both played in Warrensburg, Mo., were utterly humiliating for Metro. Game three ended in a 16-0 shutout and game four ended with a 13-4 loss. 

“It was embarrassing” Porreco said on the two losses.  “We didn’t show up to play

baseball…the offense and defense didn’t play together.” 

The Roadrunners will have plenty of opportunities this month to show that they can win on the road. Metro will play the entire month of March, 13 games, away from the Auraria Field. 

“It’s exciting when we’re on the road for a month,” Porreco said on the challenge of a month-long road trip, but “it mentally and physically drains the players.” 

If the Roadrunners stick to Porreco’s training and discipline by “doing the little things” and “playing hard every inning, every pitch,” the Roadrunners will avoid any more “embarrassing” losses and come out ahead for the month of March.

Looking on the bright side, this was Metro’s first road-trip of the season, so there is lots of room for improvement. 

“We’ve got to take it to the next step,” Porreco said on next week’s games.  “Executing and getting the job done is the bottom line.”

From March 14-16 the Roadrunners play in the Northwest Nazarene Tournament. They’ll face St. Martin’s (4-5) and Northwest Nazarene(1-6) Friday. Saturday they play Western Oregon (0-0) and St. Martin’s, then on Sunday they play Central Washington (5-9), before returning home for a match against Air Force 2 p.m. March 18.
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