Lobos Take Down Southwest in Historic Hobbs Game
HOBBS, N.M. — The University of New Mexico men’s basketball team used a 31-point halftime lead to earn an eventual 103-47 victory over the University of the Southwest on Sunday afternoon in Hobbs at the historic Ralph Tasker Arena. The victory marks the first regular-season game of 2018-19 that the Lobos have amassed 100 points.
With the win, the Lobos improve to 6-6 on the season while USW falls to 3-9.
UNM was led by senior Anthony Mathis who dropped a game-high 18 points on six 3-pointers, followed by redshirt-sophomore Vance Jackson who tallied 16 that included three 3-pointers and a 6-for-10 mark from the field.
Mathis and Jackson were two of four Lobos to score in double figures including redshirt-junior Carlton Bragg (12) and freshman Tavian Percy (10). Percy’s 10 points and six rebounds marked career highs in a career-most 22 minutes on the floor.
All 12 players that suited up on Sunday entered the contest, including all four freshmen. Freshman Drue Drinnon tallied a career-high 12 assists with no turnovers to go along with seven points. Twelve assists in a single game is just one short of cracking the top 10 for most assists in a single game in program history. Classmate Jordan Arroyo netted a career-best six points. Redshirt-freshman and transfer Clay Patterson also saw the court marking his first appearance of the season.
The contest in Hobbs was an exciting one for Lobo fans as the night was full of history – along with a plethora of dunks, alley oops and even a behind-the-back pass down low from Drinnon to Arroyo. The Lobos rebounded from the Dec. 22 game against Penn in which they shot just 43.5 percent from the free throw line and demonstrated their proficiency from the stripe at a more-regular 77.8 percent (14-18).
On the defensive end, junior Karim Ezzeddine racked up a game-high 10 rebounds and nearly grabbed a double-double with eight points. UNM came down with the most boards of the season at 55.
“The reason we created this game was to merge our two basketball communities … there’s a lot of similarities,” head coach Paul Weir said. “I’m hoping this can be the start of a lot of good things, not only basketball-wise but community-wise, enrollment-wise … just good feelings between these two basketball communities.
“We’ve been making some schematic changes and this became a really good game for us to go out and continue to practice things that are new to us and almost give us an exhibition game kind of like it would be in the beginning of the season.”
The Lobos got out to a swift start, jumping out to a 10-point lead in just the first three minutes (12-2). The Mustangs netted their first four points of the game off of free throws but it wasn’t until the 12:53 mark that they registered their first field goal on a jumper in the paint by Chamar Morgan.
UNM made it a 20-point game on the first of two straight Dane Kuiper free throws at the 6:15 mark (33-13) and nearly made it a 30-point game on back-to-back threes from Mathis fueled by a Percy steal, 42-13 at the 4:34 mark.
A Drinnon three with 2:12 left in the first half finally put the Lobos ahead by 30 en route to a 31-point advantage at the break, 50-19.
Sunday’s game marks the first time the Lobos have scored 50 points in the first half since scoring 58 at Colorado State on Feb. 28, 2018. USW put up just 19 points in the first half, marking the first time since Dec. 27, 2017 that UNM has limited an opponent to 20 points or less in the first frame.
The Lobos continued the offensive dominance in the second half and went on a game-best 21-point run from the 14:02 mark to the 7:16 mark (86-31). The run lasted 21 points and the USW scoring drought lasted 6:46.
The Mustangs never overcame the 50+ point deficit and UNM finished with a final score of 103-47, allowing the final jumper by USW with just 37 seconds left on the clock.
On the day, the Lobos shot 48.1 percent from the floor, 36.1 percent from three, while Southwest shot at a rate of 30.4 percent from the floor and 36.4 from 3-point range.
UNM returns to action on Wednesday, Jan. 2 when it kicks off conference play on the road at Air Force at 7 p.m. MT.