The rematch
UNM coach has dropped three straight vs. former team
Lobos hope to end their recent skid against Aggies tonight in Las Cruces
With surgical masks covering their faces — they said they feared the disloyalty being brought by the opposing team’s coach might be contagious — a thousand or so New Mexico State University students told the story of the Nov. 17, 2017, Rio Grande Rivalry showdown in the Pan American Center.
Regardless of what happened on the court, the backdrop of that game was always going to be how Aggie fans responded to the return of Paul Weir, their former head coach who had bolted the Mesilla Valley for the greener pastures, and larger paycheck, at the University of New Mexico.
“Wea-sel, sell-out! Wea-sel, sell-out!” were among the tamer chants that night.
A year and three Aggies victories in a row later, the UNM Lobos (4-1) return for part two of this season’s hoops rivalry series with the Aggies (6-1). The vitriol likely won’t be as intense, but the stakes remain high.
That is why both coaches — Weir as he prepares for his second visit to the Pan Am Center as an opposing coach still looking for his first victory against his old team, and NMSU’s Chris Jans, who is looking to become the first men’s basketball coach to ever start his Aggies career with back-to-back rivalry sweeps of UNM and UTEP — are doing their best to not fan the flames of the rivalry.
“In terms of our focus and our motivation, we know what this game means to everybody,” Jans said. “We know what it means to this community. We know what it means to this fan base. Our guys are well aware of that. Both teams will be through the roof. It will be more about managing emotions and making sure that we just play basketball.”
As for that possible second sweep of the Lobos in as many seasons?
“The sweep thing will have nothing to do with it,” Jans said. “Each game is its own entity and will unfold, as it does, organically. We won’t talk about that.”
Said Weir, the rivalry game is more about continuing to build on the positives his team showed in Saturday’s win at Bradley than it is about him as a coach.
And that means a renewed emphasis on the press that NMSU has handled better than just about anyone in three games against Weir’s Lobos over the past two seasons.
On the other side of the court, the Lobos offense vs. the Aggies defense seems to be more of a concern for Jans. Though they won 98-94 in Dreamstyle Arena on Nov. 17, the Aggies were uncharacteristically poor defensively.
“Something’s got to give,” said Jans, who called “atrocious” his team’s defense on effective field goal percentage — a statistic adjusting for the fact that a 3-point field goal is worth one more point than a 2-point field goal.
“It’s almost 300 (it ranks 283rd out of 353 Division I teams),” said Jans. “I just never dreamt that we’d be there at this point of the season. And their effective offensive field goal percentage is one of the tops in the country (UNM’s effective field goal percentage of 60.2 percent ranks No. 5 in the nation), so something’s got to give. We’ve got to do better or if they continue to shoot like that against us (tonight), they’re probably going to win the game.”
At the top of the list for UNM’s shooting success has been Anthony Mathis. The senior guard has hit 23 3-pointers through three games, and his 60.5 percent shooting clip from beyond the arc leads the nation.
But in the first meeting between the two teams this season, it was 5-foot-9 Aggie guard A.J. Harris’ perfect 6-for-6 3-point performance and career-high 31 points that made the difference in the game.
NOTES: To save a day of travel after Saturday’s Bradley game, the Lobos booked a direct flight from Chicago to EL Paso on Sunday after first practicing Sunday morning at Bradley University. The problem is there was a mechanical delay, and the team was stuck in the airport much of Sunday night and didn’t arrive to El Paso until about 2 a.m. Monday morning.
… Lobo junior Carlton Bragg is on the trip, though hasn’t yet been ruled eligible by the NCAA. While UNM is appealing his early eligibility status (he’s still scheduled to be eligible Dec. 16), the NCAA has allowed him to travel in the event the decision is reversed.