The Straight Story on New Mexico St.

A popular book getting major PT on the library shelves and coffee tables of Las Cruces, N.M., is called “One of Our States Is Missing.” It’s a collection of short stories that deal with life inside the state in question, a state that is perpetually in question, New Mexico.

Natives of New Mexico chuckle knowingly at the tale of the local medical school candidate who sent an application to an out-of-state college and was told, “We’re sorry, but we do not accept foreign applicants.”

Or the story of the magazine subscription order form that was returned to sender with a note: “We offer no out-of-country delivery.”

Or the one about the mail-order house that held up a shipment to New Mexico, demanding first an extra charge for sending a package across an international border.

New Mexico or old Mexico--who can tell the difference?

Who would even want to bother?

“One of Our States Is Missing” has no chapter on sports, but there’s a mother lode of material waiting to be tapped at New Mexico State, the school that gets everyone confused either on a first-name basis (with cross-state rival New Mexico) or on a nickname basis (with conference rivals the Utah State Aggies.)

The New Mexico State Aggies have a basketball team that is 17-2 and ranked 16th in four national polls. Not many people know this. Many people think the New Mexico Lobos are the ones that are 17-2 and ranked 16th in four national polls.

Just the other day, the bible of college basketball, Basketball Weekly, ran its TV listings for the Western Athletic Conference: New Mexico State at Colorado State.

Steve Shutt, sports information director at New Mexico State, says he’s “always getting calls about Luc Longley and Dave Bliss.” Longley is the 7-2 senior center at New Mexico. Bliss is his coach. “And last year,” Shutt continues, “after we beat UNLV, Dick Enberg and Al McGuire were on TV, talking about it and Enberg says, ‘How about New Mexico State? A big win for them.’ Then McGuire says, ‘Yeah, The Pit can be a very tough place to play at.’

“I promptly sent Al a letter, reminding him of the time he took his 1973 Marquette team to Las Cruces and lost--at the Pan American Center. That’s where we play. The Lobos play in The Pit.”

For future reference, McGuire ought to clip and save and keep the following crib sheet handy:

1. New Mexico State is the school that finished third in the 1970 NCAA basketball tournament, losing to UCLA in the semifinals and beating St. Bonaventure in the consolation game. Three players from that Aggie squad were drafted by the NBA--Sam Lacey (Cincinnati Royals), Jimmy Collins (Chicago Bulls), Charley Criss (Atlanta Hawks).

2. New Mexico State is the school without the 7-2 center. New Mexico State doesn’t even have a 6-9 center. The Aggies’ starting lineup runs between 6-8 and 6-3, seemingly manufactured on the same assembly line. Interchangeable parts, the first five Aggies average between 15.4 and 11.4 points and can outrun the average jack rabbit when launching their trademark matchup, full-court zone press.

3. New Mexico State is the school built by the junior colleges. Nine of the 12 current Aggies came this route, mainly because high school seniors, not knowing any better, aren’t interested in traveling abroad.

4. New Mexico State has the coach named Neil McCarthy, a major reason why a different kind of bliss can now be found in Las Cruces.

New Mexico State was 7-20 the year before McCarthy was hired from Weber State, where he won precisely 200 games in 10 years. In his first season in Las Cruces, 1985-86, McCarthy guided the Aggies to 18 victories. In McCarthy’s fourth season, New Mexico State qualified for the NIT. In his fifth, New Mexico State went 26-5 and reached the NCAA tournament.

Now, winding down Year 6, McCarthy has the Aggies entrenched in the Top 20 and gearing for the Big West Conference’s Great Slim Hope--next Saturday’s meeting in Las Vegas with the Runaway Rebels.

New Mexico State began preparations Saturday night at the Bren Center with a routine 73-65 victory over UC Irvine.

Routine in that the Aggies won--and that they had to fight for every inch.

“We don’t put anybody away,” McCarthy said. “We don’t beat anybody bad. We just keep on getting by, trying to stay close until the end. That’s winnin’ time for us. The one thing we know how to do is play well at the end of the game.”

McCarthy has a theory for this.

“In our conference, everybody knows Las Vegas is untouchable. Nobody can touch them,” he says. “But they look at us and see us ranked 16th and know the way shoot the ball (44% as a team) and we’re susceptible. People really get psyched up for us.”

Irvine did for sure, but pure emotions can take an outgunned team only so far against New Mexico State’s vacuum-packed pressure defense. Irvine turned the ball over 21 times Saturday. That was a considerable improvement over the 33 turnovers the Anteaters committed last month in Las Cruces.

“Look at the stats,” McCarthy said. “We’re eighth in the conference in free-throw percentage, eighth in three-point percentage, (sixth) in field-goal percentage. When people talk about us, they refer to our ‘smothering matchup zone and killer press.’ That’s how we get by.”

So far so good. At this rate, New Mexico State will qualify for the national tournament in another month and people will realize that they qualified in this nation, the one north of the border.