DENVER – Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
 
The MSU Denver men's basketball team is back at it again this weekend, with road games at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs on Friday at 7:30 p.m. and at Colorado School of Mines on Saturday at 7.
 
The Roadrunners faced the same teams two weekends ago in Denver.
 
"The good news is we played these guys two weeks ago, so no one is really going to change what they do," Metropolitan State University of Denver coach Michael Bahl said. "The difference is we're on the road. Any time you go on the road, you're going to have to be more productive, play cleaner, than at home. That's the challenge we're going to face.
 
"I firmly believe it's more about us than it is necessarily about UCCS and Mines. We know what they're going to do. It's more about our execution and making sure that we don't have those self-inflicted wounds. Those are catching up to us."
 
Mines, currently ranked 12^th and 15^th in the national Division II polls, is 18-3 overall and 15-0 in the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference. After playing Orediggers as well as any one has during the Mines' 17-game winning streak in a 77-71 loss on Jan. 25, the Roadrunners cruised past UCCS 93-81 on Jan. 26. It was the second of four straight losses for the 12-9 Mountain Lions, who have dropped from having sole possession of second place in the RMAC to a three-way tie for fifth at 9-6.
 
"They've lost four in a row, and they're a much better team than that," Bahl said. "They've had a couple of injuries, a couple of things haven't gone their way, and they've been on the road. They are back at home now, and it's going to be an absolute dogfight in order for us to get the job done."
 
MSU Denver (8-11, 6-9 and tied for 11^th) lost both its games last weekend in a road trip to South Dakota, and both were the heartbreaking, closing-seconds kinds of defeats that have come to define the Roadrunners' season thus far.
 
The Roadrunners have lost eight games by six points or less, including six in league play.
 
"A lot of self-inflicted wounds, and that's sort of been the story of the season," Bahl said. "Whether it's turnovers or field-goal percentage or something else, we just haven't been consistent enough to win some of those close games.
 
"We're looking for eight, nine, 10 guys to do their job at a high level. We're looking to see if we can execute better. Execute cleaner. And that's throughout the whole game and not just the last two minutes. I firmly believe games are won and lost in the first half or the (earlier part of the) second half. There are over 80 possessions either way, and one can ultimately make the difference."
 
 
MSU Denver has seven games left to try to qualify for the RMAC Tournament by finishing in the top eight during the regular season.
 
"I don't think there's a team on our schedule that we can't play with," Bahl said. "We just haven't played consistently well enough. But we've got to worry about UCCS on Friday night.
 
"We've had a pretty good week of practice. Our energy has been really high. That's the key, winning or losing, you've got to keep an even keel. It's a long season. We put ourselves in this situation, but I definitely thing we can get ourselves out of it – if we play well, compete and give ourselves a chance by having those self-inflicted wounds."