PB grad Memmelaar making impact for RPI

By Kyle Adams
Posted 2/2/22

Mason Memmelaar is a 2018 graduate of Pine Bush High School. Currently, the 6’6” forward is in his senior season at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Memmelaar has had a significant …

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PB grad Memmelaar making impact for RPI

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Mason Memmelaar is a 2018 graduate of Pine Bush High School. Currently, the 6’6” forward is in his senior season at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Memmelaar has had a significant role in the Engineers attempt to return to the NCAA Division III Tournament and attain a Liberty League title.

RPI holds an overall record of 15-2, while being 9-1 in Liberty League games, as of February 1.

“It means everything,” Memmelaar said of RPI putting themselves in position for another postseason run. “For me and the other seniors, we’re excited to be out here and we want to make every moment count.”

In 2020, RPI fell to Ithaca in the league championship game. After advancing to the NCAA Tournament, they fell in the second round to Tufts University.

“We now have that experience. We know what it’s like,” Memmelaar said. “We know what the NCAA playoffs are like. We know what it takes and now we just have to keep performing and hopefully we can get to that place again.”

On January 23, the Pine Bush alum posted a career high in points, scoring 27 against Skidmore College. His previous career high was 24, attained on December 30, 2021 against Medaille.

“He’s like a little brother to me. It’s great to see him have a performance like that,” teammate Patrick Mahoney (Ossining, NY) said of Memmelaar’s January 23 outing. “Especially after a tough game against Vassar.”

As a sophomore in 2019-2020, Memmelaar started all of RPI’s 29 games. He has started all of RPI’s 17 games to begin this season. He averages 15 points and 6.1 rebounds per game.

A goal of his entering this season was to actually stay in the game.

“Staying out of foul trouble I think was the biggest thing,” Memmelaar said. “Staying in the game is a huge step from two years ago now. Then just boxing out, making sure I’m rebounding and doing what needs to be done.”

Being a Division III program in the Liberty League, RPI’s men’s basketball team did not compete last season. Having his junior year off from collegiate competition, the opportunity to actually play is a welcome sight, even if it looks a little different.

“Without a doubt. This’ll be my fourth year playing here,” Memmelaar said of being comfortable playing at home, even without fans present. “I’ve been here for countless hours. For everyone on the team, you always feel a little more comfortable being at home, whether the fans can be here or not.”

The senior still has some time to decide whether or not he’ll be coming back for another season, as he retained an extra year of eligibility after there was no basketball last season.

After dropping their first league game on January 21 to Vassar College, the Engineers have won four games in a row. They have Capital Region rivalry matchups against Union and Skidmore on February 1 and 4 and a rematch against Vassar on February 5, in Poughkeepsie.

As Memmelaar and the Engineers look to make a deep postseason push, he says it always comes back to playing defense.

“Our goals always start on defense. We start by working on defense and we let the offense come to us. Earlier in the year we were doing that really well.

We may have lost it a bit, but hopefully we’re back now. It’s always about defense. On-the-ball defense is huge for us and that leads to offense.”