DENVER – Be ready for your opportunity.
 
Andrew Mörk was.
 
Metropolitan State University of Denver's redshirt freshman guard, who had appeared in only seven games this season, got his chance Saturday night against the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs.
 
Four and a half minutes into the game, Mörk entered as a substitute. Thirty-seven seconds later he touched the ball for the first time – and promptly drained a 3-pointer, doubling the Roadrunners' lead to six points, 14-8.
 
He converted a rare four-point play when being fouled while making a 3 with 3:51 left in the half. And he had a dunk, and another 3, within a span of 39 seconds early in the second half.
 
Mörk's 12-point outburst wasn't the only reason the Roadrunners were able to snap a three-game losing streak and knock off a team that had entered the night tied for second place in the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference. But it was the biggest feel-good story of a feel-good night that resulted in a 93-81 victory at the Auraria Event Center.
 
"The kid deserves all the credit," MSU Denver coach Michael Bahl said. "Andrew is a kid who is ultra-competitive. He's the one who did the work. He had the stick-to-itiveness to say, 'Coach I understand what you are saying, I believe in what you are saying.' And I couldn't be more proud of what he accomplished tonight. I'm not surprised, but I couldn't be more proud of him."
 
The back story? Mörk came off the bench in the season opener Nov. 16 against Stanislaus State (Calif.) and had seven points and 11 rebounds in 23 minutes, an impressive debut. After that, on a competitive roster, Mörk had appeared in only six more games for a total of 36 minutes. He hadn't scored again. He'd grabbed nine more rebounds.

"It's extremely hard," Mörk said, when asked about staying focused when the playing time was hard to come by. "Sometimes it's hard to stay motivated. But coach knows what I can do. It's hard to stay ready every day, even though you might not even get in. But you've got to keep believing."
 
And believe he did.
 
"I'm not surprised at myself at all," Mörk said with equal parts confidence and humility. "I've been waiting for my opportunity for a while now. I knew what I can do on the court, and I had no doubt going into the game."
 
Mörk hadn't played at all in the previous four games, but he got the word early Saturday that he was going to get a chance.
"In pre-game shootaround this morning, coach told me that I'd better be ready to get in the game, 'You're going to get an opportunity today,'" Mörk said. "I said, 'Yes, sir.' And I had no doubt in my mind that I was going to come in and do what I could do."
 
He said that Bahl had told him to be ready to play defense.
 
"My mindset was that I had to play 'D,'" Mörk said. "Coach said I'd better be ready to play some defense. I said, 'Yes, sir.'"
 
But Mörk also showed that he's a pretty fair offensive player, too. Besides scoring, he also nearly finished a mind-blowing drive and reverse layup attempt. His only 3-point miss was a rushed attempt as the shot clock was winding down – it went in-and-out.

"UCCS is a good team, but they were in a zone (defense) and I had a couple of good skip passes to me," Mörk said. "I got some shots and I knocked them down."
 
When the game ended and the Roadrunners went to their locker room, Mörk stayed behind for a television interview. When he caught up to teammates they were waiting – greeting him with loud cheers and dousing him with water.
 
"His situation, not playing a lot, then his time came and he stepped up," guard Druce Asah (Tracy, Calif./Tracy) said. "We're all really proud of him, especially the way he stayed prepared and mentally focused. The moment didn't rattle him."
 
Asah said Mörk provides him with motivation.
 
"He pushes me a lot in practice, because we play the same position," Asah said. "He's always guarding me, and he brings it every day. I know can't come to practice (unmotivated), just because I knew Drew is going to bring it. That's the type of person he is. Obviously he's been down because he hasn't been playing a lot, but his number got called today and he really showed up for us."
 
On Saturday, Asah did most of the heavy lifting in the first half with 21 points, while making 5 of 7 shots from 3-point range. Even though he scored only one second-half point, the damage was essentially done.
 
"My teammates are always looking for me," Asah said. "They make it easier when they're working that hard, so the credit goes to them."
 
The Roadrunners took the lead for good after five minutes, had a 10-point lead after the first 7:25, led by as many as 14 in the first half, and led by at least nine – and as many as 21 – in the second half.
 
"It didn't matter (that Asah scored only one point in the second half) because other guys stepped up to the plate," Bahl said. "Druce was attracting so much attention that he was opening things up for everybody else."
 
Kendall McIntosh (Oakley, Calif./Freedom) had a workmanlike double-double of 16 points and 11 rebounds, making 6 of 7 from the field. Garrett Carter (Rialto, Calif./Etiwanda) scored 16, with half of those coming in the first 102 seconds of the second half. Elijah Straughter (Fresno, Calif./Clovis North) had nine points, four rebounds, two blocks and two steals.
 
MSU Denver shot better than 50 percent from 3 for the second time this season (13 of 25, 52 percent), with its second-highest total of 3-point makes. Overall the Roadrunners shot 52.6 percent, also their second-best performance of the year, while recording – you guessed it – their second-highest point total.
 
Though just 8-9 overall and 6-7 in the RMAC, MSU Denver showed again just how dangerous it can be by beating one of the best teams it has played – the Roadrunners are 3-1 against teams that are regionally-ranked. UCCS dropped to 12-7 and 9-4.
 
"We all knew what this game meant to us, and we had to have it," Asah said.
 
Said Mörk: "Everything was going our way today, and it felt good."