Before we get into tonight's big rivalry game for the Aggies, we have some very interesting news on the softball front. Aggie head coach Kathy Rodolph was a guest on the Aggie Coaches Show last night (hosted by Kyle Doperalski) and during the interview she was asked by Kyle to give her thoughts on the WAC contraction/expansion. Obviously losing Boise State, a second year but up and coming program after this season is tough. It drops the league back down to seven teams, where it was when the Aggies joined in 2006. The big, huge, enormous loss for the league however is the loss of Fresno State, Nevada and Hawai'i in the 2013 season. The WAC is the best league in the west behind the Pac 10 and one of the best leagues in the country period. The WAC has routinely sent multiple teams to the NCAA Regionals and sent four teams in 2008, Fresno State, Nevada, Hawai'i and Louisiana Tech and while none of them reached the Super Regionals, all four teams played in their respective Regional championship game. WAC softball is perhaps the strongest sport that the WAC fields. Stronger than men's basketball, stronger than women's basketball, stronger than baseball (even though WAC baseball has the only national championship in the current WAC) and yes, even stronger than volleyball.

Fresno State has been to each and every NCAA tournament. If we're not mistaken, they are the only program in the country that can make that claim. Hawai'i went to the College World Series last season (knocking off the number one overall seed in the process). Nevada, Louisiana Tech and New Mexico State are all perennial contenders for reaching postseason play.

You get the picture. The defections from the WAC take a huge toll on the overall quality and competitiveness of the league, moreso than any other sport. Last season five different WAC teams combined for 10 non-conference wins over Top 25 teams, including a win by Utah State over No. 1 Washington (USU did not even qualify for the WAC tourney, that should tell you something) and 23 wins in the non-conference over BCS league teams (including five wins by the Aggies). Those 23 wins came via six of the eight WAC teams (further proof of the incredible competitiveness of WAC softball). The WAC softball hit list included wins over big time softball programs including Texas, Missouri, Alabama (twice), Stanford (twice), Cal, DePaul, Oklahoma and Washington. (Big-time thanks to the WAC Softball Blog for keeping us up to date on all those achievements)

Back to last night's coaches show. Though it has not officially been announced, Coach Rodolph mentioned that BYU will be joining the league starting in 2012, prior to the departures of Fresno State, Nevada and Hawai'i. She did not mention if this was a permanent arrangement, though we suspect it will likely only last until the West Coast Conference has enough softball programs to sponsor softball (there are currently only four WCC programs playing softball).

If you recall, when BYU went independent, three programs, swimming and diving, track and field and softball were left in limbo since the WCC does not sponsor those three. Swimming and diving has since landed in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) and softball has apparently landed in the WAC which is great news for WAC softball fans. BYU enters their final season in the Mountain West this spring and they are the defending MWC champions.

On a side note, two of the prospective schools that the WAC is looking at for expansion, Seattle and Utah Valley, both sponsor softball and both play in the Pacific Coast Softball Conference (home of the four WCC schools' softball teams).

Okay, about tonight's game. It's huge. Games against Nevada are always huge. This one is no different. The Pack has struggled a bit this season and is 5-13 overall but 2-3 in conference play with a win over Boise State at Boise (something the Aggies weren't able to do). That being said, the Aggies must also not look at Nevada's record and they must not look ahead to Saturday's game against Utah State. Focus on the Pack. They're much better than their record indicates. They have been in a lot of close games and have lost most of them. Ten of Nevada's games have been decided by 10 points or less, they've won just two of them. Had a few plays gone in Nevada's favor, they could have a vastly different record.

Nevada has some solid talent. They have a very solid, but freshman, point guard in Deonte Burton who has scored 43 points in his last two games. They have a Duke transfer in Olek Czyz who is currently the leading scorer in the WAC (conference games only). Czyz started off a little slowly averaging just eight points per game in his first four games. However, something clicked and he rattled off 23, 26 and 25 points respectively in his first three conference games. He's since cooled off a bit scoring 14 and 11 in his last two games but he is an effective and efficient scorer and he, much like Troy Gillenwater, can knock down the trifecta. Through five conference games he's shooting 11-of-21 from deep and overall is hitting 66.7 percent of his shots from the floor.

As we mentioned in our conference preview for Rush The Court way way way back before the season started, we picked Czyz as our Impact Newcomer.

Olek Czyz (F) - Nevada: Czyz, a native of Poland who graduated from high school in Reno, NV, is a 6’7 redshirt sophomore who left Duke to return to Reno, where he won two high school championships. Czyz will miss the first part of the semester fulfilling transfer requirements (he transferred from Duke midseason) but should have an immediate impact in conference play. Even though Czyz only played in six games for the Blue Devils in 2009-10, the WAC is not the ACC and Nevada is certainly not Duke in terms of history nor talent level. Czyz will likely work himself into a starting spot for the Wolf Pack this season.

