Ad
UNM guard C.J. Noland thrilled to finally be living his NCAA Tournament dream
UNM basketball players C.J. Noland, second from left, and Mustapha Amzil, second from right, talk to each other Sunday during a watch party for the NCAA Tournament Selection Show in the Pit. Noland, a senior, will be playing in the Big Dance for the first time.
Published
Modified
Growing up the son of a baller and a hoops junkie, C.J. Noland has loved the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament for as long as he can remember.
Like the rest of us, he would find ways to watch as many games as he could, filling out brackets, pulling for those upsets.
"I was everywhere trying to pull it up on my phone, in the teachers lounge, trying to watch it on the TV. Anywhere I could find a little TV, I'm like, who's playing right now? What's the score?" Noland said. "So, I'm definitely a junkie in that regard, when it comes to that. And then when I get home, that's all I'm doing on the couch with pops, watching these games."
Noland won't get that chance this year.
And he couldn't be happier.
The Lobos' 6-foot-4 senior guard who transferred to UNM last spring for his final college season will be too busy preparing to play No. 7 Marquette on Friday in Cleveland in the opening round of the Big Dance — Noland's first time playing in the NCAA Tournament.
"Growing up as a kid, you dream of playing on stages like this. And I'm glad to finally get here," Noland said Tuesday in a conversation on Episode 99 of the Talking Grammer Podcast.
In Episode 99 of the Talking Grammer podcast I catch up with Lobo senior guard C.J. Noland, who this week is playing his first ever NCAA Tournament. We go through his journey from Texas to Oklahoma out of high school to the University of North Texas and then his transfer to UNM for his final season. We also talk about support — from fans, teammates, coaches and his family during his basketball career. (Content and production by Geoff Grammer/Albuquerque Journal)
Noland said he isn't going to take for granted any part of this week — starting with Sunday's surreal feeling of being one of the players sitting in front of the cameras for Sunday's NCAA Selection Show instead of being someone who watches other teams celebrate the moment they see their team's name pop up on the screen.
"It's special, because that's what you want when you're a little kid, when you're 10 years old, 12 years old, watching March Madness and watching all these players and like, dang. Like, that's where I want to go," he said.
A four-star recruit out of Waxahachie (Texas) High School, Noland played his first two college seasons at Oklahoma and third season at North Texas. His teams made the NIT all three of those years.
Ad
Noland decided he wanted to give UNM a try for his final run in college. Within a few months with his new team, Noland was voted by his teammates one of three team captains — a rarity for a newcomer to a program that is coming off an NCAA Tournament appearance.
"The reason I chose UNM, obviously, was because I wanted to play in front of a great fan base and I wanted to play in a great system with Coach (Richard) Pitino," Noland said. "But I wanted to play for a team that had a chance of winning … a conference title and then making the NCAA Tournament. So that was my main goal going to UNM — just making a tournament, and, you know, ultimately, just going somewhere special for my last year, doing something special."
Noland averaged 8.0 points and 1.1 steals in just under 21 minutes per game. His 32 3-pointers is third most on the team.
He played in 32 games this season for the Lobos, starting seven of them and being the top player off the bench in the other 25 — something Pitino, who regularly calls him the team's "sixth starter," has praised as an example of why this team's chemistry is so strong.
"We had been tinkering with starting lineups or whatever, and I brought him in to talk to him about," Pitino recalled. "'Hey, I'm going to bring you off the bench. And you know the reason I'm going to do it …' And he stopped me and said, 'I don't care coach. I just want to win.'
"So, you know, we don't have the year that we are having — you lose a guy like (Jamal) Mashburn Jr., to the portal, you lose a guy like (Jaelen) House (to graduation) — you needed to add a key guy.
"CJ is that."
