Post-Game Notes
Feb. 21, 2005
Recap |
Final Stats |
Quotes
With the win over Utah, New Mexico earns its third straight victory and sixth in its last seven games…the Lobos notched their third straight win over Utah in Albuqurque…it’s the seventh conference win, the most since finishing 9-5 in 1999-2000, the first year of the Mountain West Conference…UNM notched its 20th win on the season, reaching that plateau for the 20th time in school history, but first since 2000-01 (21-13)…New Mexico is now 17-1 in The Pit this year with the only loss coming against nationally-ranked Wake Forest…the 17 home wins are the most since the 1998-99 team finished 19-1…the Lobos have captured 28 of their past 31 at Bob King Court…head coach Ritchie McKay now has the highest season win total of his nine-year coaching career and evened his career record at 127-127, including 44-38 at New Mexico.
Tonight marked the 31st time the Lobos have faced a nationally-ranked Utah team…UNM is 10-21 in those games, but has captured six of the past seven meetings in The Pit since taking the 1996 Western Athletic Conference title…New Mexico improved to 33-28 all-time in The Pit against ranked opponents (48-108 overall)…the upset over the ranked foe was the Lobos’ second in their last seven tries against ranked foes…the last win being 76-69 over 22nd-ranked Utah in The Pit on March 1, 2003…this is the highest ranked team UNM has defeated since a 70-68 triumph at No. 2 Arizona on Dec. 21, 1999.
Utah had its 18-game winning streak snapped, falling for the first time since a 67-62 setback at Arizona on Dec. 11, 2004…the Utes shot a season-low 36.7% (22-60), including 4-21 from 3-point range (19%)…the Utes entered the game ranked 2nd in the Mountain West behind UNM, shooting 38.9% as a team from three-point range…it two games versus New Mexico this year, Utah hit just 5-29 (17.2%) from beyond the arc…the 65 UNM points were the most points Utah has allowed in 15 games (92-76 win at Cal-Poly)
Junior guard Mark Walters finished with a season-high 22 points, one shy of his career-high 23, on 7-11 shooting, including 3-6 from beyond the arc…he had 11 points on 4-8 shooting from the floor in the 1st half…Walters had attempted eleven shots and scored 18 points over the last four games combined…his three threes were the most since also hitting three on Dec. 4 at New Mexico State…he had been 1-4 from three-point range in his last 4 games.
New Mexico tied its season-low with 8 turnovers, including a mere 2 in the first half…the Lobos had just 4 miscues in last year’s 70-54 win over Utah at The Pit.
Danny Granger just missed a double-double with 15 points and 9 rebounds…Granger also tallied 3 blocks, moving past Jimmy Allen (79, 1977-78) into 8th place all-time at UNM with 81 career rejections..
Senior forward Alfred Neale tied a season-high with 9 rebounds to go along with his 8 points, including a pair of put-back dunks.
New Mexico started 5-6 from the floor in the opening 4:13 of the first half… but then missed 11 of it’s next 13 in the following 8 minutes…Utah went 3:51 without a field goal to open the game and had a 3:09 FG drought to open the second half…UNM endured two scoring droughts of nearly five minutes apiece in the first half…New Mexico the Lobos used a 12-2 run over a 4-minute span to stake a16-point (58-42) lead with 3:09 remaining in the game…UNM trailed just once, for three minutes in the first half.