Boise State-New Mexico baseball dust cleared in pit ahead of basketball rematch

Boise State coach Leon Rice and New Mexico coach Richard Pitino greet each other after Lobos’ win in the pit in January. The teams meet for a rematch in Boise on Wednesday. (Roberto E. Rosales/Albuquerque Journal)

When basketball teams UNM Lobos and Boise State Broncos meet in Idaho on Wednesday night, it promises to be exciting.

Just don’t expect brush-back pitches or dugout clearing brawls.

Both schools and the league office say they all played well together and worked together after an incident a month ago in the pit — when the Lobos won an 81-79 overtime thriller — in which Boise State coach Leon Rice said the baseball team von Lobo deliberately stayed outside his team’s dressing room and could have started a “riot” with his team at half-time.

Testimony in a UNM report submitted to the Mountain West Conference, which also included police officers in the area, appears to indicate that the closest thing to a physical altercation came when Rice himself “reacted by saying he[LobobaseballplayerKamWalton)nailedhimtothewallbygoingchesttochest”afterthebaseballplayerstalkedtrashandbooedhisteam

Rice walked down the arena and had a lengthy discussion with a match official as that umpire walked down the pit ramp and onto the pitch where the announced crowd of 14,566 fans in the pit could see a visibly excited Rice pleading passionately be done.

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UNM has admitted its baseball team, recognized on the field during the first media break after halftime, had gathered too early in the hallway near the Broncos’ locker room — where they weren’t supposed to gather until the Broncos returned to the field .

Rice said in a postgame interview with Boise Media, including a Video viewed 115,000 times on Twitter posted by Bronco Nation News’ BJ Rainsthat he felt the UNM baseball team was there on purpose – “Yes, they did it on purpose” – and that a “riot” almost broke out. He said of UNM’s apology that “it doesn’t help if there’s a fight,” adding that the matter “needs to be addressed by Mountain West.”

Leon Rice went to the New Mexico administration for allowing the baseball team to stand in front of the locker room when the players came out after halftime. Said it got physical. pic.twitter.com/Xy4cjK8hGx

— BJ Rains (@BJRains) January 21, 2023

So the Journal filed a request for correspondence between UNM and the league office to see if the matter was handled as Rice requested.

“I am very confident that the rematch between the two institutions, scheduled for February 22 in Boise, will be conducted without incident,” Mountain West commissioner Gloria Nevarez wrote in a Jan. 24 memo to league athletic directors after she had reviewed the incident and reports submitted by matchday staff at UNM.

The memo, obtained as part of the filing request, commended both schools “for their professionalism and communication” in handling the matter, noting that this was a good opportunity for all schools to “re-emphasize preventive game management procedures.”

She also noted that the conference had conducted a “thorough review” of the matter and, while portions of the public records had been redacted, there was no indication in the declassified portions of the documents that any disciplinary action had been taken as a result.

The Journal reached out to Boise State Athletic Director Jeremiah Dickey and Rice for comment through the team’s media contact.

“We stand behind Mountain West’s review of the matter,” Dickey told the Journal in an email. “I appreciate Eddie (Nuñez, AD of UNM), Gloria and their respective collaborators, as well as our team, for acting quickly to find a solution and allow everyone to move productively forward.”

He also noted that he is “looking forward to a great game on Wednesday night!”

UNM’s incident report

UNM’s incident report included photos showing the visitors’ changing room in the mid-ramp area of ​​the pit near a stairwell leading to the arena’s concourse area.

It has been used for years by large groups who gather in the midramp area during games when they walk down the pit ramp and are to be recognized or honored on the court during timeouts.

In this case, the person who assembled the baseball team was working on their first game of lobo, and the team went down the stairs before they should have.

UNM administrators personally confirmed to Rice that evening that the team should never have been in the area at the time, but witnesses at the scene also told the Journal that night it never seemed like a fight was imminent. The incident report makes similar statements:

“Police Officer Camacho, who was stationed in the area, approached the confrontation and tried to calm everyone down, but didn’t feel the need to report the incident. UNM had four officers in the middle of the ramp at the time,” the report said.

UNM’s report to the League also included the following, mentioned in part above:

“According to (UNM’s marketing staff and two baseball players), Leon Rice, the BSU’s head men’s basketball coach, came out of the locker room and started berating the baseball team. The guess is that Coach Rice believed his players were involved in the confrontation down the hall. They were not. He began picking his way through the crowd, urging the baseball team to leave his hallway. Kam Walton replied that this was UNM’s hallway, to which Coach Rice responded by “pinning” Kam to the wall by going chest to chest with him. No baseball player responded to Coach Rice’s action. Coach Rice then walked down the hall and started a heated exchange with the on-ice official.”

Wednesday

New Mexico in Boise State, 8:30 p.m. FS1, 770 p.m./96.3 FM

More Lobos coverage