It feels so long ago that we were heading into the 2015 football season with program that hadn’t won more than four games in a season since 2007, looking at the schedule to try to see if we could squint and find a path towards bowl eligibility. There was certainly some optimism around the team last year, but it was a cautious optimism, and an optimism that seemed to rely on the Lobos winning specific games early in the season. For some, that optimism was crushed in just the second game, where they were outgunned by a Tulsa team that – although they ultimately made a bowl game – appeared to be one of the more likely wins on the schedule. For others, the optimism faded away when they lost a winnable game on the road to San Jose State, dropping their record to 4-4 going into the most difficult stretch of their schedule.

Instead of faltering down the stretch, however, the Lobos rose to the challenge, scoring big wins against Utah State, Boise State, and Air Force to not only secure bowl eligibility, but a winning record for the season. In fact, they were even in the hunt to win their division until late in the season. They were rewarded with their first bowl appearance in almost a decade, where they hung tight with a good Arizona squad before their comeback attempt fell short. Over 30,000 attended that bowl game and what they saw – what I saw – was a program reinvigorated. They are no longer the punchlines they were when Coach Davie took over, but a program that has earned the right to not just have optimism surrounding it, but actual expectations.

So with that, here are some thoughts about the team going into this 2016 season:

A Team with Depth

It’s no secret that when Bob Davie was named head coach of the Lobos, the cupboard was pretty barren. Although he did an impressive job of stitching a competitive roster together, for years he had to rely on true freshmen and junior college transfers to plug in holes, as there just wasn’t much depth in the program. If pretty much any starter got hurt, there was a significant drop-off. Those days are starting to look like they’re gone now. For one, there are enough quality players on the roster now that incoming players are now actually able to redshirt for a season to develop, a luxury that the program didn’t have even a few years ago. On top of that, there has been enough of an influx of talent that the team may have multiple starters serving as reserves this year, which should help lessen the risk of injuries. That’s a really good sign, as it shows that this truly is a program, not just a year-to-year team.

The defense, in particular, has more talent on the roster than they’ve had for years. 10 starters from last year’s defense are returning, which gives me confidence that a much-improved unit last season can take another step forward. The offense took more of a hit, particularly losing 3/5 of the starting offensive line and running back Jhurell Pressley, but between the players already in the fold and the new junior college transfers, it seems as though that unit should be able to weather the storm. I’m optimistic that both sides of the ball will take a step forward this year, which would give them a good chance of reaching their goals for the season.

Quarterback Situation

Last year in my game previews, I had an unintentionally recurring section where I was trying to figure out what was going on at quarterback. This year, it looks like the situation will again be fluid, but more intentionally, I suppose. Lamar Jordan and Austin Apodaca both had seasons full of highs and lows, neither staking claim to the QB1 position nor eliminating themselves from the competition.

To their credit, they never really seemed to complain about having to share the position and they were always supportive of each other. It’s a testament to how they haven’t let this create a divide among the team that both were selected as team captains this year. I can’t imagine that’s happened too often in college football.

So will this whole two-headed-monster approach be a success this season? Hopefully! Apodaca showed some talent running the ball last year and Jordan has been improving as a passer each season, so there’s a chance that we’ll see more diversity in the play calls for each player. Plus, this has basically been the plan, as far as I can tell, all offseason, which means that they’ve been practicing how they’re going to share the position for months now. There’s also the chance that one of them will become the clear starter, but after last season, I’m expecting to see plenty of both of them.

Impressing the Power Five

There’s been a lot of chatter about the potential Big 12 expansion – we even wrote about it a couple of weeks ago – and in general, the main reason that anyone scoffs at the idea of UNM being a strong candidate is because of their recent football history. Last season was a strong step forward, but that improvement needs to continue. Not because it’s going to matter for this round of expansion – it’s far too late for that – but because it could end up mattering whenever the next round occurs. Football programs grow through momentum and right now, the Lobos actually have some. They have an opportunity this year to keep things going and, hopefully soon, become a perennial contender in the conference and a regular invitee to bowl games.

I don’t think that it’s a stretch to say that if the Lobos are going to ever be nationally competitive, certainly in football but potentially in other sports, they’ll need to be in one of the Power Five conferences. And like it or not, football is king right now. As much as I like to think that university presidents would look into other factors when they’re considering expansion, my guess is that the TV networks are way more interested in adding a splashy name, and we’re just not that right now. But we do have potential and we are on the right track, but continuing to move forward this season could be critical towards the long-term health of the program.

Quest for a Bowl Game, 2016

Last year, I wondered how realistic it would be for the Lobos to make a bowl game, based on their schedule. This year, even before we look at the schedule, we know that it is realistic for them to do it. However, after looking at the schedule, making a bowl game isn’t just realistic, it’s the expectation.

Date	Opponent	2015 Record	2015 FEI Rank
9/1/16	South Dakota	5-6	N/A
9/10/16	@NMSU	3-9	117
9/17/16	@Rutgers	4-8	100
10/1/16	San Jose State	6-7	92
10/7/16	Boise State	9-4	37
10/15/16	@Air Force	8-6	68
10/22/16	ULM	2-11	113
10/29/16	@Hawai’i	3-10	122
11/5/16	Nevada	7-6	95
11/12/16	@Utah State	6-7	55
11/19/16	@Colorado State	7-6	88
11/26/16	Wyoming	2-10	118

 

As we can see, there are only four teams on the schedule that had a winning record last year and only five teams that were ranked higher in the FEI ratings than the Lobos (who were the 94^th ranked team). The picture is even clearer when we look at the final offensive and defensive FEI ratings for all of the teams in the FBS last year, with the Lobos shown in red and this year’s opponents shown in blue.

In this plot, we see that there are a few teams that clearly had better final rating, three that had pretty similar ratings, and five that had considerably worse ratings than the Lobos. And that doesn’t even include South Dakota, as they’re an FCS team. (It’s also worth noting that the Lobos were just slightly below average on both offense and defense, so improvements in both of those areas could turn the Lobos into a very competitive team).

Finally, another thing we can do is try to simulate how the season might go. On ESPN.com, they use their proprietary metric FPI to estimate what the probability is that each team will win a given matchup. They have their projections for this season up already, which can be found here. Now, if we make some naïve assumptions, namely that the outcome of each game is independent and these probabilities are actually accurate, we can use the probabilities to estimate how likely it is for the Lobos to win a given number of games. To do this, we simulate 10,000 seasons where the probability of the Lobos winning a particular game is given by ESPN’s estimated probabilities based on FPI. Then, for each possible win total, 0 to 12, we see what percentage of the simulated seasons had that win total. The results can be found in the plot below.

From this exercise, it appears as though the Lobos have a really good chance of being bowl eligible again. In fact, 72.8% of the simulated season had them winning at least six games, as marked by the red bars in the plot. This just reiterates to me that the Lobos are no longer in the situation where we simply hope that they can make a bowl game, we now expect them to.

Of course, the games are played on the field, not on my laptop, and it feels like so many things can happen this year, both good and bad. But even with that range of possible outcomes, I’m not sure that what I’m feeling about this season is optimism; it’s confidence.