RIO RANCHO — Jamal Fenton isn’t Joe Namath — he came about two inches short of delivering on a promise.
At Media Day for UNM men’s basketball on Thursday at the Davalos Center, the 5-foot-8-inch point guard had fighting words for his teammates. He guaranteed he would take home the dunk title on Friday.
“I am going to win the dunk contest,” he said. “I am just letting everybody know.”
Instead, he came in second to junior-college transfer Darington Hobson.
The dunk contest marked the last of Friday’s Lobo Howl festivities, with the Lobos playing in an intersquad scrimmage and 3-point contest beforehand. Hobson would show off his flight ability in the dunk contest, but first he showcased his true all-around skills in UNM’s 20-minute scrimmage.
Hobson led all Lobos with 21 points and went 9-of-15 from the field, lifting the cherry squad to a 44-31 win over silver.
Head coach Steve Alford said he was encouraged that so many people made the trek out to the City of Vision, which hosted the cherry-silver game because The Pit is still undergoing renovation.
“This is what our fans do,” he said. “This was a great turnout for us. It’s exciting for our kids. It really is a great way for us to tip off the season like this. It energizes them going into the practice season.”
But the gem of the night was the dunk contest.
To get to the finals, Fenton bounced the ball off the backboard and one-handed the basketball into the rim.
He saved a more spectacular dunk for the finals of the fun-filled contest, but he failed to finish the jam.
From about half court, Fenton flipped up to teammate Nate Garth, and did a cartwheel followed by a cleanly executed back flip — but he didn’t have enough spunk to finish the alley-oop, falling just a couple of inches shy of rocking the rim.
Still, the crowd of about 3,500 thought he won the contest.
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“I thought I was going to win the dunk contest,” Fenton said. “I would say I won.”
The night was filled with surprises, too. Two members of last year’s Mountain West Conference regular-season championship team made special appearances.
Three-point specialist Chad Toppert competed with this year’s 3-point champion, Phillip McDonald. The two tied with 13.
After narrowly beating Fenton, Hobson squared off with last year’s NCAA dunk and Howl champion Tony Danridge.
For the element of shock, Danridge dressed incognito, wearing a pair of black and red plaid shorts and a gray wig that looked like assistant coach Craig Neal’s salt-and-pepper hair.
But the crowd wouldn’t have been as pumped if it weren’t for the men’s opening act.
Women’s head coach Don Flanagan and the women’s basketball team have five new faces for the 2009-10 season, but senior Amy Beggin proved why she is the team leader and preseason All-MWC.
Beggin helped the cherry squad squeak out a 31-28 victory over the silver team in the Lobos’ intersquad scrimmage. Beggin hit the game winning 3-pointer after Lauren Taylor tied the game with a 3-pointer.
Flanagan was impressed with the scoring the Lobos were able to produce.
“I felt we shot pretty well,” he said. “Even from the beginning, I was a little surprised at our first warm-up going full-court; we scored a lot of points off of that. I was pretty surprised with the whole thing.”
Beggin, who now has won three Lobo Howl 3-point contests, repeated as champion on Friday. However, Beggin didn’t cruise like she did in years past.
In the semifinals of the shoot-out, Beggin faced her biggest competition, Amanda Best.
She narrowly avoided defeat, hitting one more 3-pointer than Best.
Then, in the finals, Beggin and Taylor were tied at 18, but Beggin sashayed her last attempt, giving her the title.
“I knew going in this was going to be a great battle,” Beggin said. “There are a lot of great 3-point shooters on our team. I think it is a sign of things to come this year. We have a lot of great players, and it will be a fun year.”
