Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Light at the end of the tunnel?

I see a light at the end of the tunnel for the New Mexico State Aggie football team.

NMSU is 3-6 this season and really could use another win or two in the final four games of their season. I think they have a VERY good chance to get a W this weekend against Fresno State.

But I also think this program is on schedule under head coach DeWayne Walker, who is in his third year in Las Cruces.

The Aggies enter the “new” WAC next season and I think a winning record will be attainable. NMSU should beat newcomers Texas-San Antonio and Texas State and the remaining four WAC schools — Idaho, San Jose State, Utah State and Louisiana Tech (maybe) — seem to be on relatively equal footing with the Aggies.

I do feel pretty positive about the Aggie football team. This is Walker’s third year — a critical year — and the team is better. Of course, they need to continue getting better — very important, obviously.

Here’s a quote from Walker about the time table for his team in his third season at the helm:

“When you look at our first year — there was no recruiting class in our first year — we pretty much had to play with what was here. You can almost cancel that year to a certain degree. If you look at it that way, really last year was our first year really getting our guys in and this year was our second year. If you look at it from that perspective, next year is really our third year. With the recruiting class we brought in this past year I thought really will give us a chance with another recruiting class to really get this program going. Talking with opposing head coaches, and there’s some good head coaches that we’ve gone against and their teams, they see it. And it’s pretty obvious that we’re better. When you’re competitive for the most part, you want to win all the games that you’re competitive in and it’s not going to work out that way all the time. We feel pretty good. We still have four games left to continue and evaluate this program so we’re not done yet. I think the jury’s still out and I’m anxious to see how this football team finishes up.”

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

There's two games missing for the 2012 season.
If Boston can stay away from the $$$ games and give Coach Walker a favorable schedule. I too believe next year could be a special year for NMSU in the new WAC!

The only problem I see is that the WAC has only one bowl (Idaho patatoe)tie-in, right?

That could bring memories of 2002 when NMSU finished 2nd in the Sun Belt with a 7-5 record and did not go bwling beacuse the Sun Belt was affiliated with one bowl.
I hope that's not the case!

Jefe

Anonymous said...

I think the Aggies are better and the WAC weaker. Been watching for a long time and won't believe the Aggies making a serious run at a bowl until I actually see them do it.

7-5 would be nice, bowl or no bowl.