We are live from media row, next to Albuquerque Journal’s beat writers for men’s and women’s basketball. Geoff Grammer and the radio guys have improved their seating from the regular season game against UNLV. I will update this blog throughout the game and do this for every game the Lobos play in the Mountain West Tournament.
The 6-seed Lobos (22-9 and 10-8 in MW play) is set to take on the 11-seed Air Force Falcons (9-21 and 2-16 in MW play) and will battle for a spot in the Quarterfinals of the MW Tournament to take on the 3-seed Boise State Broncos. These two teams split the regular season match-ups with both teams winning on the road. AFA also beat UNLV in this building earlier this year. Should be an interesting battle and we should have an idea of how it’ll play out relatively early.
Starters for the game tonight:
UNM: Donovan Dent, Jaelen House, Jamal Mashburn Jr., JT Toppin, and Nelly Junior Joseph.
AFA: Ethan Taylor, Beau Becker, Kellan Boylan, Jeffrey Mills, Rytis Petraitis.
We are all set for the opening tip. Very strong Lobo fan showing tonight.
15:29 1H: Lobos 10 AFA 7. Lobos have been able to get on the glass mostly Toppin to get on the board early. AFA has been about to get a couple of looks. This game is definitely at the pace the Lobos want it to be. If the Lobos can get out in the open court they should be able to create some separation and save some legs for tomorrow. But, as we saw with CSU and SJSU game, you have to get that lead or they will just gain confidence the longer they are in the game.
14:02 Lobos 16 AFA 7. Quick 6-0 run fueled by Dent and Toppin leads to a quick timeout called by Scott and AFA. Both players are putting on a show early.
11:06 Lobos 22 AFA 9. Petraitis finally ends the 12-0 run by the Lobos with an and1 before the media TO. He will have a FT after the TO. Lobos are looking good early in this one. PIT West is sounding like PIT West.
7:49 Lobos 29 AFA 15. House with a 3 and he is up to 9 first-half points. He is having a blast at the current moment, and the Lobos will gladly take a 14-point lead. Petraitis has been good for AFA with 9 early points.
3:50 Lobos 38 AFA 26. Can the Lobos grow this lead before the half?
Halftime: Lobos 49 AFA 30. House leads the way with 16 points including a 3 at the buzzer. Great first half for the Lobos.
14:32 Lobos 56 AFA 33. Great start to the second half. Toppin with all 7 points for the Lobos including a 3. Petraitis and Dent both have 3 fouls, which is a bigger deal for AFA down 23 points.
11:27 Lobos 60 AFA 35. Tru with a great finish for the and1 before the media TO, he will have a FT after the TO. I expect that we will see a heavy dose of the bench down the stretch with the 25-point lead.
7:34 Lobos 69 AFA 40. Toppin with a double-double, and we are about to see Pitino and company empty the bench.
Final: Lobos 82 AFA 56. Lobos take care of AFA and will move on to take on Boise State in the last game of the day on Thursday. Lobos move to 23-9 and will look to secure its first NCAA Tournament bid since 2014. We will see you tomorrow.