By Liam Cary-Eaves New Mexico is no longer accepting comparisons to last season’s club. UNM is one of the hottest teams in the conference, riding a three-game winning streak and having won six of the last seven games. Head coach Yvonne Sanchez said the team has adopted a new character of its own and has moved past the troubled 11-19 record (6-12 Mountain West) of last year.
New Mexico continued its pursuit of an upper-tier position in the Mountain West rankings with a tight 64-62 victory against San Jose State. With one second left to play on the game clock, the Spartans (9-11, 3-6 in the Mountain West) had a chance to send things into overtime with SJSU’s best free throw shooter, guard Ta’Rea Cunnigan, at the line. Cunnigan is shooting a respectable 73 percent from the charity stripe on the season, but after missing the first free throw, she botched the second attempt to give her team a chance to send it to overtime. UNM snatched the board and sealed the game.
Next year junior midfielder Ben McKendry will be a “different ball of wax,” as they say in Canada. Last week McKendry signed a Homegrown Player contract with the Vancouver Whitecaps, and will thus forgo his senior season with the UNM men’s soccer team to join the MLS. According to MLS rules, a club may sign a player to his first professional contract without subjecting him to the SuperDraft if the player has trained for one year in the club’s youth development program and has trained 80 days with the academy.
Big-name schools brought strong performances to New Mexico with record-breaking efforts in Saturday’s New Mexico Collegiate Invitational at the Albuquerque Convention Center. Ridge Jones now shares a piece of the 60-meter dash record while Sammy Silva and Holly Van Grinsven sit atop the New Mexico record books for their performances in the 800-meter race and 60-meter hurdles, respectively. The rigorous competition featured three nationally ranked teams: No. 11 Alabama men’s track team, No. 12 Kansas State women, and No. 21 UCLA women’s team. UNM’s women finished second on the day while the men were fourth.
Head coach Craig Neal was anything but pleased in spite of New Mexico’s 67-41 blowout over San Jose State on Saturday night. He said his team is supposed to be getting better on a daily basis, but he didn’t feel they accomplished that in Saturday’s 26-point romp at WisePies Arena. “I thought that was a very average performance from my team,” Neal said. “I thought they came out in the first four minutes and played really good, (but) we still had a lot of mental breakdowns offensively. We still had a lot of mental breakdowns defensively — I’m a little concerned about that. You can’t play to your opponent.”
For the first time in recent memory, New Mexico men’s basketball has had a hard time finding a consistent rotation due to injuries and an inexperienced team. Second-year head coach Craig Neal said his team is getting better every day, but still needs to work on mental errors. He said he expects a lot out of his young guys, and won’t settle for little mistakes being made this far into the season.
It’s one extreme to the next for Heather Dyche. After years of working at the club and Olympic level, Dyche will be moving onto the collegiate ranks following her introduction as the new head coach of the New Mexico women’s soccer program on Thursday.
Losing four starting position players would generally be a cause for concern. However, UNM softball head coach Erica Beach said the team is headed in the right direction after losing two transfer players and losing two seniors from last year’s squad. “We’ve got some studs on this team and I am really excited to see what they can do,” Beach said.
After a slow start to the season against tough competitors, the New Mexico women’s basketball team has been scorching hot as of late, winning five of its past six games. Head coach Yvonne Sanchez said the defense has been the key component to UNM’s recent success.
Senior guard Hugh Greenwood’s “Pink Pack” received an unexpected gift from a state figure on Monday afternoon to go toward the UNM Cancer Center. New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez presented UNM men’s basketball head coach Craig Neal with a $10,000 check to be given to Greenwood’s campaign, money that was unused from a privately-collected inaugural fund.
Tired of hearing about Deflate-gate yet? Don’t worry. I’m not throwing in my two cents about whether New England quarterback Tom Brady told his equipment manager to purposefully reduce the PSI in 11 of 12 footballs during last week’s AFC title game. If head coach Bill Belichick gave the order, I don’t care. This won’t affect the Super Bowl in seven days. I am sick of this media oversaturation over Deflate-gate, as I am sure you are. We reached the point of absurdity days ago, and there unfortunately seems to be no end in sight until next week’s title showdown. The national sports media should be ashamed of themselves.
