A game of Secret Santa was the difference for the UNM women's basketball team on Saturday at The Pit.
The Lobos (6-1) dispensed of the San Diego Toreros (4-5) 58-50 in a game that included sophomore Fatima Maddox's coming-out party.
The 5-foot-6 guard excelled against the man-to-man scheme the Toreros ran, scoring a game-high 17 points.
Maddox's offensive show went off without a hitch because of a little help she got from some sugar, she said.
"See, the thing was, today we were doing this Secret Santa thing," Maddox said. "And someone gave me a lot of candy. I think we should do Secret Santa before every game, or eat a lot of candy."
Sugar-high aside, the Lobos started the game slow, down by as many as 11 points in the first half.
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"It's not good to get yourself in a hole in the first half, because teams can take advantage of that," forward Lindsay Arndt said.
Head coach Don Flanagan offered an explanation for why UNM didn't trounce the Toreros like they had other teams this season at The Pit.
"Our fans don't like blowouts anyway," he said. "They get bored. They start doing the wave and stuff like that just to keep them occupied. We need to keep them busy."
Besides a lopsided 73-56 loss to Texas, the Lobos have won their other three home games by an average margin of 23 points.
The Toreros failed to capitalize on their 26-18 lead at halftime, however. UNM came out in the second half guns blazing, dropping nine points and taking the lead 27-26.
But those pesky Toreros wouldn't go away.
"You know what surprised me more than anything - they were quicker and shot better than I thought they could," Flanagan said.
Arndt said the team wasn't prepared for the Toreros to put up that much of a fight.
"To be honest, the girls that watched the game last night (San Diego vs. Utah State) were like, 'Yeah, they're not very good,'" Arndt said. "But they were really good. I mean they were really good. Coach even admitted to kind of overlooking them, and I think we did."
After missing their first 10 shots in the second half, the Toreros connected on consecutive threes from Michelle Augustavo and Amanda Rego. Lindsay Helvey hit a layup, and San Diego found itself up 34-27 with 13 minutes remaining.
But the Lobos seemed like they wanted to stick around as well.
Following the Torero outburst, UNM managed to keep the San Diego lead within six for the rest of the game.
With less than six minutes remaining, the Lobos went on a 12-4 run. As the dust settled, UNM accepted the Southwest Airlines Lobo Shootout Championship trophy.
Although the Lobos shot an arctic 38.9 percent for the game, including a paltry 3-for-12 from three-point land, Flanagan said the team will benefit from coming out with a close win.
"There's games like that that you have to play, and you hope you are going to win games like that," he said. "That was as close a possession game as you can get."
