UNM ready to pull back curtain on 2023-24 Lobo men's basketball season

The Pit was mostly empty around 1:30 p.m. Wednesday.

The UNM Lobo men's basketball team was upstairs in a film room going over offensive sets while a few reporters waited for them to practice on the eve of their exhibition opener for the highly anticipated 2023-24 season.

And in that moment, as Bob King Court sat open and free of distractions, four men who truly run the show behind the scenes for Lobo basketball seized their moment.

Like a well-oiled NASCAR pit crew — a true Pit crew in this case — Nate Castillo, Logan Russell, Lucas Loe and Aaron Ortiz stood at the end of the Lobos team bench and quickly sprinted with small folding chairs in hand, circling a spot on the court a few feet in front of the bench where the Lobos will be assembling during timeouts this season, placing the six folding chairs in their designated spots — one for head coach Richard Pitino and five for the Lobos who are in the game at that particular time.

Yes, Wednesday was the final dress rehearsal for everyone around the Lobo men's basketball team, even the team managers.

Thursday, at 7 p.m., though just an exhibition game against Division II CSU-Pueblo, the Lobos will pull back the curtain for all to see this year's team.

"Excited. Been waiting for this," said new Lobo Mustapha Amzil, a transfer forward from Dayton. "Every time — I feel like a kid when the season is about to start and is just around the corner. It's a good feeling. Excited to see how the fans are. I've heard a lot of good things from other people (about the Pit fans)."

Amid the Lobos' practice in the Pit on Wednesday, third-year coach Richard Pitino looked like a much better coach than he did any other time this preseason for one specific reason: His starting center — Nelly Junior Joseph — practiced for the first time with the Lobos.

The 6-foot-10 transfer from Iona arrived in Albuquerque just Tuesday evening after a student visa issue delayed his return to the United States from a summer trip home to his native Nigeria.

"Basically, over the summer he wanted to get his visa renewed," said Pitino of Junior Joseph, who played in an international tournament in Toronto in July before traveling home to Nigeria, where he's been waiting for this visa to get approved since.

"He wanted to go home and see his family, he wanted to play for his national team. I felt like (those) requests were reasonable," Pitino said in an attempt to explain how the situation unfolded. "Do I have intimate knowledge of the Nigerian Consulate? No, I do not. I have way more knowledge now…

"It was just a long process that we couldn't speed up. It was not a questions to answer (or) submit more information matter. It wasn't any of that. We had no communication with anybody for two months. So, that was just the reality of it. And it just when they did communicate with us, it was a quick process but for that two months it was not."

This wasn't the first time Junior Joseph's experienced a visa delay from Nigeria, either. In 2020, he did not arrive on Iona's campus until Oct. 29.

Pitino said he would have regular 5 a.m. "coffee with Nelly" Facetime calls for much of the past couple months, checking in regularly to keep his spirits up and to make sure he was on top of his classes (Junior Joseph was able to take online classes at UNM).

The offices of U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-N.M. and Rep. Melanie Stansbury, D-N.M., were among entities outside of UNM that did try to assist the university to speed up the process in recent weeks, something UNM Athletic Director Eddie Nuñez said Lobo Athletics was immensely grateful for.

Pitino expects Junior Joseph to play Thursday night, though it was clear in Wednesday's practice that while he looked in fine shape, he has a steep curve to learning plays and concepts.

OH CAPTAIN(S), MY CAPTAIN(S): A player vote led to the naming of three team captains this season: returning all-conference guard Jaelen House and Jamal Mashburn Jr., each in their third season with the Lobos, and Fresno State transfer Jemarl Baker Jr., a guard who is in his seventh college season thanks in part to numerous injuries and a COVID season.

The 6-5 Baker, who already has a bachelor's degree in communications from the University of Arizona and a master's degree in curriculum and instruction from Fresno State, quickly became a veteran presence in the locker room over the summer.

INJURY FRONT: A leg injury will keep House out of Thursday's exhibition game and freshman Donovan Dent will start in his place. Neither House nor Texas A&M-Corpus Christi transfer forward Isaac Mushila, who broke his hand in practice earlier this month, practiced on Wednesday.

Mushila had his cast removed and might be ready to go by the first week of the season (the season opener is Nov. 6 in the Pit vs. Texas Southern with the second game coming Nov. 9 at No. 23 Saint Mary's).

SWEDEN VS. FINLAND: Asked Wednesday if there was any rivalry in the locker room between new forward Amzil, from Finland, and Sebastian Forsling, the third-year center from Sweden, Amzil deadpanned a rather surprising answer.

"Yeah, we don't get along. He's Swedish. We don't like them," Amzil said, no smile present on his face.

As Wednesday was the first time the transfer from Dayton had talked with local media, there was a moment of uncertainty while Amzil joked about his teammate from a neighboring Scandinavian country before cracking a smile.

"No, he's a good guy. He's funny," Amzil said, adding he doesn't know Swedish, "just a few cuss words, that's it."

The two have played against each other in international competition through the years as both are a part of the national team program in their respective home countries.

Photos: UNM men's basketball practices at the Pit