Four years ago tomorrow, Craig Neal was hired as the head coach for the New Mexico Lobos. In general, it was a well-regarded hire. Neal was thought of as somewhat of an offensive genius, a man who just needed a shot at a head-coaching job, and someone who knew and loved the program already. Beyond that, fans were wanting him to maintain the program that he had built with Steve Alford, especially with a very good returning team that, the thought was, only he could keep together. Because of that, it is somewhat ironic that Neal was let go in large part because he couldn’t keep his team together anymore.

I was one of those people who believed that Noodles was the right guy for the job when he was hired. And, quite frankly, those of us who held that belief were rewarded quickly, as he was able to maintain continuity and ride the combination of Cam Bairstow, Alex Kirk, Kendall Williams, and Hugh Greenwood to another conference tournament championship and a berth in the NCAA Tournament. I remember celebrating on the court of the Thomas and Mack Center with the team, thinking that Lobo basketball was here to stay, and I’m pretty sure I wasn’t alone in that feeling.

Some people might claim that anyone could have won with that group, but it is somewhat forgotten that aside from those four, only Pancake Thomas and Nick Banyard had seen any minutes in a Lobo jersey before that year. Plugging in even a few new players is difficult enough, so having success with seven new players is nothing to sneeze at, even if you have a good core to build around. Word on the street at the time was that I wasn’t the only one impressed with the job he did that year, as Neal was linked to several other jobs in the offseason. Likely thanks to those rumors, Neal was rewarded with a raise, a contract extension, and a hefty-for-UNM buyout.

The next year was a down year, to be sure, but from the outside, it felt more like a series of unfortunate events than anything else. Cullen Neal, who was expected to drive the offense, went down with a season-ending ankle injury early in the season and Jordan Goodman, who was – unfairly – expected to be the next breakout star for the Lobos, struggled with injuries all season as well. The team still held together pretty well for most of the year, even sitting at 6-3 in conference play at the halfway mark (14-7 overall) and looking like a surprise threat to win the conference tournament. In fact, given what he had to work with, that might have been the most impressive coaching job of his tenure.

Then, like it usually does, January turned into February. Usually that’s not a big deal, but for that Lobo team, it’s when the wheels completely fell off. They went 0-8 in the month, dropping completely out of the conference race and into the 8-9 play-in game in the conference tournament, which they lost to Air Force. There are plenty of reasons to explain why things went south so quickly: they were an inexperienced team (only Hugh had more than one season of D1 under his belt going into the year), injuries left them limited, and they were just getting worn out from a long season. In fact, at one point at the end of the year, I remember seeing Cullen, Elijah Brown, Jordan Goodman, Deshawn Delany, and Tim Williams in street clothes on the bench and thinking that those five could easily beat the team that was actually on the court. It was easy to chalk the season up to bad luck and move on from there.

But then 2015-16 was another tough year on the court, and so was 2016-17. In isolation, any of these three season felt explainable. Injuries, inexperience, and general bad luck seemed to plague the team each year and you can’t really control for those types of things. But what was more worrisome than the on-court struggles, which could be hand-waved away, were the things that were going on off the court. The whole Cullen incident, the midseason transfer hours before a game, the weird dynamic between the coach and his star player. Maybe those types of issues were there all along, as some assert is the case, but as time went on, they became harder and harder to ignore for even those of us with the most deeply-tinted cherry-colored glasses.

That all came to a head the past few weeks, when the Lobos had another disappointing end to the season, followed by a quick announcement that Noodles was to return next year. Some fans were livid, as they felt they had seen enough and that he just wasn’t the right guy for the job. Others, myself included, were on the fence, but thought that given the economic state of the program and the buyout that would be involved, it made sense that the school was reluctant to fire him. And who knows? Maybe, just maybe, he could turn things around.

Then the transfers started. First came the least surprising ones in Elijah Brown and Anthony Mathis. EB had his problems with Neal and, as a graduate transfer, had plenty of opportunities to play elsewhere, so his decision was a no-brainer. Mathis was in the doghouse for whatever reason and couldn’t even sniff the court when the team desperately needed someone who could shoot threes. Of course he was going to find other opportunities. But then Sam Logwood announced he was transferring. And so did Jalen Harris. Those announcements made less sense, as Sam was not only a regular starter, he would have to sit for a year to play a single year, which hurts his market value, to be sure. Jalen looked like he was going to be a big part of the program moving forward, potentially turning into an all-conference type of point guard, and he got plenty of playing time. When guys like those two start transferring, it’s hard for even the most die-hard supporter to not wonder what is going on with the program.

Beyond those four, both walk-ons, Adam Cumber and Holt Shelley, announced that they were leaving the program, and there were rumors of several other players choosing to move on as well. At a certain point, fans were hoping that some players would announce that they were coming back just so there could be some good news. The way things were going, you’d be hard-pressed to find a better example of a coach who had lost his team. And once that happens, it’s hard to get it back.

At this point, there were more arguments to fire Neal then there were to keep him. If the thought was that he’d get one more chance to make a post-season tournament, it became highly unlikely with such an exodus of talent, so why not save a year’s salary and move on now? If the question was about the buyout, fan anger and apathy made it clear that there was going to be a huge drop in attendance next season, which made it make more sense financially to pay the buyout than take the hit during the season. And if so many players keep leaving the program year in and year out, what else could the root cause be except for the head coach?

So, after just four years, Craig Neal is out as the head coach and the search is already underway for his replacement, which will truly start a new era of Lobo basketball. At this point, we don’t know if any of the players who announced they were leaving will chose to stay or if those who had been planning on staying will chose to leave, but I hope that they all come back next year. Regardless of any faults you can point to, Noodles did do a great job of bringing in high-quality people to play for him and I want to keep rooting for them in a Lobo jersey for years to come.