Lobos Lead MW in All-Academic Sixth Straight Year
2018 Mountain West Spring All-Academic Team
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — The University of New Mexico got record-setting numbers from men’s and women’s golf, and league-leading totals from baseball and women’s tennis as the Lobos led the Mountain West with 134 Spring All-Academic selections. The Spring tally, coupled with the Fall total, gave UNM a program-record 200 Mountain West All-Academic selections. The Lobos became just the second institution in Mountain West history to amass 200 honorees in one year, joining BYU, which did it eight times.
The Lobos were followed closely by Boise State, which set its own program record with 195 honorees. The last time UNM didn’t lead the Mountain West was in 2011-12, when Boise State had 151 honorees to UNM’s 148. The 200 selections for the Lobos topped its previous high-water mark of 199, set in the 2015-16 academic year.
Four programs, baseball, men’s golf, women’s golf, and women’s tennis, led the league in the respective sports. For baseball, the program’s 19 honorees were the second-most in program history, behind last year’s Mountain West record 21. The 40 honorees in the past two seasons is a program record, and UNM’s streak of double-figure All-Academic selections in baseball moved to six straight years. UNM and Fresno State both have the longest current Mountain West baseball streaks.
For men’s golf, the eight honorees tied its own program and Mountain West record, originally set by the Lobos in 2008-09 and tied by Fresno State in 2013-14. Alongside the men’s golf program was the women’s golf program. Its seven honorees established a program record, and it tied the Mountain West record for women’s golf teams, set by Wyoming in 2008-09 and then tied by Wyoming against in 2014-15.
UNM’s women’s tennis team had eight All-Academic picks to lead the league for the first time since the 2013-14 season, and it tied the program-high, set back in 2011-12.
Other notes from the Spring announcement highlighted men’s basketball, which finished tied for third in the league with five selections, softball tying for second in the league with 12 selections, men’s track and field finishing third in the league with 26 selections, and women’s track and field finishing with 26, the second-most in its history.
Counting the Fall, UNM led the league in six sports. Along with baseball, women’s golf, men’s golf and women’s tennis, UNM led in women’s cross country and volleyball. Overall, UNM finished in the top three in 11 of the 16 sport categories.