Keeping it up
Lobos hope for first win streak in over a month, host Fresno State
Through smiles and the muchneeded relief of Wednesday’s blowout win over the San Jose State Spartans was a common understanding among UNM Lobos players and coaches.
“I’ll be able to tell you Saturday,” Lobos head coach Paul Weir said when asked what was gained from the 92-60 win over the Spartans.
“This is really a build up to Saturday . ... It’s obviously a big game. If we can build and take some things from this that can help us on Saturday, then this would be a good game for us.”
The Lobos (11-13, 5-7 Mountain West) host the Fresno State Bulldogs (18-6, 9-3 MWC) tonight at 5 p.m. in what could prove to be telling game for the rest of the season. Then again, probably not. Weir has been very consistent in reminding media types who keep asking if his team has turned the corner after some of their big wins — or if it’s time to panic after one of their big losses — that he simply doesn’t know what to expect from game to game.
Rarely, if ever, has there been a more Jekyll and Hyde Lobos team at this point of the season.
Basically, when these Lobos lose, they really lose. And when they win, they really win.
Consider Wednesday’s 32-point win came four days after a 29-point loss, a mere 61-point swing in scoring differential. But that should be expected when playing a historically great Mountain West Nevada team on the road followed by a historically bad MWC team at home, right?
Maybe. But the previous two games for UNM were a 13-point win (83-70) over San Diego State
on Feb. 5 preceded by a 12-point loss (82-70) to these same Bulldogs in Fresno on Feb. 2.
In fact, through 12 MWC games, the Lobos have had just two decided by single digits: a Jan. 2 road win at Air Force (65-58) and a 68-66 loss to Utah State.
Since the MWC moved to an 18-game schedule for the 2013-14 season, the Lobos have never had fewer than eight league games decided by single digits.
The number of UNM games decided by single digits in MWC regular season play: 2019: 2 (of 12 games so far) 2018: 12 2017: 10 2016: 8 2015: 9
2014: 10
So, maybe today’s Fresno State game will finally give fans of the program a good idea what this team really is heading down the stretch of the Mountain West season.
But probably not.
VS. FRESNO STATE: The Bulldogs are tied with Utah State for second place in the league standings.
That’s been due in large part to having three players in contention for All-Mountain West honors in guard Deshon Taylor, a preseason all-league selection, forward Nate Grimes, who has emerged as one of the top big men in the conference, and senior guard Braxton Huggins, the former New Mexico State Aggie who appears headed for an easy win of the league’s Newcomer of the Year award.
After transferring closer to his Bakersfield, Calif., home from NMSU when Weir took the UNM job after the 2017 season, Huggins sat out last season and has exploded this season, averaging 19.0 points per game.
He’s on a four-game stretch of scoring more than 20 points, including 22 vs. UNM on Feb. 22. He then scored 26 in a loss to Utah State, went for 31 against another former NMSU coach in Marvin Menzies and UNLV and then 26 again in Wednesday’s win over Boise State.
“He has no fear and he is talented,” Fresno State head coach Justin Hutson said of Huggins after Wednesday’s win. “I think you have to have both. You can’t have a guy who is talented but scared to take the shot. As you can see, he can really score the basketball.”