PUEBLO, Colo. – Colorado State University Pueblo head men's basketball Matt Hammer has unveiled his team's 28-game schedule for the upcoming 2024-25 season.
 
This season's schedule includes five games against teams that advanced to the NCAA Tournament last season, hosting two games of the season-opening regional crossover event at Massari Arena and a pre-Christmas trip to Honolulu, Hawai'i to play in the Hoops In Hawai'i Classic hosted by Hawai'i Pacific University.
 
There is one new wrinkle to the schedule this season, which is an adjustment to the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference slate of games as the league games will now be played on Thursday evenings and Saturday afternoons as opposed to playing back-to-back days on Fridays and Saturdays as has been the standard in recent seasons. Additionally, the teams will play 20 league games this season, which is a decrease of two from the previous seasons, while all 15 league schools that sport basketball have been broken up into five three-team pods, leading to the Pack only playing six league schools twice and the other eight teams once.

This season, the Pack will play Westminster, Chadron State, Colorado Christian, UCCS, Mines, and Adams State two times, while facing Western Colorado, South Dakota Mines, Regis, New Mexico Highlands, Black Hills State, Fort Lewis, Colorado Mesa and MSU Denver one time each. 
 
CSU Pueblo, who returns three starters and 10 lettermen from last season's 14-15 team that finished seventh in the RMAC with a 10-12 record, begins the 2024-25 season with an exhibition game at the University of Utah on Tuesday, Oct. 29 at 7 p.m. in Salt Lake City, Utah.
 
Following the exhibition game at Utah, the Pack will tip off the season on Friday, Nov. 8 with a 1 p.m. home game at Massari Arena against Cameron University as part of the South Central Regional Crossover and will conclude the regional crossover event on Sunday, Nov. 10 against Midwestern State at 1 p.m. Cameron went 18-12 last season, while Midwestern State posted a 16-12 a season ago.
 
The following weekend on Saturday, Nov. 16, the Pack will host Texas A&M-Kingsville at 7 p.m. in the Al Kaly Shrine Classic in Massari Arena and then will conclude its season-opening four-game homestand on Tuesday, Nov. 21 against Barclay College at 7 p.m.
 
After the four-game homestand, the Pack will hit the road for a non-conference game on Saturday, Nov. 23 in Las Vegas, N.M., against New Mexico Highlands and then will return home for a 7:30 p.m. game on Tuesday, Nov. 26 against Bethany (Kan.) College.
 
The Pack will then open RMAC play with two straight road games on Thursday, Dec. 5 and Saturday, Dec. 7 against both Westminster University at 7:30 p.m. and Western Colorado at 3 p.m. respectively. After the two RMAC games on the road, the Pack will open its home RMAC slate on Dec. 12 and Dec. 14 against Chadron State and South Dakota Mines.
 
Before the Christmas holiday break, the Pack will travel to Honolulu, Hawai'i to compete in the Hoops In Hawai'i Holiday Classic on Dec. 19-20. At the event, the Pack will face the University of Alaska-Anchorage on Dec. 19 at 11 p.m. MT and then conclude the next day on Dec. 20 against Hawai'i Pacific at 11 p.m. MT. UAA went 22-11 last season and advanced to the NCAA Division II West Regional, while Hawai'i Pacific posted an 18-11 record in 2023-24.
 
The Pack will start the new year with an RMAC game on Thursday, Jan. 9 at home against Colorado Christian, before traveling up I-25 to Colorado Springs, Colo., two days later for a 3 p.m. game on Saturday, Jan. 11 at UCCS. The road swing will continue the following week as they play games on Jan. 16 and Jan. 18 at Colorado School of Mines and Regis. Mines went 24-9 last season and advanced to the NCAA Division II South Central Regional, while Regis was 15-13 last season.
 
Following the three-game road trip, the Pack will return home to begin a four-game homestand on Thursday, Jan. 23, and Saturday, Jan. 25 with RMAC games against Adams State and New Mexico Highlands and then concludes the homestand the following week on Thursday, Jan. 30 and Saturday, Feb. 1 against Colorado Mesa and Westminster. Colorado Mesa, who are the defending RMAC regular season champions, was 29-5 last season and advanced to the finals of the NCAA Division II South Central Regional.
 
After the four-game homestand, the Pack will return to the road for games on Thursday, Feb. 6 at Black Hills State and on Saturday, Feb. 8 at Chadron State and will conclude the road swing with an 8 p.m. game on Tuesday, Feb. 11 against Colorado Christian.
 
Following the CCU game, the Pack will return to Massari Arena for a 7:30 p.m. game on Thursday, Feb. 13 against UCCS, before taking a week off due to a bye week in the RMAC schedule.
 
After a week off, the Pack will return to the road for games on Thursday, Feb. 20 at Fort Lewis and Saturday, Feb. 22 at Adams State. Fort Lewis posted a 29-4 record last season and lost to Colorado Mesa in the semifinals of the NCAA Division II South Regional Tournament last season. Following the road games at Fort Lewis and Adams State, the Pack will conclude the regular season with home games on Thursday, Feb. 27, and Saturday, March 1 against MSU Denver and Mines respectively. MSU Denver posted a 19-9 record last season.
 
Following the conclusion of the regular season, the top eight teams in the RMAC standings will qualify for the RMAC Tournament, which begins with quarterfinal games on Tuesday, March 4. The semifinals and finals are scheduled for March 7-8 and the winner of the RMAC Tournament receives the league's automatic bid into the NCAA Division II Men's Basketball Tournament.