LOBO LEGENDS FLY AGAIN
UNM alumni honor past, put on show in high-scoring game
It’s been more than a decade since Darington Hobson wreaked havoc on opponents in an still-under-construction Pit during the Lobos’ 30-win 2009-10 season.
Lest anyone forgot, “Butta” doesn’t lack confidence.
With Sunday night’s Enchantment alumni allstar game tied 131-131, and with the unique Elam Ending game-ending format in play that in the final minutes set the game-winning score at 134 points, the versatile 6-foot-7 wing began dribbling the ball up court for his Team Kelvin Scarborough.
Sure, he had 3-point specialist Anthony Mathis on the court. and teammate Phillip McDonald had a game-high 25 points and hit five triples, but Hobson had his own message to send.
“I looked over to the J.B. White team and I said, ‘The game is over. I’m shooting this off the backboard,’” Hobson said.
Then, in front of an estimated 3,500 Lobo fans in attendance, Hobson calmly dribbled past half court and, from well beyond the 3-point line, pulled up and banked in the game winning 3-pointer.
Team Scarborough 134. Team JB White 131.
“Anthony’s the shooter,” Hobson, the 2010 Mountain West Player of the Year said. “He got us there. But the big shot? I live for those.”
A day after the two had to be separated in a heated pickup game Saturday morn
ing, those two teammates shared the stage in a postgame media session.
“Obviously being back in the Pit feels amazing,” Mathis said. “Playing with a lot of Lobo legends on the same floor is a lot of fun.”
Lobos from different generations and different corners of the country assembled this weekend in Albuquerque to both play in Sunday’s all-star game and begin preparations for the 10 former Lobos who made up Team Scarborough on Sunday but now shift focus to being The Enchantment, the Lobo alumni team that is participating in the $1 million winner-take-all The Basketball Tournament (TBT) starting later this week.
The Enchantment’s first game is Saturday in Wichita, Kansas, against a team of mostly Oklahoma State alumni, the Stillwater Stars.
While this past weekend had a fun, reunion-type feel, and Sunday was a celebration of the past, the page now turns quickly for The Enchantment.
“Tomorrow,” Hobson said when asked when the intensity for TBT preparation steps up. “We had fun tonight, but the real work starts next week and we just got to get used to playing with each — guys figure out their roles.”
WHITE/SCARBOROUGH: Event organizers, spearheaded by former NMSU Aggie and UNM assistant coach Brandon Mason, decided to name the two Lobo alumni teams playing on Sunday after Kelvin Scarborough and J.B. White.
Scarborough is the Lobo legend who died in December and, like Mason now, coached youth basketball around the Metro area but also got former Lobos together for alumni games.
White was the Santa Fe High graduate who was shot and killed last August, days before he was moving to Albuquerque where he was to join the Lobo basketball team as one of the program’s highest ranked national recruits in program history.
White’s family was at the game and was presented a special J.B. White jersey by Mason during one of the timeouts. Jude Voss, White’s mother, was an assistant coach on the team.
The last game with a crowd played in the Pit was 16 months ago before the pandemic, a Santa Fe High state tournament game in which White was playing in March 2020.
‘PAPA’ BROWN: A 3-point contest at halftime was named in honor of Hall of Fame prep coach Mike “Papa” Brown, who died earlier this summer.
“My family feels really, really good about it,” said Brown’s son and Volcano Vista boy’s basketball coach Greg Brown. “All these guys, even the ones who didn’t know me or my dad or our family, they just embraced us. It’s such a special moment just to celebrate him and all of them.”
One of “Papa” Brown’s former stars at Albuquerque Academy, Chad Toppert, lost in the finals of the event to Mathis, who hit 22 of 25 3-point attempts in two rounds.
MIRANDA SANCHEZ: The halftime dunk contest was named in honor of former Lobo women’s basketball star Miranda Sanchez, who died in July 2020 at the age of 41. Lobo women’s basketball stars of past and present Lindsay Arndt-Day, Angela BacaHartill, Jaedyn De La Cerda and Nikki Heckroth-Lobato judged the contest.
J.R. Giddens, the oldest player on the court, edged Cleveland “Pancake “Thomas for the title, but wanted fans to know he usually can do much more than he showed.
“I’m blessed to be able to jump like this at 36,” said Giddens. “The unfortunate thing is we played like five times this week, so I can actually jump higher (usually), and run faster and play better than I did today.”