New Mexico Football Report

It's time for your New Mexico college football update...Why? because both UNM and NMSU insist on playing college football!  Season openers for both schools turned out how we expected, both lost. 

The U.N.M. Lobos:

 According to Yahoo sports The Lobos had this penciled in as a winnable game, so did I.  If you can't beat the CSU's of the college football world, on your home field, in the season opener... who can you beat? Yahoo sports goes on to say that UNM needed this win "as it seeks a six-victory season to become bowl-eligible." Let's back up a little Yahoo, what the Lobos need to do is win a game... as in singular, just win baby.

We know better, a bowl game is not a realistic goal in the Mike Locksley era. “ No doubt, we’re hurting,” said sophomore quarterback Tarean Austin, “but we’ve got to move on.”  Austin beat out B.R. Holbrook for the starting job and when he wasn't picking himself up, he flashed his raw talent. (Tarean was sacked a disturbing nine times) 

Austin can run with the ball but he also looks to pass, he was 20-31 for 179 yds. passing including one td. That's the good news, the bad news would be the offensive line's inability to protect him.  A couple of bright spots for the offense besides Austin were WR Deon Long and RB James Wright.

The defense played well enough for the offense to win the game, which they didn't due to critical mistakes and turnovers, most notably Austin's fumble in the closing seconds with The Lobos at CSU's  15 yd. line. “All of those things are correctable for us if this team continues to play with the effort that we played with." so says the ever embattled Mike Locksley.

With a trip to Little Rock and a match-up with Arkansas coming up next, Locks better hope that lack of talent is a correctable flaw. Otherwise, the Hawgs will feast on some scrawny desert dogs. Crusoe Gongbay had 5 carries for 17 yds. rushing, which is hardly note worthy, but with that crazy name, he has now become my favorite Lobo. Go Crusoe.... Go Lobos!

The N.M.S.U. Aggies:

I would say if you can't beat the Ohio U's of the world who can you beat other than UNM, but Ohio U. is not a bad football team. They ran a balanced attack, on their way to a 44-24 win over NMSU.  Aggie Qb. Andrew Manley threw for 362 yards and two touchdowns, he completed 22 passes, had one INT and was sacked three times. 

Manley a sophomore looked in charge and played with composure. It helps that NMSU has a trio of productive receivers led by Todd Lee (5 recs. 140 yds.) Taveon Rogers ( 97-yard kickoff return for a td, 5 recs for 92 yds.) and Kenny Turner (7 recs. for 93 yds.) you gotta love those numbers. 

The weakest link for the Aggie's is their defense. Lack of depth will hamper their rotation, allowing the opposition to wear them down. Missed assignments and opposing running backs breaking through tackles will become a familiar sight for Aggie fans. If injuries deplete the defensive unit even further, things will only get uglier.

The offense will have to put up big numbers every time out, just to stay in the game. Which might be hard to do given that the offensive line didn't blow anybody away in the opener. Up next for the Aggies is Minnesota of The Big 10 which is coming off a close loss to USC. Stranger things have happened, but an Aggie victory would be very strange indeed.