Injuries have plagued the Lobos in the month of January – especially ACL tears.
First, sophomore guard Emily Lines had a season-ending ACL tear, and sophomore Jaisa Nunn suffered the same fate on Wednesday.
New Mexico (11-9, 7-3 MW) will be without their 6-foot-3-inch post player in Nunn – who was averaging 10.4 points and 7.0 rebounds per game prior to the injury. The team will face UNLV on Wednesday night for the second time this season.
UNLV (14-7, 5-4 MW), beat the Lobos soundly earlier in Las Vegas, Nevada by a score of 57-42.
In that game, UNLV held the Lobos to just 21.9 percent shooting as a team. Senior Richelle van der Keijl and Nunn were the only two Lobos to score in double figures, combining for 27 of the team’s 42 points.
UNLV also held arguably the Lobos’ best player, junior Cherise Beynon, to four total points in the first matchup.
Beynon, who is from the Las Vegas area, may not have put up the performance she wanted, but head coach Mike Bradbury said he believes things will be different this time around.
“I think she's going to be a lot better tomorrow,” Bradbury said. “For whatever reason she had a tough day over there. I think [UNLV] did a good job on her and they had a good plan. But I'm expecting her to be much better tomorrow.”
Bradbury believes that junior Jayda Bovero could see in increase in minutes to fill the void left by Nunn, and see more of junior Laneah Bryan as well.
The Lobos will have a smaller lineup when van der Keijl and senior Kianna Keller are not on the court – perhaps forcing the team to play four guard and one post player offense.
Bradbury said he doesn't plan on elevating the amount of minutes for freshman Hannah Sjerven.
She had a game-high 14 points, 11 rebounds and six blocks against Northern New Mexico on Sunday afternoon in only 22 minutes of action. But hadn’t played at all in the prior five games.
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Bradbury said UNLV presents a lot of challenges, and praised the Rebels for their play in the first meeting. The Lobos will have to make open shots and get after it on the boards if they want to control the pace.
“They're talented…they whooped us pretty good over there,” Bradbury said. “They rebound it, they're tough, they're really good defensively. I'm sure they’ll have the same plan that they had last time.”
In the Lobos’ last matchup against UNLV, they were out-rebounded 51-49. Van der Keijl was aggressive though, giving the Rebels all kinds of problems on her was to 16 total rebounds.
Tip-off is set for 7 p.m. on Wednesday at WisePies Arena aka The Pit. The game will also be streamed live on the Mountain West Network.
Matthew Narvaiz is a sports reporter for the Daily Lobo. He primarily covers women's basketball and baseball. He can be reached at sports@dailylobo.com or on Twitter @matt_narvaiz
