bleedCrimson.net: What are your impressions of the new players you've added to the team this year?
Marvin Menzies: We've got a nice injection of a variety of players that I think can help us across the board from Sim Bhullar at center giving us additional depth there, B.J. West coming off his redshirt year as well as looking at the wing position and point guard position and Matej Buovac to K.C. Ross-Miller and Eric Weary coming off his redshirt year as well as Terrel [de Rouen] who only played nine games last year and is kind of like a new player and also Kevin Aronis who is my first junior college transfer and can shoot the ball well. You look at the guys we already had coming back and you complement them with the new guys I think it gives us some added depth and puts us in a position to be a little more competitive in practice and adds the component of versatility with most of those guys. I think it creates a nice coaching environment.

bc.net: With so many new players what's the chemistry been like, I know that was a big component to your team's success last year.
MM: The chemistry starts with character and we've got some very good kids on the team. I think our student-athletes are very solid individuals and solid people. When you have those ingredients to begin with I think it's pretty easy to satisfy the chemistry.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on heading back West for the second time.
Marvin Menzies: Portland is a great town first of all, it's a great atmosphere to play in the Big Dance, I'm sure they'll do a great job as the host city. But I also feel that the teams that are participating in it will have large fan bases to draw from so that'll make it even more exciting with Louisville, obviously Indiana and New Mexico as well. So, I think when you look at all the teams that are participating in that region, it's going to add to that atmosphere of that particular round.

bc.net: Your draw Indiana in the second round matchup. The Hoosiers and Aggies match up very well, very similar statistically and your style of play is very reminiscent of the style of play you might see in the Big Ten.
MM: Yeah, you know, Indiana really shoots the ball well. Tom Crean is an excellent x's and o's coach, he does a great job with managing a game. I have the ultimate respect for his ability as a coach and I also like him as a person, the few times we've had a chance to encounter each other, he seems like a good guy. I think it'll be a fun time to be able to go up against him.  Continue Reading This Post >>

Editor's Note: This week's interview is part of the weekly press conference. Questions were fielded from the Las Cruces Sun-News, Las Cruces Bulletin as well as bleedCrimson.net

Jason Groves: Grades are final and classes start Thursday is there any news on that front and injury-wise how are you for this weekend?
Marvin Menzies: Injury-wise we are good. Guys are a little bumped and bruised, we've got some back bruises and stuff like that but nothing that's going to keep guys out of competition. Renaldo is back after going through missing some practices and some game in trying to sort things out and deal with some personal issues. We sat and had a long talk and he's back with us practicing and will make the trip. We're happy to see that things are going well with him again.

Grades are fine, everybody should be fine. I'm not expecting any surprises. I think we're okay in that department.

JG: When did you speak with Renaldo and where his head is at?
MM: I spoke with him over the weekend. He's in a good place, he's always been in a good place, he just had some things he needed to work through and just some personal things that he had to deal with. Guys are happy to have him back, it's all good. It's a positive injection for sure in the way of depth, in the way of practice. He was sorely missed and it's good to have him back.

bleedCrimson.net: Where do you see him fitting into the rotation coming back?
MM: Any time you miss that amount of time, the famous words of 2Short out of Oakland, "You gotta get in where you fit in." He's gotta earn his stripes again so to speak but he knows the system, he hasn't been gone that long. He's just gotta get back in sync but he's not under punishment or anything like that. We're playing well right now and things are moving in the right direction. We've just gotta make sure that you keep moving in a forward direction and have him complement what we're doing right now. That's just a coaching decision to analyze that as it unfolds.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Conference play is starting and obviously your conference track record speaks for itself. Heading into conference play this year what are some things that you think your team is doing well heading into conference and what are some things that maybe concern you a little bit that you need to clean up?
Marvin Menzies: I think you can always be better both offensively and defensively. There's always things that you feel like with your talent you can do a better job. On the offensive side of the ball I feel like our timing on our screening is something we need to do a much better job of taking advantage of attacking what defenses give you. Our guys are still kind of recognizing how to take advantage of what is being given to us. On the defensive side of the ball, I think the biggest thing that we need to improve upon is our overall court awareness off the ball. We're guarding the ball pretty well for the most part but we've got to get our guys a little more alert and a little more urgent and ready to play on the weak side of the ball which lends to taking more charges and rotations. We started off doing pretty good with that, we've got to get that back.

bc.net: Your team had take a bit of a hit depth wise from the start of the season to now and at the beginning of the season, defensively you wanted to play an aggressive pressing style of defense and you felt you could do that because of the depth you had. Does the loss of that depth change that strategy a little bit?
MM: Yeah, I think obviously the depth isn't where it was at the beginning of the season but I still think we have enough to manage an aggressive style of play defensively. We might have to mix it up a little more, pick and choose our spots and maybe not go for a full 40 minutes, saving some of the starters' legs and things of that nature. But we can continue to do that style of play and maybe throw in a little more zone and throw in a few more looks but I still think we can achieve an aggressive defensive mindset whether we're in man or zone.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: What were some things that you worked on in the past couple of games that are helping you prepare for the game against UNM and also for conference play?
Marvin Menzies: We just tried to get back to playing aggressive defense and rebounding with the same intensity that we had earlier in the year and trying to clean some things up offensively. We added a few set plays that we think will be good for us going into conference and so we'll get a chance to look at some of those. Just trying to get back in the gym and back on the practice floor and have a chance to play some competition here at home and get back in the confines of home and have the friendly atmosphere and get that good feeling back and get our confidence back.

