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Saturday, August 02, 2008

Alford Says Schedule Is Balanced

By Rick Wright
Journal Staff Writer
      Oral Roberts will visit the Pit and the Lobos will travel to Creighton, completing a nonconference schedule that UNM men's basketball coach Steve Alford calls a dramatic and badly needed improvement over last season's.
    "It's a very exciting schedule," Alford said Friday. "We wanted to upgrade from last year, and I think that's taken place."
    Last January, Alford's first UNM team entered Mountain West Conference play with a 13-2 record — but with a Ratings Percentage Index strength-of-schedule ranking of 245 (according to collegerpi.com).
    In contrast, only two of UNM's 14 nonconference opponents next season were ranked outside the top 50 of the RPI at the end of the '07-08 campaign. Eight were in the top 100.
    UNM will begin home-and-home series at Creighton (Nov. 16) and with Oral Roberts (Dec. 17). The Bluejays were 22-11 last season and finished the campaign with an RPI of 45. The ORU Golden Eagles were 24-9, with an RPI of 43.
    Perhaps more importantly, Creighton and ORU have been consistently strong programs. The Golden Eagles have won 89 games the past four seasons; the Bluejays have had an RPI of 50 or better each of those years.
    "Some RPI teams might be one way one year, and you can't really predict what they're going to be like the next year," Alford said. "So you really just try to get teams that traditionally are winning 18, 19, 20 games a year."
    The Lobos will continue existing home-and-home series at the Pit with Ole Miss and on the road against Texas Tech and the University of San Diego. They'll play four games in the Cancun Challenge — two in the Pit against Grambling and Northern Arizona, then in Mexico against Virginia Commonwealth and either Drake or Vanderbilt.
    The Cancun Challenge is an exempt tournament, meaning the four games will count as only one toward UNM's allotment of 28. Thus, the Lobos will play 31 games before beginning MWC tournament play in March.
    "We want to get in as many of these exempt tournaments as we can," Alford said. "It gives us a great chance to play good talent."
    Vanderbilt, a team the Lobos might get to play in Cancun on Nov. 30, finished with an RPI of 17 last season.
    Home games against Southeast Missouri State, Cal State Northridge, Southern Mississippi and UTEP and the traditional home-and-home with New Mexico State round out the Lobos' non-conference schedule.
    Southeast Missouri State and Grambling, UNM's first-night opponent in the Cancun Challenge, figure to be the major drags on the Lobos' strength of schedule. The Redhawks finished last season with an RPI of 287, the Tigers with 322.
    Alford said he's pleased with a change in the date of one of the New Mexico State games. Originally scheduled to play the first Aggie contest on Dec. 3, the Lobos will now play their intrastate rival in Albuquerque on Dec. 23 and in Las Cruces a week later.
    Alford said the original schedule had been front-loaded, with eight games in 19 days to start the season. Moving back the NMSU game, he said, strikes a better balance.
    Also, Alford said, the Lobos can go home for Christmas having played the Aggies on the 23rd.
    "Then, when they come back," he said, "we'll be preparing for the team that we just played."
    In addition to the two neutral-court games in Cancun, UNM will play nonconference road games at Creighton, San Diego, Texas Tech and New Mexico State.
    "We had five legit (non-league) road games last year," he said. "I don't really want to play five. ... Three or four is better."
   
    ALFORD: Nonconference slate should improve RPI
   
    See LOBOS' on PAGE C2
   
    From PAGE C1
   
    Lobos' Schedule Receives Necessary Upgrade
   
    Inside
    UNM's complete 2008-09 schedule
    C4
    C4

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