UNM LOBOS BASKETBALL
Lobos add buy-game opponent to nonconference men's basketball schedule
UNM now has locked up 10 of 14 nonconfernece games
Published
The New Mexico Lobos on Monday announced a Nov. 25 home game against Mississippi Valley State.
The team now is coached by Mike Davis, the experienced Division I coach and one-time Indiana head coach, where he and UNM assistant Mike Roberts knew each other. Roberts is the person on staff who primarily handles UNM's men's basketball scheduling.
The game raises to 10 UNM鈥檚 announced nonconference games, with four more to come plus two exhibition games that will be played in October.
It is expected that one of the four remaining nonconference games will be against either Western or Eastern New Mexico for the Lobos鈥� one non-Division I game of the season. New Mexico Highlands, it has already been determined, cannot play UNM this season. But with former UNM special assistant to the head coach Scott Waterman now serving as the head coach at NMHU, he and second-year Lobos head coach Eric Olen have said they hope to play each other in the future.
As for Monday鈥檚 news, the Delta Devils are a Southwestern Athletic Conference team well known in college basketball as a program that makes its budget each season by playing essentially its entire nonconference schedule away from home in buy games against mid- and high-major programs.
The team has had only one nonconference home game against a Division I opponent in the past three seasons.
And while it seems logical to assume the team will be better thanks to Davis and his DI experience, it is coming off a 3-30 season with zero nonconference wins against DI opponents. Mississippi Valley State finished dead last 鈥� 365th out of 365 Division I teams 鈥� in both the NCAA's NET rankings and in the oft-referenced KenPom.com rankings.
The rest of UNM's nonconference schedule has been a solid mix of mid-major programs that have legitimate NCAA Tournament aspirations each season but have regular difficulties getting power-conference programs to consider scheduling games with them.
Teams generally considered in the same upper echelon of the non-power conference structure, like the Lobos, on UNM鈥檚 schedule this season include Utah State and St. Mary鈥檚 at home and road games with Santa Clara and Wichita State. The Lobos have two neutral court games in December against Boise State and Oregon State.
As currently constructed, and as reported via various sources previously by the Journal, the coming 2026-27 men's basketball nonconference schedule so far is:
Exhibition: at Oklahoma State, Oct. 11
Exhibition: vs. Washington State, Oct. 18 (The Pit)
vs. Utah Tech, Nov. 2 (The Pit)
vs. Northern Arizona, Nov. 10 (The Pit)
at Santa Clara, Nov. 14
at Wichita State, Nov. 21
vs. Mississippi Valley State, Nov. 25 (The Pit)
vs. Utah State, Nov. 29 (The Pit)
vs. New Mexico State, Dec. 5 (The Pit)
vs. Saint Mary's, Dec. 12 (The Pit)
vs. Boise State, Dec. 21 or 23 (TBD event in California)
vs. Oregon State, Dec. 21 or 23 (TBD event in California)
Reach Geoff Grammer at ggrammer@abqjournal.com or follow him on Twitter (X) .
