Rite of spring? UNM, SDSU women battle in Mountain West quarterfinals for fourth straight (!) year

Rites of spring, anyone? Yes, there are still a few certainties that people can rely on come March.

Among them:

- Folks will grumble about setting their clocks forward for the onset of daylight savings time.

- Power conference teams will get nearly all the breaks when NCAA basketball brackets are determined.

- The University of New Mexico women’s basketball team will face San Diego State at the Mountain West tournament.

True, the final one is not yet quite as certain as the sun rising in the east, but it is starting to feel almost inevitable. The Lobos and Aztecs will tip off in a 3:30 p.m. (MDT) MWC tournament quarterfinal Monday at UNLV’s Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas, Nevada. It’s the fourth straight year UNM and SDSU have battled in the quarterfinals.

For Lobos senior Viané Cumber, playing the Aztecs is indeed a rite of spring.

“I don’t want to say it’s rigged,” Cumber said, “but it’s crazy how we end up playing them four years in a row. I mean, what are the odds?”

With 11 schools in the Mountain West, the odds certainly don’t favor four straight quarterfinal matchups between the same two teams. But people around the Pit and Viejas Arena say they’re not surprised.

“That’s who we play,” UNM coach Mike Bradbury said. “I could’ve told you this back in January. If we finish second, they finish seventh. If we finish third, they finish sixth. We draw each other. That’s just the way it is.”

SDSU coach Stacie Terry-Hutson chuckled when asked about the matchup in a media conference this week.

“New Mexico knows us very well and we know them very well,” she said. “We seem to play them three times every year.”

True enough. Monday’s meeting will be the 14th between UNM and SDSU since the Mountain West tournament began in 2000 — meaning they’ll have battled in more than half of the annual tournaments, by far the most of any two foes. (Colorado State and Wyoming have met nine times).

Monday’s game will also be the 80th overall between the Lobos (18-13, 11-7) and Aztecs (22-9, 11-7). UNM leads the series 42-37 and is 8-5 against the Aztecs in MWC tournament play. The teams split their two championship matchups with New Mexico winning in 2008 and SDSU coming out on top in 2012.

Fresher in the memory banks are the grinding Lobos-Aztecs quarterfinal battles over the last three years. Here is a quick summary.

2022: UNM 63, SDSU 60 — Jaedyn De La Cerda scores 26 points, including two free throws with 5 seconds left, for the Lobos. SDSU’s Sophia Ramos misses a 3-point try at the buzzer.

2023: SDSU 69, UNM 68 — Asia Avinger’s steal and jumper with 47 seconds left gives the Aztecs a one-point lead. Aniyah Augmon misses a potential go-ahead layup with 2 seconds left.

2024: SDSU 67, UNM 56 — Kim Villalobos goes for 12 points and 14 rebounds as the Aztecs pull away in the second half. UNM goes 3-for-17 from 3-point range and gets outrebounded 45-25.

BEATING EXPECTATIONS: New Mexico has gone through its share of ups and downs in 2024-25, but Bradbury called it one of the most rewarding seasons he’s experienced.

“Fifty weeks ago at this time we had four players on our team,” he said. “ ... We brought in kids from all over the world, all over the country and it took a while, but we got them together, playing for each other. They’re great kids, fun to be around and under the circumstances, I’d call this the most successful year we’ve had since I’ve been here.”

UNM lost 10 players from last season’s roster for various reasons. Two had graduated and opted to forego their final seasons of eligibility, one elected to focus on academics at UNM, and seven entered the transfer portal. Some transferred to seek additional playing time elsewhere, while others were lured by more lucrative NIL (name, image and likeness) deals.

NIL payments are not funded by schools and amounts provided to student-athletes are not made publicly available. Still, Bradbury says UNM ranked “near the bottom” of the Mountain West in terms of NIL for women’s basketball last season.

“We talk to recruits, parents and coaches about (NIL),” he said. “We know what everyone is getting. We were definitely at a disadvantage last year.”

Things will be different moving forward thanks to a pending court ruling that will allow schools to share sports revenues with student-athletes. The amount will be capped at $20.5 million per school in 2025 and could increase in the future.

Schools including UNM have not yet disclosed how much revenue they will share with student-athletes or how those sums will be divided. Bradbury hopes the new landscape will help UNM attract and retain women’s basketball players.

“I think it will be better,” he said. “It’s up to schools to decide how much they put into NIL and how they choose to split it up. Hopefully, this will make us more competitive as far as recruiting and keeping players. If it does, we’ll be right in the mix every year.”