Then Bennett was asked to ignore the idea of not looking ahead and to talk about what he expects in Maui, where Dayton will be paired with three top-10 teams — No. 4 Auburn, No. 5 Iowa State and No. 10 North Carolina — on its side of the bracket.
“I’m excited,” Bennett said. “With the teams that are there, we can turn some heads and make some noise over there. I feel like we’re kind of the underdog, but I feel like we work better as an underdog, so I’m excited to see what we can do.”
Dayton flies west on Friday and will have two full days to acclimate to the time change before playing North Carolina on Monday in a game that will start at 6:30 p.m. in Hawaii and 11:30 p.m. in Ohio.
Dayton (4-0) will enjoy the travel and the preparation for the tournament more if it can beat New Mexico State (3-0) at UD Arena at 7 p.m. Wednesday.
Here are seven things to know about the game:
1. Early meetings: Dayton and New Mexico State have not played since the 1960s. Dayton won both games at the UD Fieldhouse: 76-60 in December 1961; and 74-48 in December 1966.
This is Dayton’s first game against a program from Conference USA since it beat North Texas 71-58 on Dec. 17, 2019. North Texas is now in the American Athletic Conference.
2. Strong program: New Mexico State dominated the Western Athletic Conference in recent decades, winning the conference tournament 10 times between 2007 and 2022.
New Mexico State lost nine straight games in the first round of the NCAA tournament before upsetting No. 5 seed Connecticut in 2022. That remains the last NCAA tournament loss for UConn, which has won 12 straight tournament games and two national championships in the last two seasons.
In 1970, three years after Dayton made its only Final Four appearance, losing to UCLA in the championship game, New Mexico State made its only Final Four appearance, losing to UCLA in the semifinals.
3. Conference change: After 18 seasons in the WAC, New Mexico State joined Conference USA last season. It finished 7-9, tying three other teams for fourth in the nine-team league.
The Aggies were picked to finish seventh out of 10 teams in the preseason poll this season.
4. Controversial season: New Mexico State’s 2022-23 season was cut short after 24 games because of hazing allegations within the program. Coach Greg Heiar, who was in his first season, was fired with a 9-15 record.
Credit: AP
Credit: AP
5. New start: Heiar’s replacement, Jason Hooten, came to New Mexico State after 13 seasons at Sam Houston State. He led the Aggies to a 13-19 record in his first season.
New Mexico State ranked 290th in the NCAA Evaluation Tool last season after finishign 78th two seasons earlier when it was 27-7 in coach Chris Jans’ final season. After five seasons at New Mexico State, Jans took a job at Mississippi State after the 2022-23 season and has led that program to the NCAA tournament the last two seasons.
6. Transfer portal loss: Guard Femi Odukale, the team’s second-leading scorer last season (10.7 points per game), transferred to Minnesota.
7. Top players: Zawdie Jackson, a 5-foot-11 senior guard, leads New Mexico State in scoring (16.3 points per game) through three games. He played at the University of West Georgia last season and is one of seven players New Mexico State added from the portal.
• Christian Cook, a 6-2 fifth-year guard, is averaging 16.0 points in his second season with the Aggies. He led the team in scoring (11.3) last season.
• Robert Carpenter, a 6-8 fifth-year forward who started his career at St. Bonaventure in the 2019-20 season, averages 13.3 points per game.
8. Dayton connection: Nate Tshimanga, a 6-10 senior forward, and Emmanuel Tshimanga, a 7-0 fifth-year center, are the younger brothers of former Dayton center Jordy Tshimanga, who played for Dayton from 2019-21.
Emmanuel is averaging 5.0 points in 17.7 minutes per game. Nate is averaging 2.3 points in 13.3 minutes per game. They are teammates for the first time. They each played for two other schools in the previous four seasons.
9. Perfect start: New Mexico State opened the season with a 93-57 victory against New Mexico Highlands University, a Division II program. It then won 75-63 at Utah Tech.
In its most recent game, New Mexico State beat Texas A&M Corpus Christi 83-82 on Thursday. The Aggies led by 21 points early in the second half. Corpus Christian rallied and had a chance to tie the game with a 3-pointer in the final seconds.
9. Odds and ends: KenPom.com gives Dayton a 90% chance of winning. It predicts a 77-63 score.
• Dayton has fallen from No. 27 to No. 43 in the Pomeroy ratings since the season began. New Mexico State is No. 153.
• Dayton forward Isaac Jack has made all nine of his field-goal attempts in his first two appearances of the season against Ball State and Capital. He’s averaging 9.5 points.
WEDNESDAY’S GAME
New Mexico State at Dayton, 7 p.m., Spectrum News 1, ESPN+, 1290, 95.7
Credit: David Jablonski
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