Questions and excitement surround New Mexico’s newest sport as the first official practice inches near. Sand volleyball will hold its opening practice on Feb. 9, and head coach Jeff Nelson said his team has shown a lot of enthusiasm at open gym sessions in preparation for the inaugural season. Even with an upbeat group of players, UNM has not yet confirmed where it will host the home games, although Nelson said he foresees his team hosting games at the Stoneface courts located on Paseo Del Norte and I-25.
New Mexico turned to its leaders to fight through a major first-half deficit in a 60-54 victory over Wyoming on Saturday. Nothing was falling in place for the Lobos in the first half as the team went into the locker room trailing 28-19. A halftime speech from head coach Yvonne sparked a fire among her unit, and the Lobos stopped committing silly turnovers in the second half. “I told my leaders Antiesha (Brown), Khadijah (Shumpert) and Bryce (Owens), I challenged them at halftime,” head coach Yvonne Sanchez said. “They responded. I am really proud of those three because everyone kind of jumped on their back and said ‘We’re with you.’”
The New Mexico men’s basketball team had several chances to put away the first-place Wyoming Cowboys on Saturday afternoon, but a couple of late-game mistakes cost them down the stretch. Senior guard Hugh Greenwood kept up his hot streak in Laramie with 23 points (8 of 14 FG, 5 of 8 3-pointers) but did, however, make two costly mistakes at the end of regulation and overtime that doomed the Lobos in a 63-62 loss. With 10 seconds remaining in the second half and the Lobos leading 54-51, Greenwood fouled Wyoming guard Josh Adams on a 3-point attempt. Adams knocked down all three free throws to tie the game at 54.
Fueled by comments from a crude Twitter account, senior guard Hugh Greenwood led New Mexico to a 71-69 victory over UNLV at the Thomas and Mack Center Wednesday night. UNM has now won 11 of its last 13 games in Las Vegas, including the Mountain West Tournament. Greenwood finished with 22 points on a career-tying six 3-pointers. He also added eight rebounds and two assists. Greenwood, whose mother has cancer, said an anonymous Twitter account was posting jokes about cancer all week and taking shots at the Greenwood family. He credited his huge game to this account. “Credit to him for getting us this win tonight,” Greenwood said. “That’s what motivated me.”
The New Mexico men’s and women’s indoor track teams are looking to make history once again. Last season the Lobos became the first team to sweep the Mountain West indoor titles since former MW member BYU did in 2011. It was the second-straight MW title for the men and the first for the women. Now UNM hopes to once again sweep both championships and become the only team aside from BYU to win both the men’s and women’s titles in back-to-back seasons.
After a dramatic home win against Mountain West foe UNLV, New Mexico will play host to a strong-shooting Wyoming team on Saturday. Head coach Yvonne Sanchez said UNM’s defense will not have as gritty of a physical battle as it did in the 63-60 victory over the Rebels (6-11, 3-3 MW). However, Sanchez said the Lobos will need to cover the Cowgirls’ shooters in order to be successful. “It’s hard to play Wyoming zone because they have such good shooters,” Sanchez said. “They can shoot from deep, so we will have to guard them deep.”
New Mexico’s toughness and solid bench play carried the Lobos to a thrilling 63-60 victory over UNLV at WisePies Arena Wednesday night. UNM was forced to play with a thin lineup after three starters and a key reserve had early exits, but head coach Yvonne Sanchez said she never experienced an uneasy feeling filling vacant spots with her reserves. “I just had a boat load of confidence in whoever I put in,” Sanchez said. “It was one of those games I thought our defense just did a nice job.”
Forward James Rogers became the second former Lobo taken in the MLS SuperDraft when Sporting Kansas City selected him 53rd overall Tuesday. The Sierra Leone native joined former teammate Oniel Fisher as one of the 84 players selected in this year’s draft. Fisher was selected by Seattle Sounders FC with the40th overall pick on Thursday during the second round.
New Mexico will have its hands full when the Mountain West’s most potent female basketball scoring duo steps onto the Wise Pies Arena floor tonight. UNLV’s senior point guard Danielle Miller, along with senior guard Alana Cesarz, are a frightening tandem. Miller averaged 19.1 points a game, best in the Mountain West, while Cesarz has the fourth most points in the conference at 15.9 points per contest.
Solutions by The State News
