Written By: Walter Hines

Author's Note: Update on Ex-NMSU AD Brian Faison

I wrote the piece below in 2004 for a sports forum run by Jimmy Hester, a UNM booster that I had befriended and introduced to Faison at an Aggie-Lobo football game in Las Cruces in 2003. Faison left NMSU in May 2008 to become AD at North Dakota a while after Mike Martin became the NMSU President and hired Dr. McKinley Boston as AD. He’s led Fighting Sioux athletics into a new conference, the Big Sky, D-1 status in football and 13 other sports, and facility improvements and increased budget. He’s received praise from the North Dakota administration and alumni.

Unfortunately for Faison, controversy not of his own making continues to dog him. There was an extended battle, in which he remained a reasoned, neutral leader, about whether to drop the school’s Fighting Sioux moniker. Many Sioux in North Dakota said they were honored by the name, but one tribe was dead set against it. The NCAA intervened and political correctness won out, despite intense efforts by the North Dakota legislature to retain Fighting Sioux. A statewide vote resulted in citizens approving the removal of the moniker. Ironically, a group of Sioux is now threatening legal intervention to retain the name.

I’ve exchanged emails and had several conversations with Faison over the years. He retains his self-effacing qualities and sense of humor. When I asked what the biggest difference was between NMSU and UND, besides the weather, he mentioned student diversity.

He said, “When we talk about diversity here, it involves whether an individual is Swedish or Norwegian.” The Sven and Ole jokes are alive and well in North Dakota.  Continue Reading This Post >>

Written By: Walter Hines

Over the forty-one football seasons of 1968 to 2008, New Mexico State had a dismal record of 140-313-2, with no bowl appearances and only four winning seasons – the best being 7-5 in 2002 under Tony Samuel. In contrast, from 1958 to 1967 under Coach Warren Woodson, NMSU won 63 games, lost 36, had a glorious undefeated season and seven winning seasons. Woodson’s Aggies appeared in and won two Sun Bowl games. They had four national rushing champions, the only first-team All American in NMSU history, a future All Pro NFL quarterback, and more than a dozen pro players in all.  Continue Reading This Post >>

NMSU opened the season In Las Cruces against the University of Mexico Pumas, a team they played the previous year in Mexico City. The Pumas were game but unable to match the Aggies size and speed. Gaiters and Atkins broke many long runs and accounted for three touchdowns. Johnson hit Bob Kelly with two touchdown passes and the Aggie defense, featuring hard-hitting Bob Jackson and Bob Langford as linebackers, had their way. The game ended with a 41-0 Aggie victory.

The next week, the Aggies were in Oklahoma to take on a strong Tulsa team. The Aggies exploded offensively, and led in the second quarter 19-0 before Tulsa scored to make it 19-7 at the half. NMSU finished the game with a flurry. Gaiters scored four touchdowns and Johnson passed for another in a 38-18 victory. Tulsa coach Bobby Dobbs was wowed by the Aggies offense. He called Atkins the best football player in America.  Continue Reading This Post >>

Woodson would spend five years in Tucson. At 26-22-2, his teams were not as successful as at HSU, but there were some highlights. In 1953, in front of a statewide television audience, the Wildcats defeated arch-rival Arizona State 34-0 -- the first of three straight wins over the Sun Devils. The Wildcats would sweep New Mexico all five years of Woodson’s tenure. And the Wing T continued to produce records. In his first start for Woodson, halfback Art Lupino (aka the “Cactus Comet”) gained 228 yards on six carries and scored 32 points. Lupino went on to win national rushing titles in 1954 and 1955, and led the nation in all purpose yards, scoring, and kick returns in 1954.  Continue Reading This Post >>

In late 1942, at age 39, Woodson had been commissioned as a Lieutenant Commander in the Navy. He served as a senior physical training officer for three years, primarily in Texas and the Gulf Coast states. The Hardin Simmons football program was canceled during WW II from 1943-45.

But Woodson’s military contacts and experience proved valuable in his ability to recruit veterans for his future teams. These veterans were stronger, heavier and more mature than typical college freshman. They were instrumental to Woodson’s success at Hardin Simmons in the mid-to- late ‘40s and later at Arizona and New Mexico State in the late ‘50s and early ‘60s.  Continue Reading This Post >>

Written By: Walter Hines

Over the forty-one football seasons of 1968 to 2008, New Mexico State had a dismal record of 140-313-2, with no bowl appearances and only four winning seasons – the best being 7-5 in 2002 under Tony Samuel. In contrast, from 1958 to 1967 under Coach Warren Woodson, NMSU won 63 games, lost 36, had a glorious undefeated season and seven winning seasons. Woodson’s Aggies appeared in and won two Sun Bowl games. They had four national rushing champions, the only first-team All American in NMSU history, a future All Pro NFL quarterback, and more than a dozen pro players in all.  Continue Reading This Post >>

This article is excerpted from Elsie Carr’s memoir, Elsie’s Story, with minor editing by her cousin, Walter Hines. Published by Dona Ana County Historical Society, Southern New Mexico Historical Review, January 2009.

My Early Life in the Mesilla Valley, New Mexico

Childhood, 1915-1928

At the time of my childhood, New Mexico was still in a pioneer stage. My parents had graduated from New Mexico College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts (New Mexico A&M) in 1911, one year before New Mexico became a state.   Continue Reading This Post >>

Gerald (Jerry) Hines was born in Old Mesilla in 1903 with twin brother Harold to Dr. Lemuel and Minnie Hankins Hines. Raised with four siblings on the Hines orchard-farm that supported a mail order pear business, Jerry attended Las Cruces Union High from 1918-22. There, he excelled in athletics, starring in both football and basketball. Under head coach, F.M. (Tony) Wilson Las Cruces had a good football team and finished second in the State basketball tournament to Albuquerque High in 1922. Wilson, who later coached high school sports for decades in Albuquerque, has Wilson Stadium in northeast Albuquerque named in his honor.

While in high school, Hines also tried his hand in amateur boxing and had 4-5 victorious matches. He ‘retired’ from the ring after an ill-advised fight with a much older brawler from Juarez.  Continue Reading This Post >>

Aggie women's sports have come a long way in the last 100 years. Click on Read More for the story from the 1907 Yearbook.

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What does ex-Aggie basketball coach George McCarty have in common with the great Adolph Rupp, Phog Allen, Frank McGuire, and John Wooden? Answer? They all brought teams to the 1952 NCAA Basketball Tournament.

It was the Aggies first NCAA tournament, though NM A&M did have a strong tournament tradition, having played in the NIT in 1939 and several NAIB Tournaments in the 1930s and early 1950s, including the NAIB in Februrary 1952 just prior to the NCAA tournment. The NAIB, or National Association of Intercollegiate Basketball, held a tournament for "small colleges" each year. It was not unusual for schools to play in both the NAIB and NCAA tournments in those days.

George Courtney McCarty had an unlikely background for a basketball coach. Recruited from the Texas JC football ranks in 1937, he had a scholarship offer from Oklahoma A&M. Instead, he chose to accept one from NM A&M. An undersized, but very tough guard on the fine Aggie football teams of the late 1930s, the 160-lb, 5'8" McCarty never played college basketball, but he was a student of the game and a fan of the great Aggie basketball teams of the late 1930s.   Continue Reading This Post >>