Extra effort
UNM coaches work a bit harder when preparing for Air Force
Forgive the University of New Mexico men’s basketball coaching staff if it doesn’t display the same pep in its step today as its peers across the Mountain West as league play tips off tonight across the conference. It’s Air Force scout week. And, as assistant coaches across the Mountain West will tell you, that usually means they’re waking up feeling a little more sore today and walking a tad slower. Once or twice a season, the assistant coaches aren’t only preparing scouting reports, but are full-fledged participants in practices, trying desperately in an abbreviated amount of time to teach the concepts and schemes that the disciplined Falcons players often spend several years honing.
“We have four players on this team who’s ever even seen Air Force before,” said Lobos head coach Paul Weir, who coaches in his first Mountain West game today at 7 p.m. when Air Force (6-6) visits Dreamstyle Arena in the conference opener for both teams.
“We needed to find five guys who at least understood what
Air Force does and then practice guarding it. And the coaches are going to do a better job than the players, because half of them wouldn’t really know what’s going on. So we had some coaches out there running around running the Air Force offense.”
Tuesday’s practice featured Lobo assistants Chris Harriman, Jerome Robinson and David Chiotti, who actually regularly participate in the team’s post-practice running drills, breathing a little harder and stretching a little longer in their own postgame cool downs while chatting with a reporter (assistant Brandon Mason avoided the practice due to his longtime back injury that may require offseason surgery).
Lobo senior forward Joe Furstinger admitted Air Force scouts are among the players’ favorite practices each year. While they’re difficult to pick up all the intricacies of what Air Force will bring at you, it’s fun getting to bang bodies and go up against the assistant coaches running the show all season.
“Definitely,” said Furstinger. “I always like competing against the coaches. It’s always fun.”
But are any of the assistants as good on the court as they tell the players the rest of the season?
“Jerome is pretty good,” Furstinger said. “Rench (last year’s assistant coach Terrence Rencher) always used to talk a lot of trash. (Former assistant Alan) Huss was always good, and Chiotti, too.”
While the coaches may not be used to the rigors of a Paul Weir practice, the Lobos players by this point are. And that’s been part of the plan all along and why, despite being 5-8 entering league action, it’s hard to find too many hanging heads or sulking Lobos around the Pit these days.
“The only thing I’ve talked about (is) we’re here for three or four games in March — gearing up for those games in March,” said Weir, referring to his long-stated goal of building a program that is designed to be peaking at the end of the season physically in time for the conference tournament.
“Our style of play, our conditioning, our depth, is building itself for the back half of the season. When other teams get worn down, when other teams get injuries, when other teams don’t have all the scouting time to prepare for us, we’re going to be going into the Mountain West Conference tournament and hopefully we’re fresh.”
That is the same approach Weir has said repeatedly is his goal for games: Keep coming at opponents with intensity with the hope that, though the roster may have deficiencies, it will eventually overwhelm opponents in the closing minutes due to depth and conditioning.
While results shooting the ball remain sketchy for UNM late in games, Weir is confident his team has been better conditioned than opposing teams recently.
Weir said Tuesday he thinks UNM and Air Force probably have the two “most distinct” styles in the league, albeit with very different approaches.
Air Force slows the game, ranking 289th in tempo, and UNM speeds it up, ranking 43rd.
Weir also said this is the first time this season he’s been able to show game film to his players of an opponent who played another team like UNM in terms of style. Army, which beat Air Force 79-54 on Dec. 17, also runs a full-court press all game, uses pressure defense throughout, even in the halfcourt, shoots a lot of 3-pointers and tries to push the tempo.
“It’s really good to finally have an opponent with a game film (like UNM),” said Weir. “Maybe there are some things we can steal or maybe some things we can do differently.”
OPENING STRONG: The Lobos have won their Mountain West opener each of the past six seasons. The last time UNM started league play 0-1 was in 2010-11 when it opened with a road loss to Wyoming.