GameDay: UH at New Mexico State

Here's last night's Chawan-pilation with game previews from KHON, KITV and KGMB. Looks like Liz Chun's report from El Paso got redacted by the government.


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Stephen Tsai's gameday preview breaks down the offense, defense and specialists of both teams.

Jason Kaneshiro has stats, lineups and breakdowns, and highlights this key matchup:

Hawaii defensive line vs. NMSU offensive line

The Warriors have put some hard hits on Chase Holbrook in wins over NMSU the last two years. The Aggies have had trouble protecting the quarterback lately and gave up six sacks against Boise State last week.

"We've played eight football games and we've started four different left tackles and we've started two centers, two different right tackles," NMSU coach Hal Mumme said. "We've had a hard time with twists and rush because of that."

UH defensive end David Veikune has 4 1/2 sacks in the last two games. NMSU has started sophomore Joe Suder at right tackle for the last two games.

Felix Chaves of the Las Cruces Sun-News has a game preview.

Two teams in need of a victory to stay bowl eligible meet on Saturday at Aggie Memorial Stadium in a key Western Athletic Conference battle.

New Mexico State (3-5, 1-3) has lost three straight, while Hawaii (4-5, 3-3) is coming off of a tough loss at Utah State.

"We're going to play as hard as we can and we're going into this game believing we can win," NMSU quarterback Chase Holbrook said. "If we didn't think we could win, we wouldn't even show up."

Bobby Curran writes that the game is a must-win.

Kaneshiro talks to David Veikune and Mike Washington about returning to places they spent part of their childhoods, Las Cruces and El Paso respectively.

Tsai writes about Viliami Nauahi winning A LOT of money on Wheel of Fortune, and has some notes about changes made to the depth chart.

To counter the Aggies' spread offense, which uses as many as five receivers, the Warriors are prepared to use packages involving five or six defensive backs.

To boost the pass rush, defensive end Francis Maka was moved to defensive tackle. In the Okie scheme (3-3-5), Maka would give the Warriors a front line of essentially three pass-rushers.

Defensive tackle Josh Leonard, who did not play last week because of an ankle injury, said he is available for the New Mexico State game. The Warriors now can rotate Maka, Leonard, Fale Laeli, Keala Watson, Tuika Tufaga and Vaughn Meatoga at defensive tackle — a key energy-conservation strategy for the breathtaking thin air in Las Cruces.

Ferd Lewis writes about Greg McMackin and Hal Mumme's connections to Texas Tech coach Mike Leach.

Over at BleedCrimson.net, an excellent New Mexico State blog, I answer a few questions for their Know the Foe segment.

Tsai has some random game day notes.

And Ferd Lewis has some news and notes.