bc.net: You talked about the rebounding and after the game against McNeese, offensive rebounding for them was something that you weren't particularly pleased with. What are some things that the team can do to shore up rebounding on the defensive end?
MM: You've just gotta work on it in practice, there's no shortcuts. The kids will learn what you emphasize and we've done a good job I think as a staff of making it a priority and as a result hopefully that equates to a better output when you actually play the games.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on the loss at Southern Miss?
Marvin Menzies: First of all Southern Miss is really good. They did a really good job of crashing the boards on us, something that we've been able to take a little bit of pride in here early in the season but they just owned us on the glass, had great second effort with some really talented, undersized bigs and really skilled guards. They had a lot of energy, very fresh legs at the very beginning of the game and jumped out on us and made it an uphill battle all the way back.

bc.net: The last five and a half minutes, you'd been down by 18 twice in the second half and had been able to get it down to seven but the last five and a half minutes they were able to get eight offensive rebounds and hurt the Aggies' effort to come all the way back in a situation that, I really felt if you'd been able to get some of those rebounds, you would have come all the way back to win that game.
MM: Yeah, I think that the offensive rebounding that they had at the end of the game was really the key to stopping our runs. They were just some long bounces and we had some guys in position but they just had fresh legs and were very athletic and were just able to get to those balls and that's what makes climbing back into a game so tough when you give up that much of a lead.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on this last stretch of games you played with four games in six days?
Marvin Menzies: Well it's been a tough stretch of the season. We knew it would be with the wear and tear of travel as well as with the games back-to-back and not having a chance to really practice in between and that kind of thing. It was a challenging stretch but to come out with a couple wins in Alaska was obviously a good then and then to play as well as we did, unfortunately falling short to Arizona, I was still satisfied with our effort. We've just got some things to clean up. They're very coachable corrections that can be made. We're feeling pretty good, still feeling very optimistic about the rest of the non-conference schedule.

bc.net: Out of the four game stretch and obviously playing back-to-back-to-back nights in Alaska and then traveling back and playing Arizona two days later, what were some of the things that you took away from that stretch that you maybe didn't know about your team that you found out?
MM: Well the guys were very mentally tough during that period. I thought that they understood what was necessary to keep their bodies in the best physical condition to be able to play hard throughout the tournament and then also with the Arizona game so that was good to have. Guys were getting sleep and taking care of themselves and that was important. We found also that you need practice. We need practice to continue to get better. We had made some very good strides through October into November but we haven't created habits that are continuous yet. We still need to get back in the gym and shore up some things before we're able to be the team we want to be going into conference.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on the Northern Colorado game, a couple of things that you were pleased with and a couple things that you want to work on before the game against UNM?
Marvin Menzies: I liked the team chemistry on the road, I liked they way they handled the routine. The experienced guys kind of walking the younger kids through the whole road game scenario and it was good to see that leadership there. The on court intensity I thought was good. We ended up wearing them down just on our stye of play throughout the game which was the plan going in. I think we need to work on some execute and subtle nuances on offense and defense in terms of playing when we're a little fatigued. I think that comes with repetition and conditioning and so we'll continue to work on that.

bc.net: What were your thoughts on the touches in the post for Hamidu and Chili in the game against Northern Colorado and how much of a focus will that be in the game against UNM?
MM: It's always going to be a focus to go where we have potential mismatches and where we have advantages. We didn't get as many post touches as we would have liked but that's not uncommon when you play at the speed of play that we're playing at. We've got to get them to run the floor a little better and then to get our spacing a little more organized so we can get them those opportunities as well. I think going into UNM our game plan is still the same in terms of concentrating on what we're going to do to try to maximize our opportunity to win the game.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: A big road win on Saturday at Nevada, your team's back was against the wall and you fought back and notched a very good road win.
Darin Spence: Yeah no question about that. It's much much bigger than what we realized at the time just because of what we had to go through in the week. It was our third game in that week and two on the road. It wasn't a very kind stretch for us. We practiced Sunday, Kaitlyn Soto gets hurt. We turn around and play Fresno [Monday] we play a tough game there and then we didn't practice again until Wednesday night, played at Utah State who's playing as well as anybody in our league and plays differently than anybody else. We're short on guards again, could have played a little bit better but still competed. Then after that game we were pretty drained and just a beat up team. We didn't even practice before we played Nevada. We had a little shootaround that morning and I think played probably our best game of the year. Kaitlyn came back and played and gave us some good minutes. Madi was sick, she's been sick. Jasmine Lowe played really well and everybody else kind of fit in and did their piece and got a huge win. It was just a great atmosphere there. Nevada had a good crowd, they had a lot of fun things going on, it was just a fun atmosphere and our kids competed and played their backsides off and it was a great win for us.  Continue Reading This Post >>

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.

On the team's injury situation:
MM: Troy's ankle is still bothering him. We're kind of going day to day and just waiting to see Saturday how he feels. He's definitely going to travel, it'll probably go all the way to Saturday until we actually know if he's going to play or not. Gordo will practice, his ankle is sprained but he'll be okay. Hamidu should be good to go, he'll practice today.

On who might get the extra minutes if Troy is unable to play:
MM: It just depends on who we're playing. You've got different guys now. We feel like we can go to CK and go small and put Tyrone at the four or we can play Renaldo now and keep the guard rotation the same. It just depends what we feel like the best way to start the game off will be. You'll see all those rotations at some point but it's just really about trying to get a good start.  Continue Reading This Post >>