After a convincing, comfortable win against Western New Mexico in their first exhibition game, the Lobos will put the finishing touches on their preseason by hosting New Mexico Highlands. The first game was a great coming-out party for the freshmen and also was a good display of the level of talent that this team has from top to bottom. This game should be more of the same, mostly serving as a great chance to get to know the entire roster.
Against D-II WNMU, the Lobos simply dominated on their way to a 78-41 victory. Even without Khadijah Shumpert, the team had no problem scoring the ball, pulling down rebounds, and playing defense. All 12 Lobos that played got at least 10 minutes and each of them scored. They were led in scoring by two freshmen, Jaisa Nunn and Jannon Otto. Jaisa ended up with 18 points, 7 rebounds, and 2 steals in 23 minutes while Jannon had 12 points, 3 rebounds, and a steal in 15 minutes. Kianna Keller also had a nice game, with 6 points, 10 rebounds, and 5 blocks. If there was one weakness that the team showed on Wednesday, it was their three point shooting. The team only went 2-14 for 14.3%, with Cherise Beynon and Emily Lines having the only makes. That will certainly need to be better when they’re playing tougher competition, but I think that they’ll be fine.
NMHU is another D-II team from the RMAC conference, just like CSU-Pueblo and WNMU. Unlike WNMU, who is expected to finish in the middle of the pack for the conference, NMHU is expected to be towards the bottom. They were picked 14th out of 16 in the RMAC preseason poll, which seems fair for a team that finished 12th out of 14 last season and lost three of their starters. The returning starters are junior guard Giulla Simoni and senior forward Brittany Brown, both of whom are threats to make shots from downtown. In fact, all of their starters look to be threats to score from three point range. They’ll need to do so, as they are giving up a lot of height to the Lobos.
The Lobos won their first exhibition game so easily because they were able to take advantage of the size differential and dominate inside. The Lobos outscored WNMU in the paint 56-12, outrebounded them 43-25, and outblocked them 10-2. By the looks of it, it wouldn’t be a surprise if they put up similar numbers. As far as tonight’s rotation, I don’t know if Khadijah will be recovered from her illness in time for this game, but I’m sure that she’ll be ready for the season either way. The other Lobos should all see plenty of playing time and plenty of opportunities to prove to Coach Sanchez that they deserve to be in the rotation once the season starts. Although Jaisa had a great game earlier this week, my guess is that we’ll see basically the same starting lineup if Khadijah is out. However, if Jaisa keeps playing as well as she did against WNMU, it’s going to be hard to keep her out of the starting lineup for long.