Isabel Gonzalez
@cisabelg
At the beginning of January the Lobos seemed to have turned the ship around. But two weeks later, they have discovered that they still have a lot to figure out.
Here is Paul Weir’s opening statement from today’s press conference pic.twitter.com/g54ZfLa5Cr
— The Lair New Mexico (@thelairnm) January 18, 2019
Possible transfer?
New Mexico does not have any scholarships available right now and Weir said no one on the team has requested a mid-year transfer yet. However, there might be a situation arising.
Corey Manigault and Karim Ezzeddine were visibly frustrated during Tuesday’s game at San Diego State. While there have been questions about Manigault, Weir said nothing with that situation has been significant enough to talk about.
Ezzeddine left to the locker room a couple minutes before the game was over. He only registered three minutes of play that night. During Thursday’s press conference, Weir said that an official status for Ezzeddine can be expected in the next couple of days. The coach has talked to the player a couple of times including at the airport on the way back to Albuquerque. The junior forward wasn’t at practice on Thursday.
Mid-year Transfer
Weir said the Lobos have a mid-year transfer who has already been admitted at UNM. Classes began this week, but he has not enrolled yet so the coach won’t comment much on this. The transfer is potentially a non-scholarship player since the team currently doesn’t have one available.
Defense
When talking about mixing up the defense, the coach said his team had been using practice time trying to get caught up in the zone and hadn’t spent that much time with man-to-man. Weir said he’s not “married” to anything yet.
“Our turnover percentage has actually been much better in the zone than I ever thought, particularly against Nevada…I think when we first went to the zone, we were even a little nervous,” he said. “‘What is this going to mean for deflections?’ We had 39 against Air Force and we had 42 against Nevada. Those are two of our higher totals for the year.”
Weir admitted this is something the Lobos have to continue working on because deflections have now dropped drastically and they are once again encountering issues they had before turning to the zone.
Lobos working on that defense 🙅♂️ pic.twitter.com/FfBsZsxpjE
— The Lair New Mexico (@thelairnm) December 12, 2018
Injuries
Carlton Bragg had a small injury at Colorado State that Weir said bugged him a little but that it was nothing serious and it wouldn’t affect him long term.
Point guard
Weir said that his decision to have senior Anthony Mathis as point guard instead of Keith McGee or Drue Drinnon is because they’re the two highest turnover rate guys on the team. He said he will still continue to try all three players.
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