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Lamar Jordan
Lamar Jordan

Being a Lobo: Top five Lobo athletes to watch this year

UNM has plenty of athletes to watch this upcoming year.

There are several players on every team to keep an eye out for, but there wasn’t room for everybody on this list.

The list of the top five athletes to watch isn’t meant to honor these athletes, but to highlight some of the better players that UNM puts on the field.

Only athletes from the fall/winter sports were chosen.

1. Quarterback Lamar Jordan

The redshirt sophomore has plenty of pressure heading into the 2015 football season. Jordan will first have to stave off junior college transfer Austin Apodaca from overtaking him as the starting quarterback.

If Jordan is able to hang on to the starting job, he will then have the responsibility of leading UNM to its first bowl game since 2007. The playmaking ability of Jordan flashed at times last season, but he will have to be more consistent if UNM wants to hit the .500 mark.

2. Guard Cullen Neal

Not only does Neal have to bounce back from an injury-shortened season, he must help UNM men’s basketball climb back into contention in the Mountain West.

Neal isn’t afraid to score, and UNM will need his shooting touch after averaging just 62 points per game last season, which ranked 296th out of 300 Division I teams.

Between Neal’s only two full games last season he averaged 24.5 points. Neal will also be called upon to be a leader after the graduations of Hugh Greenwood and Deshawn Delaney.

3. The UNM women’s soccer team

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The only team on the list is the one coming off a hazing incident that left a black eye on the program. New head coach Heather Dyche is tasked with not only trying to produce a winning team, but cleaning up the image of the women’s soccer program.

UNM did finish the 2014 regular season in third place in the Mountain West, but lost in the semifinals of the conference tournament to Wyoming 2-1. The Lobos will begin the year against one of the best teams in the nation when they play host to Florida State on Aug. 21.

4. Guard Cherise Beynon

UNM’s Cherise Beynon knows how to stuff the stat sheet. The junior guard led the women’s basketball team in steals per game (1.6), tied for first in rebounds per game with forward Khadijah Shumpert (5.8) and had the third-highest scoring average (8.9).

Beynon’s scoring will have to increase with the departure of shooting guard Antiesha Brown, who averaged a team-high 15.8 points per game. If there’s any hole in Beynon’s game, it’s shooting the ball. Beynon shot just 38.9 percent from the floor, and an ugly 21.9 percent from beyond the arc.

5. Midfielder Christopher Wehan

Wehan has flourished ever since he became a starter for the UNM men’s soccer team. After being named Conference USA Freshman of the Year in 2013, he followed up with a First Team All-Conference nod last season.

Wehan is one of the most dynamic players for the Lobos. He led the team with 10 goals and 22 points as UNM finished with an 11-6-1 record in 2014.

Thomas Romero-Salas is the sports editor for the Daily Lobo. He can be reached at sports@dailylobo.com or on Twitter 
@ThomasRomeroS.

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