New Mexico

Scouting report: What to know about New Mexico ahead of matchup with Auburn

Published

1 year ago

September 12, 2024

Scouting report: What to know about New Mexico ahead of matchup with Auburn

Auburn football is looking to bounce back in Week 3 after an ugly loss to Cal in Week 2.

The Tigers will face New Mexico, and despite being a heavy favorite, will look to avoid a result similar to when they faced a different team from New Mexico in 2023.

While New Mexico is an 0-2 team from the Mountain West, that doesn’t mean it can’t cause problems. The Lobos scored 39 points in its Week 1 loss to ranked Arizona and are capable of hanging around with Power 5 opposition.

Here’s a closer look at what New Mexico brings:

Dynamic threat Devon Dampier

Everything New Mexico does offensively starts and ends with sophomore quarterback Devon Dampier.

While that’s obviously the case for most offenses and their quarterbacks, Dampier’s versatile skillset makes him unique. A true dual threat, much of what New Mexico does offensively involves getting Dampier on the move whether it be through RPOs, bootlegs or designed quarterback runs.

Dampier was especially effective against Arizona, throwing for 260 yards and three touchdowns, while adding another two touchdowns and 130 yards on the ground.

He’s averaging 9.1 yards per rush through two games this season and is the team’s leading rusher despite having 15 less carries than the next leading rusher.

Dampier to Wysong connection

Through two games, Dampier’s favorite target has undoubtedly been junior wide receiver Luke Wysong.

Wysong leads the team in receptions and yards with 14 and 224, respectively. Against Arizona, he was consistently effective, catching eight passes for 129 yards and a touchdown.

He’s also the second-highest graded player on the team by Pro Football Focus (only trailing Dampier). Wysong isn’t a particularly big target at 5-foot-10, 184 pounds, but still has an impressive ability to make contested catches, highlighted by a play he made in double coverage to set up New Mexico’s first touchdown against Arizona.

The defense

New Mexico’s defense is where the team fell short in its early season losses.

Through two games, the Lobos are giving up an average of 597 yards and 48 points per game. Those numbers rank New Mexico dead last in total defense and 131st out of 133 FBS teams in scoring defense.

Despite the overall poor showings, New Mexico has already scored two defensive touchdowns, both coming on fumble returns in Week 0 against Montana State.

The downside to the Montana State performance was that the Lobos still gave up 567 total yards in the loss, with 362 yards coming on the ground.

Both Montana State and Arizona averaged just under eight yards per rush against New Mexico. With Hugh Freeze voicing his satisfaction with Auburn’s run game against Cal, that may be the place for Auburn’s offense to start against New Mexico.

Peter Rauterkus covers Auburn sports for AL.com. You can follow him on X at @peter_rauterkus or email him at prauterkus@al.com

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New Mexico

New Mexico deserves speedier game commission appointments

Published

12 hours ago

January 9, 2026

Press Room

New Mexico deserves speedier game commission appointments

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New Mexico

What bills have been filed for New Mexico’s 2026 legislative session?

Published

1 day ago

January 8, 2026

Press Room

What bills have been filed for New Mexico’s 2026 legislative session?

The governor sets the agenda for the session, including for the budget, so here is what they are looking at so far.

SANTA FE, N.M. — As the regular session of the New Mexico Legislature is set to begin Jan. 20, lawmakers have already filed dozens of bills.

Bills include prohibiting book bans at public libraries and protections against AI, specifically the distribution of sensitive and “Deepfake” images

Juvenile justice reform is, again, a hot topic. House Bill 25 would allow access to someone’s juvenile records during a background check if they’re trying to buy a gun.

Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham sets the agenda and puts forth the proposed budget lawmakers will address during the session. The governor is calling for lawmakers to take up an $11.3 billion budget for the 2027 fiscal year, which is up 4.6% from current spending levels.

Where would that money go? More than $600 million would go to universal free child care. Meanwhile, more than $200 million would go to health care and to protect against federal funding cuts.

There is also $65 million for statewide affordable housing initiatives and $19 million for public safety.

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New Mexico

Understanding New Mexico’s data center boom | Opinion

Published

2 days ago

January 8, 2026

Press Room

Understanding New Mexico’s data center boom | Opinion

Paul Gessing, Rio Grande Foundation
| Las Cruces Sun-News

After years of failure to land a “big fish” business for New Mexico’s economy (or effectively use the oil and gas revenues to grow the economy) Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham with the help of her Economic Development Secretary Rob Black have lured no fewer than three large data centers to New Mexico. These data centers are being built to serve the booming world of Artificial Intelligence (AI), and they will have profound impacts on New Mexico.

It is our view that having these data centers locate in New Mexico is better than having them locate elsewhere. While we have many differences of opinion with this governor, we are pleased to see her get serious about growing and diversifying New Mexico’s oil-dependent economy albeit quite late in her second term.

Sadly, the governor and legislature have chosen not to use broad based economic reforms like deregulation or tax cuts to improve New Mexico’s competitiveness. But, with the failure of her “preferred” economic development “wins” like Maxeon and Ebon solar both of which the governor announced a few years ago, but haven’t panned out, the focus on a more realistic strategy is welcome and long overdue.

Currently, three new data centers are slated to be built in New Mexico:

Oracle’s Project Jupiter in Santa Teresa with an investment of $165 billion.
Project Zenith slated to be built in Roswell amounts to a $11.7 billion investment.
New Era Energy & Digital, Inc. While the overall investment is unclear, the energy requirement is the largest of the three at 7 gigawatts (that’s seven times the power used by the City of San Francisco).

What is a data center? Basically, they are the real-world computing infrastructure that makes up the Internet. The rise of AI requires vast new computing power. It is critical that these facilities have uninterrupted electricity.

That electricity is going to be largely generated by traditional sources like natural gas and possibly nuclear. That contravenes New Mexico’s Energy Transition Act of 2019 which was adopted by this Gov. and many of the legislators still in office. Under the Act electrical power emissions are supposed to be eliminated in a few years.

With the amount of money being invested in these facilities and the simple fact that wind and solar and other “renewable” energy sources aren’t going to get the job done. In 2025 the Legislature passed and MLG signed HB 93 which allows for the creation of “microgrids” that won’t tax the grid and make our electricity more expensive, but the ETA will have to be amended or ignored to provide enough electricity for these data centers. There’s no other option.

New Mexicans have every right to wonder why powerful friends of the governor can set up their own natural gas microgrids while the rest of us face rising costs and decreased reliability from so-called “renewables.” Don’t get me wrong, having these data centers come to New Mexico is an economic boon.

But it comes tempered with massive subsidies including a 30-year property tax exemption and up to $165 billion in industrial revenue bonds. New Mexico is ideally suited as a destination for these data centers with its favorable climate and lack of natural disasters like hurricanes, tornadoes, and floods. We shouldn’t be giving away such massive subsidies.

Welcoming the data center boom to New Mexico better than rejecting them and pushing them to locate in other states. There is no way to avoid CO2 emissions whether they happen here or somewhere else. But, there are questions about both the electricity demand and subsidies that must be addressed as New Mexico’s data center boom begins.

What will the Legislature, radical environmental groups, and future governors of our state do to hinder (or help) bring these data centers to our State? That is an open question that depends heavily on upcoming statewide elections. It is important that New Mexicans understand and appreciate these complicated issues.

Paul Gessing is president of New Mexico’s Rio Grande Foundation. The Rio Grande Foundation is an independent, nonpartisan, tax-exempt research and educational organization dedicated to promoting prosperity for New Mexico based on principles of limited government, economic freedom and individual responsibility

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