Tonight's title game big deal for Nuñez, UNM's former athletic director

Its not just some random Monday, oh no.

This particular Monday is the Eddie Nunez Super Bowl, Mardi Gras and work-family reunion all wrapped into one.

Monday nights Final Four championship has Houston (thanks for vanquishing Duke, by the way) facing Florida.

For Nunez, its his alma mater (chomp chomp Gators) against his current employer (Phi Slamma Jamma).

Nunez, UNMs former athletic director, left the 505 for H-town in August, taking over the same role at a Big 12 power with a basketball program thats all that and a bag o chips.

The Cougars will make their third appearance in the national championship game, their first since going to consecutive finals in 1983 and 1984.

The former was in The Pit when North Carolina State pulled off its monumental upset that sparked Jim Valvanos run around the court not that it really has anything to do with this.

The latter was to Georgetown and some guy named Patrick Ewing in Seattles Kingdome.

But, nope.

This is the Eddie Nunez story and Mondays game puts him front and center for a championship regardless of who wins.

Nunez came out of the high school ranks in Miami and walked onto Floridas basketball team.

His Gators coach back then was Billy Donovan.

Donovan is a story unto himself.

He won two (post-Eddie) national titles with Florida before transitioning into the NBA.

He stole a few headlines Saturday when he was among the people voted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.

He later became Nunezs contact when UNM was in need of a coach when Nunez fired Paul Weir in 2021.

Nunez called Donovan up he was, and still is, coaching the Chicago Bulls and asked for suggestions.

Donovan immediately recommended Richard Pitino, who was set to be fired as Minnesotas coach any second.

Pitino was on Floridas staff a few years after Nunez came and went as a player and, together, the three men had shared a bond that would eventually pull UNMs basketball program out of the weeds and put it back into NCAA Tournament-level status.

Within a day of Nunez contacting Donovan, Pitino was a Lobo.

Nunez and Pitino made music during their brief time together, injecting new life into a program that had done the impossible drive fans away and turn The Pit into just a regular basketball arena that was often only two-thirds full.

Nunez isnt the only Lobo connection to Mondays game.

His top assistant at Houston is David Williams, who served in the same capacity at UNM until January.

Williams filled in as the Lobos interim AD but packed his bags and headed out of town when he wasnt hired as the permanent leader in December.

Look closely at Houstons bench area during the game.

Youll be sure to spot Williams sitting (or standing) a row or two behind Kelvin Sampson and the rest of the Cougars sideline.

As for Nunez, make sure hes not secretly wearing any blue or orange under the red and black ensemble of the Cougars.

u u u The mens Final Four is in San Antonio, Texas.

Specifically, the Alamodome.

Its the River Walk, Tex-Mex and reenactments of old shootouts not far from where the nets will come down Monday night.

The Lobos werent there, but a team from New Mexico was not the Alamodome or the Final Four, but definitely in town during the weekends national semifinals.

Eastern New Mexicos baseball team was in San Antonio for a four-game series against St.

Marys, a private school and fellow member of the Lone Star Conference.

The Rattlers campus is only about 15 minutes from the Alamodome.

As exciting as it must have been to be in town during the Final Four, the Greyhounds and Rattlers were a little preoccupied with playing a doubleheader at the same time as Saturdays Florida-Auburn tilt.

Game 1 of the double-dip was wrapping up at the same time the Gators and Tigers were tipping off.

Game 2 was just ending right around the time Duke and Houston were starting the nightcap.

ENMU swept the two games, ended the weekend tied for fifth place in the Lone Star and was ranked No.

8 in the most recent South Central Region.

u u u Once upon a time, organized hockey was a thing in Santa Fe.

From 2004-07, the Santa Fe RoadRunners called the Genoveva Chavez Community Center home as part of the North American Hockey League.

The team did well and was a playoff regular at a time when its main rival, the more heavily funded Texas Tornado, dominated the league.

The RoadRunners live on, albeit in a much different form.

The franchise moved to Topeka, Kan., in 2007 and thrived for 11 years before it was rebranded as the Topeka Pilots in 2018.

The club moved again in the post-COVID season of 2021, setting up shop in the Texas Panhandle as the Amarillo Wranglers.

Now members of the NAHLs South Division, the team ventures into its former state from time to time to play the New Mexico Ice Wolves, a team based out of Rio Ranchos Outpost Ice Arena.

The Ice Wolves are in this years playoffs.

New Mexico is the No.

4 seed in the South and will open a best-of-three series this weekend against No.

5 El Paso.

The Wranglers, aka the once-upon-a-time Santa Fe RoadRunners, finished eighth in the nine-team division and failed to make the postseason.

For a little nostalgia, the RoadRunners coach all those years ago was Scott Langer.

Hes still in the league and is regarded as one of the most successful and influential junior hockey coaches in the country.

He led the NAHLs Aberdeen Wings to the 2019 Robertson Cup championship and reached his 700th win this season the most in NAHL history.

And to think it all started at the Chavez Center.

u u u The high school baseball season is halfway done, but it hasnt gotten this far without a little record-breaking stuff.

On March 25, Cimarron broke the states mark for runs in an inning when the Rams crossed the plate 32 times in the top of the first at Penasco.

The effort was verified by the New Mexico Activities Association and logged into the states record book as the single-most prolific inning ...

ever.

At least, in New Mexico.

The previous mark was set by St.

Pius in a 2002 game against Espanola Valley.

The Sartans managed a measly 28 runs in a 35-8 win over the Sundevils.

No.

3 on the all-time list is 22 by La Cueva against Santa Fe High in 2003, a 32-1 nailbiter.

The Cimarron-Penasco game was halted after one inning thanks to the mercy rule.

The Panthers got one run back in the bottom of the first but lost 32-1..

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