by Riley Bauling
Daily Lobo
The days of being thrown out of seventh-story windows and landing on its feet are over.
The way senior center midfielder Brandon Moss sees it, the UNM men's soccer team dodged its last bullet.
"We've had our nine lives already," Moss said, "and we're going on our 10th."
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Life one drifted away into the cosmos when the Lobos topped Ohio State University 1-0 in overtime in the second game of the season.
Life two was gone in Tulsa, Okla., with a 2-1 overtime win over the University of Tulsa on Sept. 25.
Life three disappeared after UNM tied Air Force Academy 0-0 in Colorado Springs on Oct. 7.
Life four went the way of bell-bottoms on Oct. 14 after the Lobos took 96 minutes to top Sacramento State University.
Life five said "hasta la vista" two days later when the Lobos lost for the first time in two years at home to San Jose State University in overtime, 3-2.
Life six stuck around for a little longer than life five, finally vanishing into thin air after the Lobos' tie on Sunday with Sacramento State.
Life seven was the best one of all, as the Lobos happily kissed it goodbye after San Jose State tied the University of Nevada-Las Vegas on Sunday too, leaving UNM in control of its own fate for the last two games of the season.
It wasn't nine lives, but Moss was pretty close.
Had San Jose beaten UNLV - a team the Lobos beat 7-2 and 4-0 this year - it would have been the Spartans who only had to win their last game to take the conference championship.
Now, UNM only has to beat Denver on Friday and Air Force on Sunday to grab its third Mountain Pacific Sports Federation trophy in four years. If it drops one and San Jose wins, the Spartans will take the crown and pocket the automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.
That's why the Lobos are chewing their nails, Moss said.
"The relief came last weekend hearing they (San Jose) tied," he said. "The worry kicked in thinking about this weekend's games. It'd be nice to go out on top as conference champs. It makes sense to go out as conference champs if you're a top-five team in the country."
UNM holds a top-five ranking in all four national polls, but head coach Jeremy Fishbein said he is cautious about looking too far into the future.
"Our destiny is in our hands, but we got to take it one game at a time," he said. "We're making a big mistake looking at more than one game at a time."
With the NCAA Tournament poking its head over the background of this weekend's games, Moss said the team has to seize its opportunity to grab a high seed.
"First and foremost, we're still trying to get that top-eight seed," he said. "If we lose one of those games, the chances of getting that seed and the bye are slipping further and further away."
The top eight teams in the tournament get two games at home, with the top four teams getting three games at home before the Final Four.
The NCAA selection committee seeds 16 teams for the tournament, all of which get one game at home.
Forty-eight teams participate in the tournament.
With home-field advantage on the line, left back Matt Wootton said the Lobos need to use their last two regular-season games advantageously.
"It's definitely important, not only because it's my senior year and I want to win conference, but it's important we play well to have some confidence and have good momentum going into the tournament," he said.
