Both Chadron State College basketball teams will open the 2015 portion of their schedule by hosting teams from western Colorado this weekend.
 
The Fort Lewis Skyhawks will visit Friday night for a double-header and the Adams State Grizzlies will follow on Saturday night. Tipoff in the new Chicoine Center will be at 5:30 both nights.
 
Both Chadron State teams have shown promise at times, but neither has played with the consistency needed to be a Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference contender so far.
 
The women are 1-9 for the season with their only victory a 75-62 decision over Western State on Dec. 6.
 
The CSC men, who are 3-6 for the season, also downed Western State 73-57 after having handed Colorado Mesa its only conference loss so far this season, 64-58, the previous night.  The Eagles' other victory was a 71-59 verdict against Presentation College in the season-opener.
 
All the CSC wins have been at home.
 
Both sets of Eagles have often struggled to score.  Both rank 13^th among the 14 teams in the RMAC in offensive output.  The men are averaging 61.4 points and the women 56.7.  Both also are 13^th in field goal shooting.  The men have made 38.4 percent of their shots from the field and the women 36.5.
 
The CSC men have given up 68.0 points a game and the women have yielded 72.1.
 
The men's leading scorer is senior Kendrick Holliman at 14.5 points a game.  Senior guard Chris Smith is next at 10.0 per game. The women's top gun has been junior point guard Emma Block, a native of Belgium who joined the team this fall.  She is averaging 16.3 points and has led the team in scoring in six of the seven games that she has played.
 
Maka Daysh, a freshman from New Zealand, is next at 7.0 per game.
 
The Fort Lewis women are 5-4 overall and 2-3 in the conference.  The RMAC wins have come over Adams State (71-46) and Western State (74-67), but they have lost to Colorado-Colorado Springs (91-64), Colorado State-Pueblo (62-51) and Colorado Mesa (52-50).
 
The Lady Skyhawks' top scorer is 6-foot-1 junior Mary Brinton at 12.1 points a game.  She is shooting 57 percent from the field.
 
The Skyhawks' men are 8-3 for the season and 3-2 in the conference. They have defeated CSU-Pueblo (76-70), Adams State (83-73) and Western State (92-81) in RMAC action, but lost to Colorado Springs (85-78) and Mesa (94-88).
 
Fort Lewis features one of the RMAC's most potent players in 6-9 senior Alex Herrera.  He has led the team in scoring in all but two of the 11 contests and has been the leading rebounder in 10 games.  A native of Ignacio, Colo., a village about 20 miles from Durango where Fort Lewis is located, Herrera is averaging 21.5 points and 11.3 rebounds.
 
The opponents have tried to stop Herrera.  He's already been to the free throw line 124 times (made 87 for 70.2 percent), more than twice the total for any of his teammates.
 
Coach Bob Hofman, who began this his 19^th season at Fort Lewis with a 341-181 record, also has two excellent guards, Cade Kloster and Rasmus Bach, both 6-4. Both are averaging about 12 points a game and shooting at least 44 percent from 3-point range.
 
The Adams State women have won just one game, 77-72 over Western State, and dropped the remaining eight. Mariah Gonzales, a 5-5 senior, leads the Lady Grizzlies in scoring at 13.9 points a game. Desiree Anderson, a 5-8 senior, is averaging 12.2 points.
 
The Adams State men, who have 10 seniors on the roster, are 4-4 overall and 1-4 in the conference.  The RMAC victory was over Western State, 100-67.  They lost to Mesa by just 84-82 in their final game before Christmas.
 
The Grizzlies' 88.4 scoring average is second in the RMAC this winter, but they are 12^th in scoring defense, giving up 75.6 points a game.
 
Four Grizzlies are scoring in double figures, led by 6-1 junior Shakir Smith at 17.9 a game and 6-6 senior Juwan Buchanan at 14.9.