The Aggie bench will be a big factor in this game. Nevada rides their big four of Czyz, Malik Story, Dario Hunt and Deonte Burton to the tune of nearly 30 minutes per game out of all four. Those four average over 12.6 PPG each and outside of them, nobody else is averaging more than 4.2 PPG.

The Aggies just need to continue to do what they've been doing the past three games and they should win this game.

Tip-off is scheduled for 8:30 p.m. (MT) and the game can be heard on the Aggie Sports Network with streaming audio available via Aggie Access (subscription required).

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bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on the game against Fresno State on Saturday? Your freshman Jasmine Rutledge had a pretty solid game with 15 rebounds.
Darin Spence: We came out in the beginning of the game and I thought we were focused and we were into the game and then we didn't react very well when we missed a handful of really good shots that we got early in the game. Even off some steals, Day Day had some breakouts, we probably missed five or six shots within six feet of the basket and I think once that happened it kind of took the wind out of our sails and we got back on our heels for the rest of the night. They're an awfully good team and when you do that they're going to step up and make you pay for that. Jasmine Rutledge is a very active freshman and she's been getting better and better.

bc.net: Your team did have a couple of good stretches in the game, after they had their 8-0 run your team responded with an 8-0 run to cut the lead back to two. After being down by 17 at half, you cut the lead to nine in the early moments of the second half.
DS: We did. We cut it to nine in the second half with Jasmine Lowe shooting free throws. She scored that night but just didn't have one of her better outings. She was 2-for-7 from the free throw line. You just think of the free throws that she missed and the two Tabytha missed, I think Kaitlyn Soto missed three, you've got nine points right there from the foul line and it's a different game and obviously a different shooting percentage. We did some good things, we played with some energy, we just found out that a team like Fresno that has won at a high level and has some experience winning, you're going to have to be really good, especially on the road. There were stretches where I was kind of disappointed and we just kind of let down, not in how hard we played, just our execution. We'd get good shots and we'd miss shots or we'd play a good defensive possession and we'd get a stop, we just didn't feed off the positive plays enough and when a negative play would come we'd kind of hang our head and not fight through it quick enough. That was the disappointing part right there. Your'e going to have to be really good to go on the road and beat the team that's a two-time defending champion in our league. You're just going to have to be much better than we were.  Continue Reading This Post >>

Written By: WAC Media Relations

DENVER, CO - New Mexico State's Lasasha Aldredge and Hawai'i's Sarah Saddleton were named the Verizon Western Athletic Conference Women's Indoor Track and Field Athletes of the Week, respectively, for the week of Jan. 10-16.

Aldredge, a sophomore from Fresno, Calif. (Central East HS), had a great start to the 2011 season at the University of New Mexico Lobo Open Invite in Albuquerque, N.M., on Jan. 15. Aldredge placed first in the 400 meters with a time of 57.27 seconds. Her time is the best mark in the WAC thus far in the early portion of the season. She was also a member of the 4x400 meter relay team that placed first finishing with a WAC-best time of 3:53.50. Aldrege also had a fifth-place finish in the 200 meters finishing with a time of 25.50.  Continue Reading This Post >>

If you're in the Las Cruces area we encourage you to make it out to the Aggie Coaches Show tonight (or tune in on KSNM AM 570 or to the live online stream on KSNM570.am) as Kyle Doperalski will have former Aggie coaches Michael Needham who was just named the head women's soccer coach at Rhode Island, Don Flora who was just named the head volleyball coach at Texas Tech (Don will be calling in), Aggie softball coach Kathy Rodolph and Aggie women's basketball coach Darin Spence. Spence and the Aggies will host Utah State on Saturday night and we'll post our interview with him a bit later today.

In case you missed it yesterday, be sure to check out the latest group of verbal commitments that Aggie head football coach DeWayne Walker and the staff have received. And speaking of Coach Walker, he will be in Albuquerque on Saturday, February 12th at 5:30 p.m. at the Albuquerque The Magazine offices. The event is free and all Aggie fans in Albuquerque are encouraged to attend and hear Coach Walker talk about the 2011 recruiting class as well as the state of the Aggie football program.

To RSVP: call (575) 646-5151 or send an e-mail to aac@nmsu.edu.

Don't forget to check out this week's interview with Aggie head basketball coach Marvin Menzies. The Aggies are on the road this week to take on Nevada and Utah State and with a sweep on the road they would move into a share of first place in the WAC.

