LAS VEGAS — New Mexico and UNLV went after the same two players. The Rebels got one. The Lobos got the other. Jason Eck has a nine-win season behind him now, and recruitments that once might have gone nowhere are turning into wins. New Mexico has made itself harder to dismiss, on the field and on the recruiting trail.
“Maybe last year we’d have lost both,” Eck said.
Eck says the evaluation process is the same, but New Mexico can now pursue players it might not have landed before. More contested recruitments are going its way, and the 2027 high school class is farther along than at this point last year.
The Lobos tied for first in the Mountain West regular-season standings and reached the Rate Bowl. A 40-35 win at UNLV made them bowl eligible for the first time since 2016. Their next opponents know what Eck’s first team did.
“I think we snuck up on some people,” Eck told The Scarlet Standard during an appearance on Rebel Daily Drive at Mountain West Football Media Days.
“There were some people who probably didn’t have our game circled as a tough game. I think now that advantage is probably gone because I know a lot of people will have our game circled.”
Finding value, then developing it
Better recruiting access has not erased the financial choices. Eck sees UNLV as a destination for players building their professional stock. At New Mexico, he emphasizes development and weighing one player’s price against all the other positions that money could address.
“You’re looking for some value,” Eck said.
“You don’t want to overshoot your budget adding one player. In football, you need so many good pieces that one great player can’t maybe turn the tide as much as he can in basketball.”
Quarterbacks and both lines of scrimmage are particularly expensive in the portal, Eck said. Internal development has to fill some of those needs. New Mexico cannot pay the market price at every position and still build the roster it needs.
Damon Bankston showed what that search can produce. Eck added the Weber State running back without committing a major share of the budget, and he became one of the offense’s most important players. At UNLV, he turned a screen into an 84-yard touchdown and set the school’s single-game running back record with 122 receiving yards.
Dorian Thomas showed what can happen next. He came from Arizona with little playing time, became an all-conference tight end at New Mexico and transferred to California after the breakout.
Eck accepts that players may leave for larger programs, just as others arrive seeking a chance to play.
“We embrace it,” Eck said. “We embrace players moving up if that’s what they want to do. We had some coaches who moved up and got bigger jobs. I was happy for those guys. You just have to adjust to the modern environment.”
All three freshmen New Mexico started last season stayed. Another productive year could bring outside interest, but Eck would rather play talented young players than keep them out of view.
He also supports the NCAA’s newly adopted age-based eligibility model, which replaces season-of-competition limits and redshirt rules with a continuous eligibility period. Most players enrolling by the academic year after their 19th birthday could have up to five years. Current players with eligibility remaining and fall 2026 entrants will receive whichever is more favorable: the previous rules or the new model.
For Eck, removing the four-game redshirt threshold means a scout-team freshman could improve into a contributor later in the fall without the same season-of-competition decision.
“It gives you some hope,” Eck said.
“But if you keep working and getting better, maybe by the middle of October, you are ready to help us,” Eck said. “Now we can get you out there.”
The 35-10 victory at UCLA, New Mexico’s first Power Four win in 17 years, is Eck’s example of what development can accomplish when the Lobos rarely beat those programs for the same recruit.
“We’re going to help you develop,” Eck said.
“We’re gonna make you better.”
Edge rusher Keyshawn James-Newby, Philadelphia’s seventh-round pick in the 2026 NFL Draft, and Bankston, an undrafted signing with the New York Giants, give him another recruiting example. Players can earn professional opportunities without transferring out of New Mexico.
New Mexico’s returning defense gives the development argument substance beyond a skill-position success. Linebacker Jaxton Eck made 129 tackles in 2025 and shared the conference’s defensive player of the year award. He enters this season as the preseason choice for that honor. Brian Booker, another preseason all-conference selection, returns inside a rushing defense that finished among the nation’s top 20.
Booker returns with 19 tackles, three tackles for loss, 1.5 sacks and a fumble recovery.
Eck has something worth keeping. New Mexico returns 14 starters, most in the Mountain West, including four offensive linemen. That is a considerable advantage for a coach trying to make development pay before the portal creates the next opening. He has lost Thomas and Bankston; he does not have to begin again everywhere. The returning players give the Lobos a chance to spend the fall improving a good team instead of teaching an entirely new one how to function.
