While the sledding outside might have been nice, it was tough for the Colorado State men’s basketball team inside the Pepsi Center on Saturday afternoon.

Despite a hot start on a cold day in Denver, the Rams weren’t able to keep the momentum on their side as the game progressed in their 89-70 loss to the Kansas State Wildcats, that dropped them to 8-3 on the season.

On an afternoon in which the Rams couldn’t hang on to the basketball, the one player who didn’t seem to have much trouble was sophomore guard Prentiss Nixon.

Nixon had a career afternoon in the Rams’ loss. He led all scorers with a career-high 30 points.

“Prentiss was really good today,” Colorado State head coach Larry Eustachy said following the loss. “And not just because he scored 30 points. He really showed a lot of leadership, a lot of heart.”

Perhaps the most important statistic that Nixon put up on Saturday afternoon was his lone turnover. Colorado State’s 14 turnovers led to 21 Kansas State (10-1) points. Nixon was not only able to take care of the ball, but he was able to score as well.

As has been the case with the Rams this season, Nixon got the scoring started for the Rams with a jumper and never looked back.

Nixon’s previous career-high, a 20 point performance, came in Colorado State’s loss to Wichita State earlier this month. He nearly matched that number with his 17 second half points.

“I just stayed confident,” Nixon said of his performance on Saturday. “I’m not going to make every shot, I’m not going to miss every shot. So I just step up and knock it down when my number is called.”

Alongside Nixon’s big night seemed like just any other night for senior forward Emmanuel Omogbo, whose 13 points and 11 rebounds gave him his sixth double-double of the season.

Despite his performance, Omogbo wasn’t happy with the way Colorado State’s big men complimented Nixon’s career night.

“The big guys didn’t come to play,” Omogbo said following the loss. “We big guys let our guards down tonight and by letting them down we lost by 20.”

Omogbo wasn’t happy with the way the team performed as a whole on Saturday either.

“We just got to do better than that,” Omogbo said. We are better than that and we just got our ass kicked tonight.”

“D.J. Johnson, seven offensive boards,” Nixon said. “That’s not just on the bigs, that’s on the guards. Most of them were on long rebounds, and we didn’t rebound down to get them. He can say that he knows it’s on the bigs but it’s on all 10 of us. 10 people played, so it’s 10 people’s fault at the end of the day.”

While the shots haven’t fallen as often as Nixon would’ve liked so far this season, they fell on Saturday. Nixon shot nine of 16 from the field and a perfect eight of eight from the free-throw line.

“You just seem him getting better and better,” Eustachy said of Nixon. “Particularly against the better teams.”

The Rams were visibly disappointed in their performance, but made it clear that they were already looking forward to their next game.

“I just felt like we blew an opportunity,” Omogbo said. “Now we just got to pick our head right back up and just go play a good game versus a good team.”

The Rams will look to get back to their winning ways against Loyola Marymount back at Moby Arena at 7 p.m. on Monday.