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Albuquerque Journal, N.M.
Lobos face slim margin for NCAA bid
- Story byAlbuquerque Journal, N.M.
- Lobos face slim margin for NCAA bid
On NCAA Selection Sunday this past March, the UNM Lobos were left on the outside looking in.
They had 23 wins and built a NET ranking of 46 (out of 365 Division I teams). That ranking — derived by the NCAA from a formula attempting to place a value on every regular season game — is one that will be even harder for the Lobos to replicate this season due to a new-look Mountain West that lost several quality opponents in league play.
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UNM went 2-7 in Quad 1 games last season (Quad 1 is considered the highest quality game) and 6-1 in Quad 2 games by Selection Sunday (Quad 2 is still good, but to a lesser degree than Quad 1).
Six of UNM's nine Quad 1 games were against teams formerly in the Mountain West and now in the Pac-12.
UNM did manage this season to schedule Pac-12 defectors Utah State and Boise State in the nonconference, and in league games against Nevada and Grand Canyon — home and on the road — project to be high quality games still.
Of course, teams always have the opportunity to just win their conference tournament and guarantee they get in the NCAA Tournament, but putting your team in the best position possible for the Big Dance requires strategic nonconference scheduling and college basketball makes that harder than ever for mid-majors, even with an expanded NCAA Tournament field of 76 teams now (it was 68 last season).
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"We tried to give ourselves as many Quad 2 or better opportunities as were available to us in the nonconference," Olen told the Journal this week. "I think when we look at the schedule we put together, we're hopeful to get up to maybe seven (Quad 1 or 2 games) in the non-conference."
There are no preseason NET rankings, so it's impossible to know yet how many Quad 1, 2, 3 or 4 games the Lobos will end up with. Based on the preseason KenPom.com rankings — rankings mostly in the same ballpark as the NET — the Lobos are clearly headed into a season with almost no wiggle room for slip ups thanks to so few quality games coming their way in league play.
Based on those KenPom rankings, the Lobos would only get two Quad 1 games this season (down from nine last season). Those would be when the Lobos play on the road at preseason No. 44 Grand Canyon and at preseason No. 70 Nevada.
There are, however, a potential of 12 Quad 2 games (up from seven last year), including seven the Lobos managed to get scheduled in nonconference play.
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"We're gonna be light on Quad 1s, but we're at a minimum going to try to be that team with a whole lot of Quad 2s," Olen said.
Nonconference rankings
UNM's first three regular season games — home games vs. Utah Tech, Northern Arizona and Little Rock — are all projected to be Quad 4 games, based on KenPom.
The meat of the 14-game nonconference schedule starts Nov. 14 in a road game at preseason West Coast Conference favorite Santa Clara and a road game a week later at a highly-regarded Wichita State team.
Though the preseason games don't count in the NET, for the sake of context:
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UNM's 99-89 road win at Oklahoma State (preseason 45 in KenPom) on Oct. 11 would have been a Quad 1 victory
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UNM's 92-64 home win vs. Washington State (preseason 102 in KenPom) on Oct. 18 would have been a Quad 3 victory
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UNM's 91-86 loss to Arizona State (preseason 71 in KenPom) on Sunday would have been a Quad 2 loss
Card 'em
UNM sent out more than 2,000 specialty Lobo basketball trading cards this week as part of their offseason "Real Ones" promotion for season ticket holders who either renewed or were first time buyers by a certain date.
SEASON TICKET HOLDERS
Your Real Ones packages have hit the post office and are on the way! Here's what you're chasing in your trading card packs. ⤵️
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The full set checklist may be located here: https://t.co/NnNEKQeJ5N
Pull a rare card? Use #RealOnes to show off your… https://t.co/HpCwdJBYfX pic.twitter.com/X5cp4iDSNJ
— New Mexico Lobos (@UNMLOBOS) October 28, 2026
Each pack comes with 20 cards and includes a variety of men's and women's cards from several categories: base set cards featuring every men's and women's player and head coaches, turquoise bordered cards of players that are numbered 1-250 through each player, autographed cards of select players numbered 1-80, the "Legends" series of former players and prominent figures for men's and women's teams, "rare" cards that have a variety of special looks to them and then a series of very rare 1-of-1 cards (16 of them in all) of people around the program or events (the Nelly Junior Joseph overtime game winner in the 1,000th game played in the Pit three years ago being one of them).
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Due to high demand of fans wanting the cards for sale, UNM is considering options on how to make other, or more of these cards, available at some point in the season.
Geoff Grammer is the Sports Editor of the Journal, a podcaster, columnist and covers UNM Lobos basketball, among other things. Reach him at ggrammer@abqjournal.com or follow him on Twitter (X) @GeoffGrammer.
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