New Mexico gets invitation to make return trip to LV

Steve Guiremand

Monday, Nov. 24, 2003 | 10:41 a.m.

Shortly after UNLV's bowl hopes sailed wide to the left with Dillon Pieffer's missed 23-yard field goal, Tina Kunzer-Murphy and the Las Vegas Bowl committee didn't waste any time turning to Plan B.

And a pretty good Plan B it is, too.

For the second straight year the New Mexico Lobos (8-4, 5-2) will be the Mountain West Conference's representative in the Las Vegas Bowl, which has been moved to Christmas Eve at 4:30 p.m. And Rocky Long's squad may have been the conference's best team the final month of the season as evidenced by its 47-35 thrashing of conference champion Utah in Salt Lake City on Oct. 25th.

The Las Vegas Bowl picked New Mexico over Colorado State (7-5, 4-3) and Air Force (7-5, 3-4), both of whom lobbied to get the invite.

"We had some good discussion," Kunzer-Murphy, the executive director of the Las Vegas Bowl, said. "It just came down to the fact New Mexico is playing great football right now."

The Lobos, led by MWC player of the year candidate DonTrell Moore at tailback, have won seven of their last eight games with their only loss in that span ironically a six turnover debacle against UNLV, 37-35.

New Mexico brought almost 8,000 fans to last year's game against UCLA that was won by the Bruins, 27-13. And even though bowls usually frown on bringing back the same team two years in a row, the Lobos were the overwhelming choice of the 25-person Las Vegas Bowl committee to get the invite over the Rams, who may be without star quarterback Bradlee Van Pelt (broken hand) for a bowl game, and the Falcons, who lost four of their final five games.

"We think they're probably playing the best football in the conference right now," Kunzer-Murphy said of the Lobos. "New Mexico fans came here last year and had a lot of fun which is important. They didn't play UNLV here this year. Plus, with the Mountain West basketball tournament not being held here this year, this would be their only chance to come to Las Vegas."

Long was busy studying film of his team's 26-3 victory at Wyoming on Sunday morning when he was notified of the bowl bid.

"I was pretty positive that we were going to get a bowl invitation but I didn't expect it to happen so quickly," Long said. "It was good news and everybody here is very excited about going to the Las Vegas Bowl again."

It certainly beats the Lobos trip to Laramie over the weekend.

Because of a snowstorm, the Lobo plane never was allowed to land at Laramie despite two different attempts. Instead, the team eventually landed in Denver and made the three-hour drive to Laramie in a blizzard and didn't arrive at its hotel in Wyoming until about 3 a.m. The wakeup call for the 11 a.m. kickoff was at 7:30 a.m. which meant most players got only about three hours of sleep.

"It was one of those trips that you hear about," Long said."The weather was really bad. We had our team meal Friday night at a Burger King at the Denver Airport. And then it was really cold Saturday morning at the game. It was minus-5 with the wind chill. We were happy to get out of there with a win and fly home."

There's a good chance that the Lobos could be matched up against another Pac-10 team with strong ties to Long.

Barring a USC loss to Oregon State on Dec. 6 at the Los Angeles Coliseum, New Mexico will likely be playing the Steven Jackson-led Beavers here. Like last year's opponent, UCLA, Long spent part of the 90's as a defensive coordinator in Corvallis.

Las Vegas Bowl tickets are available by calling (866) 388-FANS or on the Internet at www.unlvtickets.com.