At the Roundhouse: Go Lobos

I’ll bet this place clears out early tonight.

No. 14 Lobos versus San Diego State, 8:15 p.m. (CBS Sports Network. Comcast 274. DirectTV 613. Dish 158). That’s why.

I’m not sure how many of New Mexico’s 112 legislators are UNM grads, (or Aggies, for that matter), but a bunch of them will be headed for TV sets and even the Pit soon after sunset.

Back at the ranch: A couple of committees labored into the night Tuesday.

One worked on a possible illegal immigrant driver’s license compromise, and another fretted over the state’s public employee pension problems.

Not as fun as watching the Lobos in the Pit, but it’s gotten to that point in the session.

House and Senate floor sessions are running long. Committees don’t start meeting until they’re done. Then it’s hours of testimony from all sides of the issue.

Game plan: Hard to tell how things are really going, although Democrats keep tabling key proposals from Republican Gov. Susana Martinez.

Last Saturday, it was her reading retention push. Last night, it was the compromise attempt on the long-running driver’s license debate.

It’s clear that the Legislature’s Democratic majorities, with whom Martinez has struggled for three years, have learned to take the initiative in proposing legislation.

It’s not clear, though, that they can get anything through Martinez, or even the Legislature’s own conservative-leaning Senate Finance Committee.

At the same time, the governor’s strategy is unclear, at least to me.

She seems to be keeping her cards closer to her chest than in previous years, issuing slightly critical but still noncommittal statements when the Ds slam-dunk one of her bills.

While Democrats were doing their thing in Santa Fe on Tuesday, it looked like the governor’s big public comment of the day was a speech in Albuquerque on improvement in New Mexico exports.

Scorecard: Even though Rep. Miguel Garcia’s House Labor and Human Resources Committee tabled a compromise on the illegal immigrant driver’s license issue, it looked like there still was a chance lawmakers could pick up the ball again and work something out.

The legislative session clock runs out March 16. I think anyone who tells you how things are going to turn out between the governor and the Democrats is probably blowing smoke.

And after reading about the Lobo’s Kendall Williams scoring 46 in that last game against Colorado State — 18 points in the last 6:02 with four fouls — I’ll say anything can happen.