The magic number is now three, after the UNM men's basketball team handed TCU a 76-62 loss. The Lobos will need to win out if they want a share of the Mountain West Conference title.
The Horned Frogs visited The Pit on Tuesday for the Lobos' second-to-last home game. The Lobos pulled away late and defeated the Horned Frogs 76-62 to move to 9-4 in the conference.
"Tonight was a big win, and every game is a big game - it sounds cliché, but it's true," Roman Martinez said. "We are trying to fight for a conference championship with four other teams. We have to (be in) it every night, and tonight we were lucky to pull it off."
TCU entered The Pit out of the hunt for first place and hoped to spoil that taste in the Lobos' mouth for the time being.
The Horned Frogs, 5-9 and 14-14 overall, couldn't do it.
Coming into the game, second place in the conference was at a three-way stop sign with BYU, SDSU and UNM all chasing Utah (10-2 MWC) at the top.
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Initially, Zvonko Buljan lit up the Lobos in the first half and led all scorers with 13, but he turned into public enemy No. 1 for Lobo fans.
Buljan was not only getting under Lobo fans' skin but under freshman Will Brown's too.
At the 9:06 mark in the first period Buljan turned a routine post-up on Brown into an altercation.
"It was a physical game. I mean both teams play with a pretty physical style," TCU head coach Jim Christian said.
It didn't matter.
Buljan cooled for three second-half points and finished with 16.
The Lobos' defense turned it up. UNM outscored TCU 44-32 in the second half.
The same UNM defense also kept TCU leading scorer Kevin Langford, 14.1 points per game, to just one field goal attempt.
Langford and Faris had a duel down in the post when both were on the floor.
Langford finished with 13 points, but all of them came from the free-throw line.
Faris led all scorers with 20 points - 12 coming from free throws.
Tony Danridge finished the night with 17 points and added to his phenomenal play this year during conference. Danridge has averaged 20.2 points in his last five games.
"I thought it was a really good win for us," Alford said. "I thought TCU played really hard. I didn't like our focus in the first half, but we really responded in the second half. They're hard-fought wins, and we know that's going to be every night out."
