Cowboy Basketball to Face Tough Conference Opener [AUDIO]

The University of Wyoming men's basketball team will open up Mountain West play in Laramie on Saturday against New Mexico. The pokes are 3-2 in MW openers against the Lobos. With four of those five games being decided by seven points or less, two games being settled in overtime, and both teams coming into the game with a 14-2 record, the stage seems to be set for a tight game.

In fact, Paul Bessire from predictionmachine.com has New Mexico winning just 53 percent of the time after simulating the game 50,000 times. When the Lobos came to Laramie last year, Wyoming escaped with a 67-66 win on a bucket by Pako Cruz with two seconds remaining. Bessire says to expect a similar result this year, he has the Lobos winning by a predicted score of 60-59.

Led by MW preseason player of the year, Drew Gordon, New Mexico comes into Saturday on a 12 game winning streak.  During an interview on Sportsline Live, Wyoming head coach Larry Shyatt pointed out three areas from the Lobos play that concern him in 3-point shooting, offensive rebounding and field goal percentage defense.

Wyoming currently has four players averaging double figures in Luke Martinez, Pako Cruz, Leonard Washington and Adam Waddell. The Cowboys are leading the MW in scoring defense, allowing an average of 52.1 points per game and are second in field goal percentage defense (36.9%) to New Mexico (36.5%).

Saturday's game is set to tip at 1:30 p.m. in the Arena-Auditorium. Coverage will begin on KCGY-FM (95.1) at 1:00 p.m. with Dave Walsh and Kevin McKinney. The game will be followed by this season's first edition of Cowboy Talk with Kari Eakins.