Lobos Open Mountain West Play in Vegas vs. UNLV
New Mexico Game Notes | UNLV Game Notes | Mountain West Game Notes
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The New Mexico Lobos head into Saturday’s Mountain West opening clash with UNLV without its starting quarterback, coming off a game in which the team felt they let get away against an like-caliber FBS team. It enters Saturday with a junior college transfer quarterback who started out at an Autonomous 5 school. Funny thing … UNLV can type that exact paragraph.
It’s a matchup of two similar teams in similar situations, both wanting to jump out to a 1-0 conference start as the New Mexico Lobos (2-2, 0-0 MW) and the UNLV Rebels (2-2, 0-0 MW) meet at Sam Boyd Stadium in Las Vegas, Nevada on Saturday at 1 p.m. Pacific, 2 p.m. Mountain time in the league opener for both teams. The game will be broadcast on AT&T Sports Network with Colorado Rockies front man Drew Goodman on the call along with AFL Hall of Famer Sed Bonner, with Brad Thompson roaming the sidelines. The game will of course be on the Lobo Radio Network with Voice of the Lobos Robert Portnoy on the call, along with UNM Hall of Honor recipient DonTrell Moore assisting.
The Lobos are coming off a game in which they fell behind 42-10 at the break but whittled that lead all the way down to 49-43 with five minutes to go, before ultimately falling 52-43 to Liberty University. The Rebels are coming off a 27-20 loss in the rain at Arkansas State, a game they led in the fourth quarter.
For the Lobos, it will be Sheriron Jones, who started the season as UNM’s third string quarterback after a hamstring injury knocked him out of two weeks of camp leading up the season opener. Jones is the only quarterback to have played in all four games, and he leads UNM in yards and touchdowns. “It is Sheriron now,” said Davie on Tuesday, “so the package (on offense) gets tweaked a little bit more than it would have been in Las Cruces, because it’s now more than a one-game thing.”
Jones nearly led one of the greatest comebacks in school, and NCAA history, throwing for over 300 yards and four touchdowns in basically a half of football against Liberty. While UNM isn’t with its season opening quarterback, neither is UNLV, as the dangerous Armani Rogers was injured in UNLV’s 27-20 loss to Arkansas State, paving the way for Max Gilliam to make his first UNLV start. Like Jones, Gilliam started at a big school (Cal), and then transferred to a JC before ending up in the Mountain West. Gilliam is just 1-1 passing this season, but he led his JC to a 7-3 mark last year.
NOTES: On battle to watch is the punt return battle for both teams, as both have excellent punters. New Mexico has not returned a punt for a touchdown since August 31, 2002, a span of 201 games. UNLV hasn’t returned one since October 13, 2001, a span of 2003 games. (Rice has the longest drought at 247 games, since November 8, 1997)