Air Force Academy
New Mexico
Falcons Grounded In New Mexico
2/8/2003 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Feb 8, 2003
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) - Ruben Douglas remained on a torrid shooting streak with 32 points and New Mexico stayed perfect in The Pit against Air Force with a 73-59 win Saturday night.
Douglas, making a strong bid to win the national scoring title, has scored 30 or more points in the last four games to hike his season scoring average to 27.5 points a game, third best in Division I.
Douglas broke the 30-point mark again on just 13 shots. He hit 5 3-pointers and was 11-for-11 on free throws.
New Mexico (8-12, 2-5 Mountain West) is struggling through its worst season in 20 years, but it still easily handled an Air Force program that has never won in The Pit. The Falcons (10-10, 1-6 MWC) are 0-22 against the Lobos in Albuquerque since 1968.
With Douglas scoring 19 points in the first half and connecting on a trio of NBA-distance 3-pointers, New Mexico took a 37-20 halftime lead.
The Falcons, who failed to hit back-to-back baskets in the first half, scored the first 7 points of the second half to get within 37-27 with 16:46 left.
 Marc Holum goes up for a layup against New Mexico.  | |
New Mexico answered that brief rally with a 9-0 run, which began with a layup by Douglas after he beat his defender on a drive through the key and ended with a Douglas 3-pointer.
Tim Keller led the Falcons with 19 points, 17 of them in the second half. But the Falcons continued to have trouble scoring. They had a total of 68 points in lopsided losses last week to Utah and BYU and the drought continued Saturday as they missed six of their first seven shots, fell behind 21-6 early and didn't get their motion offense untracked until the game was out of reach.
Douglas moved into No. 8 on the all-time New Mexico scoring list, passing two of the Lobos' star centers of the '60s, Mel Daniels and Willie Long. Douglas, a former player at Arizona, has 1,548 points in 2? seasons with the Lobos.
