DENVER – You've heard the term of drinking water through a firehose.
 
That's been the oft-repeated phrase to describe Hank Lewis' first month as men's soccer head coach at MSU Denver.
 
Since he was hired to lead the Roadrunners on Aug. 1, Lewis has merely had to learn his personnel, get everyone on the same page, do all the necessary administrative work, and get prepared for a season-opening road trip to Texas.
 
Metropolitan State University of Denver opens the season with a 4 p.m. game Friday at St. Mary's (Texas), then travels for another road game at noon Sunday against St. Edward's (Texas).
 
"The easiest part is when the season actually starts, because you're on the field" said Lewis, who most recently has been an assistant coach at Colorado School of Mines and Air Force. "But 80 percent of the job is not on the field, and that part has been challenging – but people here have been great."
 
Smoothing Lewis' transition has been a talented cast of returning players.
 
"What I told the guys, when I was approaching the job and probably the first thing I told them in the first team meeting was, 'This is your team. I've been hired to run it,'" Lewis said. "What that means is that these have been here longer than I have. We're relying on the fact that they are not new to each other. I'm trying to introduce some things that are new, but we're also trying to go with what they know.
 
"It's been great because all the guys are tight. They've been supportive. They are good at telling us what works and what doesn't. And they've been good at buying in to things that are new. I think what you'll see is a team that is learning some new things, and everybody is really interested in raising the level of where they've been at."
 
St. Mary's and St. Edward's, who both are moving to the Lone Star Conference this season, shared the South Division title in their final season in the Heartland Conference with 5-1 records in 2018. St. Mary's, picked fourth in the Lone Star, was 10-5-3 overall last season, while St. Edward's, picked third, was 7-6-1.
 
After going 9-10 overall and finishing sixth in the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference at 8-6 last season, the Roadrunners were picked to finish eighth in the league in the preseason coaches' poll.
 
"We're really excited," Lewis said. "We had a good preseason in that we had three different types of games. There was a lot of learning that was done. There was a lot of great play. And when we weren't doing things well, we learned from it."
 
The Roadrunners have solid veteran leadership in midfielders Yannick Schad and Danny Bautista. Schad is a two-time All-RMAC honoree with career totals of six goals and seven assists. Bautista has career totals of three goals and three assists.
 
"Their institutional wisdom has been great," Lewis said. "There are times we just ask, 'What have you done in this situation?' But we've also tried to go in and do the things that we've done well in other places. Sometimes we'll try new things, and we'll check in with them. 'How did this work? What do you think?'"
 
MSU Denver also boasts talented forward Jaime Gutierrez, who was the RMAC Freshman of the Year last season while also earning second-team all-league. Gutierrez had eight goals and five assists last season, including a hat trick in a league game at Regis.
 
"We all know he's talented, but he's also one of the hardest-working players on the team," Lewis said. "Usually flashy forwards like to do all the talented stuff but don't always want to do all the work. But he loves to work, loves to run. Sometimes I have to tell him to back off an angle. It's a huge plus to have a guy like that, and his example is great for our other attacking players.
 
"He is going to have a target on his back this year. A lot of times freshmen who have great first years have a slump the next year. But we're hoping to make our attack dynamic so he can continue to do what he does. And a plus us is that the six goals we've scored in the preseason have come from six different players. That's a huge thing for us."
 
MSU Denver does have one major hole to fill at goalkeeper after sixth-year senior James Tanner patrolled the net for 91.4 percent of the minutes over the past two seasons.
 
Alessandro Gentile and Nick Jansen have been shown they are ready for the challenge.
 
"Sandy has been great, and Nick had an amazing (exhibition) game the other night," Lewis said. "We tried to put all our players under fire in the preseason. Nick responded well to that. Now we have the choice of two guys."
 
Lewis expects his first team to make continual improvements throughout the season.
 
"We're going to have some challenges," he said. "We're going to have some slip-up moments. I don't think we're going to be fully playing the way we need to be playing until late in September. But I think we've built a mentality where guys are going to at least be able to deal with that."
 
Ultimately he'd like to see his team in control of games and using different approaches to do so.
 
"This team is stacked and loaded for success," Lewis said. "Any coach can step in and see there's an amazing blend of talented players, international and American. That makes it easier. Every guy, down to the lowest spot on the depth chart, is working hard and buying into the work and trying to improve."