GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. (KJCT) – Colorado Mesa University introduced Ken DeWeese as its new men’s basketball coach today.
DeWeese comes over to Grand Junction from Colorado State, where he served as an assistant coach.
“This was an important hire for us, for our program, and for the entire department. We approached this with intention and knew we had to be deliberate throughout the process and find the right person. And I think we found that right person. This is not a rebuild. We’ve had a ton of success in our program, and we want to find someone who can continue that success while elevating us in the future,” Colorado Mesa Athletic Director Rob Courtney said.
DeWeese takes over a program that has won 19 games or more in each of the last nine seasons.
“Winning 17-18 games at Colorado-based University is not good enough. And is it always going to be better than that? I can’t guarantee that. You know, sometimes the ball bounces different ways. But we understand that this place is a championship-level university, a championship-level athletic department. You can see it across the board through all the other great sports. We’re going to tow the line in men’s basketball. Is it going to be year one? Sure as heck hope so. That’s what we’re going to work for. But we’re going to get there. We will get there,” DeWeese said.
During the introductory press conference DeWeese mentioned how he plans on dipping into his Colorado Recruiting connections, having previously coached at Colorado State and Northern Colorado.
“I’m excited about what the future’s going to be. I can tell you guys, we’re going to try and build this thing as much as we can with Colorado kids. You know, whether that’s from the Valley, whether that’s from, you know, going to the Denver Metro in Northern Colorado, Southern Colorado, wherever they’re at, we’re going to go try and get them. I’m going to try and build a fence around the state and keep all the best players that are going to be playing Division 2 playing here,” DeWeese said.
CMU went 21-11 this last season and made an NCAA DII Tournament appearance under Mike Dunlap.
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