No. 19 New Mexico enters its Wednesday game against Boise State at The Pit in Albuquerque, N.M., on a five-game Mountain West winning streak with each victory by double digits.
It is the program’s longest such streak since 2011-12, when New Mexico won seven straight.
The Lobos (18-3, 6-2) are coming off an 89-55 win Sunday over Nevada in Albuquerque. It was their largest margin of victory in a conference game since an 81-42 rout of Air Force on Jan. 31, 2012.
Jaelen House had 21 points, six assists and six steals in the win over Nevada. No other Mountain West player has achieved at least 20 points, six assists and six steals in a game in the past 14 years.
“Jaelen House was phenomenal, not just the shot-making but the steals,” New Mexico coach Richard Pitino said. “Offensively, we were great and defensively we turned them over.”
Nevada, which had its nine-game winning streak against New Mexico snapped, had 15 turnovers that led to 25 points for the Lobos.
Jamal Mashburn Jr. added 14 points and Nelly Junior Joseph had a double-double with 12 points and a game-high 10 rebounds.
Donovan Dent and Mustapha Amzil each had 11 points.
“It was a great performance all around by our guys,” Pitino said. “It was a team effort for 40 minutes. We got better as the game went on, which is great to see.”
Boise State (14-6, 5-2) lost 90-84 in overtime at home to then-No. 18 Utah State on Saturday in a game that was for first place in the Mountain West standings. The Aggies (18-2, 6-1) are ranked No. 17 this week.
The Broncos failed to score in the first 3:30 in overtime. They missed their first six shots and went 2 of 10 in the extra session.
“We just really didn’t get into a rhythm,” Boise State forward Tyson Degenhart said. “We had good offensive sets and ideas of what we were going to call, and we just didn’t execute.”
Degenhart led all scorers with 24 points. He also had four rebounds and two steals. O’Mar Stanley added 20 points and nine rebounds for Boise State.
Degenhart scored 21 points after halftime and had all eight of the Broncos’ points in overtime. He moved up to 19th in the school’s career scoring list with 1,123 points.
When asked about playing New Mexico, another ranked league opponent, Degenhart said, “The Mountain West is a hard conference, you’ve got to bring your A-game every night.
“We’ve got a lot of good teams, and you have to play well every game because there’s too many good teams and too many good players to overlook.”
New Mexico is 11-0 at The Pit this season. Boise State is 3-1 in true road games, with the lone loss an 85-68 setback at Clemson on Nov. 19.
The Broncos’ past three road games were Mountain West victories over San Jose State (78-69 on Jan. 5), Nevada (64-56 on Jan. 12) and Fresno State (72-68 on Jan. 23).
–Field Level Media