No. 24 Colorado State off to program's best start

FORT COLLINS, Colo. (AP) - The cohesion was instant at Colorado State, even with all the transfers and junior college additions.

Thats because of video game sessions in the locker room after practice. And bowling nights. And movie matinees. And watching fighter Floyd Mayweather Jr.s last bout at the home of guard Gian Clavell, who whipped up his famed Puerto Rican chicken-and-rice dish his mom taught him to make.

The 24th-ranked Rams are a tight-knit group of overlooked vagabonds arriving from the University of Arizona, Navy, North Carolina Central, Northwest Kansas Technical College, Southern Illinois and places in between.

Colorado State possesses an attitude - picked fifth in the Mountain West preseason poll - and a savvy coach in Larry Eustachy who melds the pieces seamlessly together, helping the Rams (12-0) to their best start in school history. Theyre one of eight remaining unbeaten teams heading into a game at New Mexico State on Saturday, but will be without starting center Tiel Daniels (calf) and key reserve Clavell (shoulder) as they stay behind for treatment.

The whole team is filled with chips on their shoulders, said Stanton Kidd, a forward from Baltimore who transferred in from North Carolina Central. Colorado State never gets the respect we deserve. But we dont really care. We just want to win.

Its easy to see why the Rams didnt receive a whole lot of preseason love: They had a largely unknown group.

Sure, senior sharp-shooter Daniel Bejarano was back, along with senior post player J.J. Avila, who played at Navy before his arrival at Colorado State last season. After that, no one really knew much about the Rams ensemble.

But they had three players in Daniels (Southern Illinois), John Gillon (Arkansas-Little Rock) and Stanton who practiced all last year even as they sat out under the NCAA transfer rule. So, they had a built-in familiarity.

Clavell, a junior college arrival from Caguas, Puerto Rico, fit right in as well, holding dinner parties for the team off the court as the team cooked on it.

We dont care who scores the most points or who got the most rebounds, Bejarano said. We have that feel of a brotherhood, of a family. We just find ways to win.

See the article here:
No. 24 Colorado State off to program's best start