New Mexico
TCU Horned Frogs New Mexico Bowl Lookahead: Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns
For the TCU Horned Frogs, it’s again the most wonderful time of the year – College Football Bowl Season! On Sunday, TCU was selected to play in the Isleta New Mexico Bowl against the Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns (10-3). The New Mexico Bowl kicks off Saturday, Dec. 28, at 1:15 p.m. CT from University Stadium in Albuquerque, N.M. Catch the game on ESPN.
What can TCU fans expect from the Frogs’ final foe of the 2024 season? Let’s dive in.
Despite sitting in neighboring states, TCU hasn’t faced Louisiana on the gridiron before. Don’t call them “ULL” or “Louisiana-Lafayette” – that moniker was dumped very publicly a few years back. To be official, the university’s official name is the Univerty of Louisiana at Lafayette, but that isn’t used for athletics.
This season, Louisiana went 10-3 and finished as Sun Belt Conference runners up. Despite a lame duck head coach, Marshall upended them, 31-3, in the title game played in Lafayette.
This year marks the seventh-straight bowl game from a program that recently has been excellent. Head coach Michael Desormeaux took over the program after Billy Napier left for Florida and accrued a 23-17 record over three years. This year may have saved Desormeaux from finding a new position, as he led Louisiana to consecutive 6-7 seasons. He was named Sun Belt Coach of the Year last week.
Starting quarterback and Sun Belt Offensive Player of the Year Ben Wooldridge unfortunately suffered a broken collarbone in Week 13 and won’t play in this game. His backup, Chandler Fields, is a sixth-year senior with 35 games of experience. Fields exited the Sun Belt Championship with an injury and true freshman Daniel Beale stepped in relief.
Fields’ status for the bowl game isn’t certain. However, this would be his last opportunity to play for Louisiana, as his eligibility expires after this bowl game. Barring serious injury–which it didn’t appear to be–Fields likely starts the New Mexico Bowl.
Six Ragin’ Cajuns were named First Team All-Sun Belt: Wooldridge, tight end Terrance Carter (of Killeen, TX), offensive linemen A.J. Gillie and Landon Burton, linebacker K.C. Ossai, and kicker Kenneth Almendares. Five others earned second and third team honors.
Nola Bowl Cajuns Vs Marshall V4 1554 / SCOTT CLAUSE/USA TODAY Network / USA TODAY NETWORK
What makes Louisiana so difficult to defend is how multiple the team is. Two players, WR Lance LeGendre and TE Terrance Carter, combine for over 1,700 yards and 10 touchdowns. Three players rushed at least 65 times for over 450 yards, with two–Bill Davis and Zylan Perry–rushing for over 600 yards and 13 combined touchdowns.
Through the air, Wooldridge was an excellent distributor, leading to the success of multiple pass catchers. His absence certainly hurts the Louisiana passing attack. Though undersized (5′ 10″), Fields is experienced and seasoned in the system. He completed about 65% of his career passes with 23 touchdowns and just eight interceptions (compare to Wooldridge’s 61%, 38 TDs, 11 INTs). Either player is capable of running the offense.
Another key to the successful passing game–and run game–is a strong offensive line led by two all-conference selections. That line gave up sacks on fewer than 4.5% of dropbacks, good for the 34th-best number nationally and fourth-best in the Sun Belt.
As efficient as the offense is, the defense lacks. Louisiana surrendered 30 points four times this year, including most recently in the Sun Belt Championship. While the points per game measure is solid (24.5 ppg allowed is 55th), teams move the ball better against this defense than most. Louisiana ranks 108th in rushing efficiency allowed.
The weakness to the defense is in the front seven, meaning TCU may have to lean more into the ground game to find offensive success. The Louisiana secondary is the strength of the unit, but the Ragin’ Cajuns rank just 64th in passing efficiency allowed.
Per ESPN’s strength of record metric, Louisiana ranks 48th, behind 7-5 Boston College and 6-6 Washington.
Team: Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns
Record: 10-3 (7-2 Sun Belt)
Coach: Michael Desormeaux (third season)
Scoring Offense: 32.5 points per game (28th)
Scoring Defense: 24.5 points allowed per game (55th)
|
Date |
Opponent |
Result |
|---|---|---|
|
Aug. 31 |
Grambling (FCS) |
W, 40-10 |
|
Sept. 7 |
Kennesaw State |
W, 34-10 |
|
Sept. 14 |
BYE |
|
|
Sept. 21 |
Tulane |
L, 41-33 |
|
Sept. 28 |
at Wake Forest |
W, 41-38 |
|
Oct. 5 |
at Southern Miss |
W, 23-13 |
|
Oct. 12 |
Appalachian State |
W, 34-24 |
|
Oct. 19 |
at Coastal Carolina |
W, 34-24 |
|
Oct. 26 |
BYE |
|
|
Oct. 29 (Tues.) |
at Texas State |
W, 23-17 |
|
Nov. 9 |
Arkansas State |
W, 55-19 |
|
Nov. 16 |
South Alabama |
L, 24-22 |
|
Nov. 23 |
Troy |
W, 51-30 |
|
Nov. 30 |
at ULM |
W, 37-23 |
|
Dec. 7 |
Marshall* |
L, 31-3 |
*Notes Sun Belt Championship game.
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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.
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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