Ask Will Voigt about his time as an assistant coach at then-Metro State with Mike Dunlap, and two things spring to mind.

Early mornings and winning.

Oh, and Dunlap’s basement, where Voigt made his home for half the year.

Voigt, who is back in Denver as an assistant coach with BYU, was on the Metro State staff when the Roadrunners were at the height of their Division II powers. The ‘Runners won NCAA titles in 2000 and 2002 when Dunlap was busy building a powerhouse right off Auraria Parkway.

“Every day we were in the gym at 4:30 in the morning. Players were in at 5,” Voigt said prior to No. 6 BYU’s matchup with No. 3 Wisconsin in the NCAA Tournament’s Round of 32 Saturday. “We had a young staff. Coach Dunlap really mentored all of us. He was so kind to us young guys. He taught and helped us every day.”

That included “a roof over my head,” Voigt said, in Dunlap’s Cherry Creek neighborhood.

“I lived in coach’s basement,” he said.

Dunlap is back in the RMAC as the head coach at Colorado Mesa, which finished third in his first season. A brilliant basketball teacher, Dunlap was a Nuggets assistant from 2006-08.

“Coach Dunlap had built a program at that point that had a culture of work. And we worked,” Voigt said. “How we went about everything was already firmly in place. And we had some really high-level international guys. And we put a huge emphasis on footwork and development. It was a perfect storm of all three of those things.”

Championship programs tend to grow bonds, and the Metro State champs still keep in touch — such as Voigt with Patrick Mutombo, a former Metro State player who is now an NBA assistant with the Grizzlies after stops with the Nuggets, Raptors, Suns and Bucks.

“It’s funny. We were pulling up (to Ball Arena) and I looked across the street and I remember that parking garage being built,” Voigt said. “Lot of good memories in Denver.”