Malik Aliane is one of those returning linemen. He started all 13 games last year, 11 at left tackle and two at left guard, after previously starting at guard and center. A player who has worked at several positions offers choices when injuries or a younger teammate’s development change the best five.
Keeping Layne healthy and the offense stocked
The immediate offensive concern is quarterback Jack Layne’s throwing arm. He started all 13 games and completed a school-record 65.1% last season, but the arm bothered him late and required offseason surgery. Eck praised his veteran judgment and football IQ while stressing the need to manage the workload.
“We have to keep Jack healthy,” Eck said.
“We have to make sure we’re keeping him on a pitch count to make sure that doesn’t flare up on him.”
Backup quarterback James Laubstein offers a running option behind him. At UNLV, his 58-yard run moved New Mexico into the red zone before he threw a 12-yard touchdown to Simon Mapa. The Lobos have used him to change the player carrying the ball and then kept the passing threat available. Younger quarterbacks gained spring repetitions with Layne unavailable, and their development remains part of protecting the position.
Eck will keep using multiple personnel groups, including sets with two tight ends. Cade Keith and Tripp Walsh are his top two at the position. Former UNLV receiver Troy Omeire joins the receivers. Eck sees a possible role like Keagan Johnson’s, who transferred in and became New Mexico’s leading receiver.
Keith is already a contributor, rather than merely a prospective replacement for Thomas. He caught 20 passes for 253 yards and three touchdowns last season. His performance against Utah State earned both the Mountain West’s offensive player and freshman of the week awards. His return gives Layne a receiver with demonstrated production at tight end while the staff evaluates how Keith and Walsh fit into the weekly personnel groups.
Omeire‘s move adds a receiver UNLV followers have seen in an established role. He caught 31 passes for 514 yards and five touchdowns for the Rebels last season, including four receptions for 60 yards against New Mexico. His preseason all-conference selection reflects expectations for the transfer, but Eck’s comparison with Johnson remains a projection. Johnson’s work at the end of the UNLV game shows the responsibility Omeire might eventually be asked to carry.
UNLV saw exactly what that receiving job demands. After the Rebels finally took the lead, Johnson converted third-and-12 with a 19-yard catch, then added receptions of 25 and 15 yards. McKinney finished with the winning 13-yard touchdown run. New Mexico had surrendered a 21-0 lead and still had enough offense to take the game back. That is the standard Omeire is being asked to approach: become the receiver Layne can trust when the lead, crowd and momentum belong to somebody else.
McKinney was not finished. When New Mexico later had to punt, he downed Daniel Hughes’ kick at the UNLV 2. Johnson and Layne had moved the Lobos to the winning score; the punter and coverage player made the Rebels start their last chance almost against their own goal line. I buy Eck’s argument about needing good players everywhere because that finish demanded them. UNLV lost to a team that kept doing its job after surrendering the lead.
A home audience and another UNLV meeting
The winning season also gave football a way to draw on the following Eck already saw across the street at The Pit.
“We had a great passionate following for basketball,” Eck said.
“We just had to give them some good football to get people to come across the street and support it.”
New Mexico won all six home games. More than 30,000 fans attended the double-overtime win over San Diego State in the regular-season finale.
Eck has told UNLV coach Dan Mullen he expects the rematch, Nov. 14 at University Stadium, to matter in the race again.
“I think this is going to be a huge game in the conference championship race going forward,” Eck said.
“Two teams that tied for the title last year in the regular season and had a heck of a football game last year.”
First come home games against Central Michigan and Mercyhurst, then trips to Oklahoma and New Mexico State. Eck prefers one Power Four opponent to last season’s two, Michigan and UCLA. The annual New Mexico State game occupies another nonconference date, leaving limited room for a comparable FBS game and an additional home date.
For future schedules, he wants stronger opponents from leagues chasing the same College Football Playoff access as the Mountain West. A home-and-home with an American contender would give the teams a direct comparison.
“If you can have some head-to-head data points, hopefully getting wins for the Mountain West against that conference, I think it’s huge,” Eck said.