Lobos roll past Cowboys in The Pit

A slow by the Cowboys start never really got any better as No. 12 New Mexico earned another lop-sided win over Wyoming in The Pit.

The Lobos, 10-2 MWC, 24-3) ran out to as 17-point halftime lead and never looked back, leading by as much as 31 in the game before stopping the Cowboys 83-61 in Albuquerque.

“I think they're probably playing as good as anybody in the country,” Wyoming coach Heath Schroyer said. “When a team wins eight straight games in the league, especially this league and this year; it shows that they're a very good team. And this venue is great. It's hard playing here, but you tip your hat to the fans, the atmosphere, and everything this place is. It's the real deal."

Darington Hobson had 20 points and 10 rebounds for his ninth double-double of the season, and New Mexico's Steve Alford won his 300th game as a Division I coach.

“This was a great game,” Alford said. “Any time you come off the road this is the biggest game because you haven't played here in awhile. You get a little complacent because you think you just win because you come back home. I really appreciate the crowd. I just appreciate what our fans do. They wear red, they get after it and they did a good job of welcoming this team back."

Phillip McDonald scored 14 points and Roman Martinez had 13 for New Mexico (24-3, 10-2 Mountain West), which has won 10 straight - all in conference. The last time the Lobos did that in league play, Michael Cooper was suiting up during the 1977-78 season.

“We did what we do, 23 assists, eight turnovers,” Alford said. “We just share the basketball and our defense is getting better and better. Overall, I was extremely pleased. You got everybody in, everybody gets to play, everybody scores. Those are always fun nights."

The Lobos scored the first 11 points and raced to a 22-8 lead midway through the first half after consecutive 3-pointers by Jamal Fenton and Nate Garth. Hobson added a nice no-look pass to McDonald for a layup that put New Mexico up 26-10.

The Cowboys cut the deficit to 29-18 after New Mexico's defense went soft and allowed two easy layups by Thiam with 2:58 before halftime. Alford took a timeout to chew out his players, and the Lobos answered with an 8-0 burst that included two 3-pointers by Martinez.

"For the first couple minutes of the game, we could tell what they were doing. They were going to put Darington Hobson and Phillip McDonald on the block and isolate those guys on Desmar Jackson and Arthur Bouedo,” Schroyer said. “Those guys struggled guarding in the post and we knew we'd get into foul trouble. The other part of it was that we wanted to slow them down and shorten the game. I thought it was actually pretty good for us. We went back into a man-to-man in the second half and did some nice things."

The Cowboys return home Saturday to host No. 15 BYU at 4 p.m.