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The men’s basketball team held its first practice of the 2010-2011 season last Friday at 5 p.m. in Hamilton Gymnasium.

Players emerged from the locker room about 15 minutes before to warm up and shoot around.

Head coach Joe Scott wasn’t allowed in the gym until exactly 5 p.m. due to NCAA rules that prevented all NCAA coaches from holding practice until the Oct. 15 start time.

While he waited to get back on the court with his team, Scott talked about the prospect of the new season after the team’s 19-13 finish last season, which ended when the Pioneers lost to North Texas in the semifinals of the Sun Belt Conference Tournament.

“What we need to see from this team is our guys playing their best basketball in the last nine weeks of the season, starting on Jan. 1, because that’s how you win a conference championship,” Scott said.

For the first time since his arrival in 2007, Scott is coaching an entire roster of players he selected and recruited to play at DU.

More importantly, he has 10 returning players.

“We chose to recruit four-year guys and build the program that way and felt that was the best way to sustain it,” said Scott. “We have the right parts, experienced parts that have been members on a 19-win team and still have two or three years remaining in their careers.”

The Pioneers’ two newcomers this season are redshirt sophomore Trevor Noonan, a transfer player from Air Force who sat out last season, and freshman Chris Udofia from Dallas.

Both Noonan and Udofia bring skills to the program that the team did not have last year.

“We have added two new pieces, size and athleticism, which we needed and if you add that to all the experience we have, it is all a matter of time until we make our best basketball show up,” said Scott.

Noonan is a 6-foot-9 center and will look to be the low post presence the Pioneers lacked last season.

As for Udofia, he is a versatile athlete who will instantly contribute on both sides of the ball, according to his teammates.

“This program was missing that one freakish athlete, who can rebound, block shots, alter shots and help us inside the paint,” said junior Travis Hallam.

The team benefited from an almost two-week long trip to Spain and 10 practices this past summer, because guys like Noonan and Udofia had time to adjust and get settled into the offense, according to Scott.

“We are so much further ahead then we were last year at this time, but we have to prove that on Nov. 12,” Scott said.

The men’s basketball team opens its season on Nov. 12 when it travels to Eugene, Ore. to take on UC Santa Barbara.