Isabel Gonzalez
@cisabelg
With less than a week until New Mexico begins its 2019-20 season, head coach Paul Weir admitted the Lobos still have a lot to figure out. Weir said his team is talented but the Lobos are still is looking for consistency in the offense and a solid defensive plan.
Thursday was the Lobos’ last day of practice before a two-day break. The staff has a lot of meetings and film sessions scheduled to help figure out changes that need to be made before the Nov. 6 season opener against Eastern New Mexico.
“We are not anywhere near where I would like to be with regards to that and with regards to an offensive rhythm,” Weir answered when asked if his rotation had been figured out. “We have a lot of new guys, a couple returners that are very talented players, particularly offensively…. There are some stretches where we are terrific together and some stretches were we haven’t quite connected yet. Offensively there is still a process we are going through and inevitably that involves rotation and substitutions.”
The head coach said the Lobos are still moving around with their defense quite a bit. New Mexico has been working on three or four different types of pressure to try to find a sweet spot, including a different one right now. Half court defense has been a big focus for the Lobos this preseason. Weir said the team has spent around 65 – 70 % of their practice time on it.
Six days until the New Mexico men’s basketball team season opener pic.twitter.com/v2v31xgWk6
— The Lobo Lair (@TheLoboLairFeed) October 31, 2019
“Even in our scrimmage I thought that was our strongest part of our game, in our first scrimmage,” he said. “For us to be a championship level team we have to defend, specially in the half court. What we are working is basically everything else around that.”
Talent is not lacking in the offense, but now it’s about figuring out how to make it consistent. The coaching staff is still giving players an opportunity to show what they can bring to the table. The Eastern New Mexico game might not even exactly reflect what this season’s team will look like. The team does have game goals and objectives they are trying to meet along the way, but right now Weir said it’s a little early to think about those.
“Our goal right now in these few days we have post-Oregon, is to clean up all the things that we wanted to clean up and make all the changes we wanted to make to our offense and our defense based on that,” he said. “We are going to take the next two days to really reevaluate and see where we are at. Make sure we are coming back on Sunday with a great plan. We’ll use Sunday, Monday and Tuesday to get ready for Wednesday’s game.”
Notes
- Daniel Headdings is redshirting. Weir announced he had a back injury late September and now the decision of redshirting has been made official. The freshman averaged 20.4 points, 3.0 assists and 3.0 rebounds per game during his senior year at Wasilla High School.
- Drue Drinnon left due to a personal family situation. Weir is not sure when or if he will be back. The coach hasn’t spoken to him since he left, and would not give more details to allow Drinnon to have some privacy.
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