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Editorial Note:This week's interview was conducted through a teleconference with members of the media from the Las Cruces Sun-News, Las Cruces Bulletin and Albuquerque Journal. The questions asked by bleedCrimson.net are marked as such.

Marvin Menzies: This is a huge trip for us potentially. It depends on the result but it's going to be a big trip just when you have two environments to play in like Lawlor and in Logan. You've got to be ready to play. Yesterday's practice and today's as well as tomorrow even though that's a little trickier because we're on the road so it'll be light. I'm just anticipating trying to get better on the defensive end and trying to get some consistency there as well as shoring up a few things on offense. I think that you can throw the records out the window when you play either one of these teams. There'll be a lot of passion in both those games so we've got to make sure we match it with our energy and enthusiasm. We just have to go out and play the best ball we can play. With that we've been playing the best ball we've been playing as of late but you can't attach one game to the next unfortunately. Each game will stand on its own so it'll be interesting to see how this road trip works out for us.

bleedCrimson.net: Last season you went into this same road trip in a similar situation and didn't have a very good results. Obviously you got your revenge in the conference tournament the next week against both teams but is there anything that you do differently this time around?
Different team, different players. I think every year it kind of just depends on the matchups and so forth and that'll be a different component that we have to look at. As far as how we traveled and what we did, I think we had the most expeditious form of travel that we could have laid out for ourselves, we just didn't get favorable results. I think the only difference now can be hopefully that we have learned a little bit and we've got some retention of players that have been there and that will be more focused and understand what they're going into and not let the crowds rattle them at either location.  Continue Reading This Post >>

The Aggie football team continues to build an impressive recruiting class as we head towards National Signing Day next month. The Aggies had a few recruits in this weekend and came away with some big verbal commitments.

The headliner of the weekend, perhaps of this year's recruiting class is Kemonte Bateman, a 6'0" wide receiver from Pasadena CC. You can watch video of him here. He originally signed with Arizona State but had to go the junior college route and will suit up for the Aggies in 2011.

ESPN Scouts Inc. had this to say about Bateman:
There is a lot to like about Bateman as an inside or outside wide receiver. He has good size, adequate-to-good speed and is a crafty route runner in the short and intermediate passing game. He is a very competitive player, and he has a knack for getting open and he is very steady. He has excellent hands and he will come over the middle, he will catch the ball in traffic, and his concentration is excellent. He has great focus when the ball is in the air and he does a good job of adjusting to the ball.

The Aggies also received a verbal commitment from 6'2" corner Jeremy Harris from East Los Angeles College. Harris runs a 4.4 40 and you can see video of him here.

Along the defensive line the Aggies received a verbal commitment from Stephen Meredith out of Garden Grove HS (CA). Meredith is a 6'4", 215 pound defensive lineman and his video can be seen here.

The Aggies also got a pair of verbals from teammates at Riverside Community College. Lester White, a 6'2" defensive back and James Calhoun, a 5'11" wide receiver. Harris finished the season with 17 tackles, 10 solo, three interceptions, three pass breakups and one fumble recovery in seven games.

Finally, the Aggies got a verbal commitment from Promise Amadi, a 5'11" athlete who plays wide receiver, running back and cornerback at Chni High School. You can read more about Amadi here and watch his highlight tape here.

The Aggie recruiting class for 2011 is shaping up to be one of the best the Aggies have put together.

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It's a big week for the Aggie men's basketball team. The Aggies are coming off a home sweep of Hawai'i and San Jose State and sit tied for second place at 4-1 in conference play with Idaho. The Aggies make the annual Reno/Logan road trip this week with a chance to come home with a share of first place in the conference. This will be undoubtedly the toughest road trip the Aggies have left (the Hawai'i/San Jose roadtrip notwithstanding just due to the sheer amount of travel involved). Nevada is playing well and just picked up their first road conference victory defeating Boise State. And of course there is Utah State. The UtAgs are 16-2 and 5-0 in WAC play and coming off a road sweep of their own defeating Boise State 68-59 on Thursday night and then notching an ugly 52-39 victory over Fresno State in Fresno.

We'll get more into both teams as the week goes on but with the way New Mexico State is playing, there is plenty of reason to believe that the Aggies can come away with a road sweep.

Jason Groves of the Las Cruces Sun-News posed the question of whether the Aggies' win over San Jose State on Saturday night was the Aggies' breakout game. While we would agree that it was the Aggies' most complete effort from start to finish (literally from the start with Bandja Sy's dunk) to finish.

However, because SJSU was playing without Adrian Oliver, one can't really gauge if this was the Aggies' "breakout" game. We think after this week's games against Nevada and Utah State we'll have a better gauge of where the Aggies stand.

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