Another fire alarm delayed a home game at the $60 million University Arena, but Phillip McDonald was the only thing on fire at The Pit tonight.
The Lobo junior came off the bench to lead the UNM men’s basketball team to a 68-61 win over Mountain West conference foe Colorado State University on Wednesday night.
The Lobos (13-4, 1-1) faced criticism from head coach Steve Alford about lackadaisical play during their recent loss at Wyoming. Tonight Alford approved his team’s performance.
“We played a team that had eight days to get ready for us, very confident team and we knew we had to play well and I thought our guys did some real good things,” he said.
The Lobos were up by double digits with one second left in the first half. Before a CSU (11-5, 1-1) player shot a free throw, someone pulled a false alarm in the ramp leading to the locker room and sank the Pit into a Ninja Warrior-style obstacle, where some fans used empty rows to zigzag their way outside. The majority of the 14,303 in attendance filed back into the arena after the 18-minute fire alarm and the Lobos continued their domination on both sides of the ball.
Kendall Williams and Drew Gordon complemented McDonald’s 14 first half points with perfect shooting from the field, the pair shot a combined 7-7 from the field. Playing off the bench, McDonald was the main scoring threat throughout the game.
“I thought his cutting tonight was with much more urgency and more focused tonight,” he said. “At times he gets into a cut mode where you guard him a certain way he stops. He really got to cutting hard. He was hard to guard tonight.”
McDonald, who was pulled from the starting lineup due to a, “coach’s decision,” led all scorers with 27 points in 28 minutes. Gordon had a double double, 16 rebounds and 15 points. Williams finished with 10 points.
Senior Dairese Gary played a limited role in the offense, firing off only five shots and finishing with nine points.
McDonald took the leadership role but his performance was almost on the losing end after CSU’s Dorian Green drove a layup over Alex Kirk to bring the Rams to within one with less than one minute left in regulation.
The Lobos, who led by 11 points, were in a familiar position. This time McDonald carried the team with a clutch three and two free throws to maintain the lead down the stretch and position the Lobos to complete the win.
”I absolutely loved (McDonald’s) performance,” Alford said.
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