ABQ fan blog: UNM should play OU, Texas, etc.

[NMSooner'80]

(too bad its author didn't think about using paragraphs a bit more...)

"For Sports Speak Up;
Here we go again & see (I think) another weak upcoming Lobo Basketball schedule. Seems like every year we have mostly teams in there that we hope & pray will have good years to boost our RPI. Why don't we just start great regional rivalries with some of our heavyweight neighbors like Texas, Oklahoma, OK ST, Tulsa, Colorado, Arizona and Arizona St. then we don't have to worry about this anymore. NMSU, Texas Tech & UTEP are ok but not like these guys I just mentioned & they all border our state! I'm sure they would schedule home & home with us, we're so close and they'd bring in lots of their fans I'm sure. Now seeing this caliber of teams in The Pit or University Stadium for that matter would be great. Now that crybaby Olson is gone @ Arizona, let's begin with them. Coach Alford is doing a phenominal job and his teams can compete and WILL WIN our share against these teams. Also, what about Coach's Big Ten connections, schedule some of those overrated teams. We'll show them what Lobo Basketball and the MWC is all about. The MWC is not the "Rodney Dangerfield" (I get no respect!) conference anymore thanks to Utah footbal. Maybe we'll even get that Duke/North Carolina homie Dick Vitale back to The Pit! Coach Locksley, how about some of these teams coming to Univ. Statium also. A&M was a good start before your arrival. Get your Big Ten connections going too. Let's go Lobos, lets go out and beat some people! Then we'll get all the national pub & accolades we need! Come on Cass & Coaches, get with the program and lets beef it up! Let's go Big Time! GO LOBOS!!!! "

We have a guy at our Sooner Caravan (the last two years, we've had a "stop" in Albuquerque) ask various OU coaches why they don't have a home-and-home with the Lobos. The polite answer is always, "We'll look into it." The accurate answer would be, "Heck no - we have nothing to gain by it."

[John Kochtoston]

(too bad its author didn't think about using paragraphs a bit more...)


We have a guy at our Sooner Caravan (the last two years, we've had a "stop" in Albuquerque) ask various OU coaches why they don't have a home-and-home with the Lobos. The polite answer is always, "We'll look into it." The accurate answer would be, "Heck no - we have nothing to gain by it."

In football, we'd have little to gain from it. Basketball might be a bit more of an even shake, though, frankly, OU's passed UNM in hoops as well.

[badger]

The way you rake in money for games is the bigtime matchups, not the lightweigths of the... um... they're Sun Belt Division, right? Well, whatever conference they're from, it's filled with lightweights :D

New Mexico should start with Arizona or Arizona State first (preferably Arizona, because it can be a border war or sorts then). Then, perhaps they could look to their other border and schedule a west-ish Texaz school like UTEP or Tex Tech.

It would also be viable to schedule the bigtime state schools to the north of them, such as Utah, BYU and Nevada (or UNLV)

If they were to establish themselves as a premiere program after these type of matchups first, THEN maybe Tex or OU would be interested in starting a cross-state rivalry of sorts. As it is now... well, I don't care about UNM. Do any of you?

[NMSooner'80]

The way you rake in money for games is the bigtime matchups, not the lightweigths of the... um... they're Sun Belt Division, right? Well, whatever conference they're from, it's filled with lightweights :D

New Mexico should start with Arizona or Arizona State first (preferably Arizona, because it can be a border war or sorts then). Then, perhaps they could look to their other border and schedule a west-ish Texaz school like UTEP or Tex Tech.

It would also be viable to schedule the bigtime state schools to the north of them, such as Utah, BYU and Nevada (or UNLV)

If they were to establish themselves as a premiere program after these type of matchups first, THEN maybe Tex or OU would be interested in starting a cross-state rivalry of sorts. As it is now... well, I don't care about UNM. Do any of you?


UNM was co-champion of the Mountain West (with Utah) this past season. They used to play Arizona when they were all on the WAC every year. Arizona did play them home-and-home a few times between 1988-99, but they only won at the Pit once in four tries. That's why it's so risky to play them out here.

They do play Tech off and on, and have been playing UTEP recently. Their current league does include BYU, Utah, UNLV, Wyoming, San Diego State, Colorado State and Air Force.

The point of posting it was to show how odd it is that people here think it's that easy to get "big-name" teams to play out here in Albuquerque. It was that much tougher in the mid-to-late 1990's when UNM was probably better than everyone in the Big 12 except for KU and maybe OU and OSU at times. I'm sort of glad OU didn't play them between 1993-99, except for maybe 1995. They were really good then, but very underappreciated in Albuquerque for reasons that still baffle me.

[badger]

I have visited New Mexico and it's a very nice summery climate. It is surprising to me that the state between Arizona and Texas hasn't really stepped into the mainstream yet with some sports or some top venues... you know, something other than aliens :D

The Mountain West is probably the closest non-BCS conference to becoming a BCS conference... but lest we forget Conference USA, that tried to make the same claim before losing half their teams and not being able to get a handful of NCAA tourney bids anymore.

[stoopified]

New Mexico? Who dat ? :D

[NMSooner'80]

New Mexico? Who dat ? :D

The school that OU beat, 120-100, in Norman in February of '88, and then edged, 100-96, in December of '88, in Albuquerque. It's also the team that suited up the guy who got posterized by Harvey Grant in Norman that day.

http://i92.photobucket.com/albums/l38/BootsRabb/My%20OU%20sports%20pix/GrantOverRobbins.jpg

[bluedogok]

My grandparents had Lobo season tickets when they lived in Albuquerque in the early 70's, they were big basketball fans. They loved the OCU games at Fredrickson Fieldhouse when they moved to OKC in the mid-70's and the All College when it was still a tournament.

[boomersooner28]

I have no opinion on the subject. Thought I would share that. :D