New Mexico Lobos Men’s Basketball — On The Road
Who: New Mexico Lobos (4-3) at Valparaiso (8-1)
When/Where: 6 p.m. (MT), Saturday – Athletics Recreation Center (5,400)
On The Air: ESPN3; 770-AM KKOB/Lobo Radio Network
GoLobos.com: Game Story, LoboTV, Complete Stats, Quotes
By Richard Stevens – Senior Writer/GoLobos.com
You need to take the Valparaiso Crusaders seriously. Sure, they play in the Horizon League and probably a lot of folks in New Mexico have no idea where Valparaiso is located. Google it.
And, yes, the Crusaders play in a recreation center, but that center has a nickname just like the Lobos’ WisePies Arena (The Pit). It’s called the ARC and the Crusaders defend it fiercely.
But Lobo fans need to push all that stuff aside and pay attention to the Crusaders’ record. They are 8-1. They are on a seven-game win streak. They return to their ARC for the first time in almost three weeks and they are hungry to smash down these visiting Lobos.
“We know the challenge ahead of us,” said Lobo Coach Craig Neal. “Valparaiso isn’t 8-1 by accident. They have a talented team that obviously is playing well and we need to be focused for this game.”
The Lobos showed great focus in the final 30 minutes of their impressive 57-44 win Wednesday night in WisePies Arena over the New Mexico State Aggies. The Lobos put the foot to the pedal, played solid defense, and frustrated NMSU with a tight, aggressive 2-3 zone.
The Lobos have shown the ability and the versatility to play solid defense both out of a zone and in a man-to-man attack. They also have shown a few cracks.
You don’t want to give the Crusaders any cracks. They are playing well. They used a 13-0 run to post a 72-66 win over Eastern Kentucky in Valparaiso’s last outing. The win was noteworthy because the Crusaders snapped EKU’s 25-game, non-conference home-court winning streak.
That game also gave the Lobos a target. The Crusaders got 21 points from Alec Peters off seven 3-pointers. Peters also was named the Horizon League Player of the Week by College Sports Madness for a second straight week after his MVP performance at the Challenge in Music City. In that tournament, Peters averaged 18.7 points and 5.7 rebounds. He shot 53 percent from the field and 10-of-17 from 3-point range.
Peters leads the Crusaders in scoring with a 19.4 average. He is hot. The Crusaders are hot. Valparaiso has won six of seven games by double digits. Their lone loss was 56-41 at Missouri.
Assuming UNM can take the long shot away from Peters – a tough chore since Peters is 6-foot-9 – the Crusaders will need to establish some inside punch against Neal’s long and lean Lobos. Obviously, Peters can score inside, too.
Valparaiso has some depth. There are eight Crusaders averaging between 4.7 and 19.4 points. Darian Walker, a 6-3 guard, averages 11.9 points. Tevonn Walker, a 6-1 guard, hits at a 10.0 clip. There is good size inside in 6-10 Vashil Fernandez, who averages 6.8 points and a team-high 6.6 boards per game. The Crusaders also get productive minutes inside from of 6-8 David Skara and 6-7 Jubril Adekoya.
Peters is the Crusader to watch and try to control. As a freshman last year, he scored in double figures in 20 of 34 games. He had highs of 30, 30 and 29 points. His inside-outside touch makes him a tough player to defend. The Crusaders have scored 90-plus points four times, but this is not a team that leans simply to the offense to win games.
“We’ve got a lot of guys on this team that can score points, but we’ve been working very hard on defense this year,” said point guard Keith Carter, who along with Tevonn Walker might get the defensive assignment of stopping UNM’s Hugh Greenwood. Carter averages 7.3 points and has 37 assists in nine games.
Says head coach Bryce Drew: “We’re more of a defensive team. It’s our defense that really helps lead to our offense getting on track.”
The Lobos look to do the same thing. The Lobos have yet to establish a dominant inside game or even a go-to inside scorer and they do well in transition.
The Lobos are led in scoring by Deshawn Delaney with a 13.0 average. Delaney is one of those Lobos who can damage a team in the open court. Greenwood averages 10.6 points. The 7-1 Obij Aget tops UNM in board work with a 6.1 average followed by Delaney at 5.7.
The Crusaders and Lobos have played twice in program history with New Mexico winning both games. Valpo fell 65-52 to New Mexico in WisePies Arena on Dec. 8, 2012. Greenwood and Valpo’s Fernandez are the only current players who played in that game.
Editor’s Note: Richard Stevens is a former national award-winning Sports Columnist and Associate Sports Editor at The Albuquerque Tribune. You can reach him at rstevens50@comcast.net.