Week 5: BYU at New Mexico

Regardless of the outcome, coaches Bronco Mendenhall of BYU and Rocky Long of New Mexico will be commiserating with one another after this game. That's because the former colleagues still function as defensive coaches, and there will be a lot of points on the scoreboard in Albuquerque.

At least, there will be a lot of yards recorded in the statistics. Each team has its passing game cranked up to a high level and also has a capable rushing attack, but each has also made enough mistakes to occasionally prevent itself from scoring in big numbers.

It happened to New Mexico in a 10-6 loss at UTEP to open the season and it happened to BYU in a 27-17 defeat at UCLA. Otherwise, the offenses have been productive. BYU has scored 78 points in the last two games against Tulsa and Air Force and the Lobos have scored 131 points against New Mexico State, Arizona and Sacramento State.

Utah was supposed to have the Mountain West's top receiving corps, but with a season-ending injury to the Utes' Brent Casteel, UNM's unit may be the best now. Sophomore quarterback Donovan Porterie has been outstanding, and he should feast on a BYU secondary that gave up 490 passing yards to Tulsa. BYU's defense was solid in a 31-6 win over Air Force last week, but this will be a much different challenge.

On the other side, UNM's defense allowed only 104 total yards to Sacramento State, but that's not an accurate gauge, either. The Lobos were shredded by Arizona's passing offense, even though they pulled out a 29-27 win, and BYU's scheme is much the same.

One limiting factor for the Cougars is that quarterback Max Hall will be looking to get rid of the ball sooner after losing a fumble via a blindside hit in each of the first four games. That could keep him from finding secondary receivers. But if Hall can locate his primary targets, BYU's offense should roll.

Mendenhall is 2-0 against Long as a head coach, after they worked together at Oregon State and New Mexico. This will be a wild, offense-oriented duel that goes down to the wire, but BYU will win again.

BYU by 1