New Mexico at Nevada
Usual during the game: 49°, between 36° and 62° in about 7 in 10 games. Altitude 4,615 ft above sea level.
Airport reading near the stadium35 games since 2016 · How we measure
New Mexico (#22, 7‑1) travels to Nevada (3‑5), with New Mexico favored by 9.5. The model gives New Mexico a 67% shot. Nevada’s offense is at the 19th percentile on efficiency; New Mexico’s defense is at the 99th.
How they got here
Last three games
New Mexico · 7-1
Rated 73rd in our preseason ratings, 53rd now, up 20 spots.
Three straight wins — but still hunting a ranked opponent.
W 42-18 @ New Mexico State No. 149 of 668 teams
won by 24 as an 11.5-point favorite
Last three games
Nevada · 3-5
Rated 229th in our preseason ratings, 156th now, up 73 spots.
1-2 in its last three — but nothing on this résumé beats a top-40 team yet.
L 20-27 @ Middle Tennessee No. 124 of 668 teams
lost by 7 as a 3.5-point favorite
Biggest mismatch: Nevada’s passing EPA against New Mexico, 87 points
Each row ranks the two sides among all teams. The longer the line, the bigger the mismatch.
Nevada’s EPA/play against New Mexico’s defense
Nevada offense, 19th percentile · New Mexico defense, 99th
Nevada’s passing EPA against New Mexico’s defense
Nevada offense, 10th percentile · New Mexico defense, 97th
Nevada’s explosive plays against New Mexico’s defense
Nevada offense, 74th percentile · New Mexico defense, 3rd
What’s at stake
New Mexico
- New Mexico is ranked #22, right on the edge of the Top 25.
- New Mexico hasn’t beaten a ranked opponent since 2024.
Nevada
- Nevada needs 3 more wins in the final 3 to reach bowl eligibility — 39% to get there with a win here, 7% with a loss.
- Nevada hasn’t beaten a ranked opponent since 2019.
The series
Nevada leads the series 6-4-1
11 meetings since 1941 · New Mexico won the last meeting
- 2025New Mexico 24-22
- 2023Nevada 34-24
- 2020Nevada 27-20
- 2019Nevada 21-10
- 2016New Mexico 35-26
Each line is Nevada’s chance to win through that meeting. Older meetings have no play by play, so no line.
Face-off
What each fanbase carries into this one.
New Mexico
The chip · vs the national mediaFans relish that a team the preseason poll buried at 11th of 12 tied for first and earned Coach of the Year — and they want every analyst who wrote the Lobos off to explain how they missed it.
What this game touches
The lost decade. Between Rocky Long's 2007 bowl team and Jason Eck's 2025 arrival, New Mexico went without a bowl game for the better part of two decades — years of losing seasons and coaching turnover that made the 2025 breakthrough feel almost unbelievable.
Nevada
The chip · vs the national mediaFans point out that half of college football borrowed the Pistol from a chalkboard in Reno, and that nobody outside the Mountain West remembers the offense was theirs — or that they once put a future Super Bowl quarterback on the biggest stage.
What this game touches
Two straight three-win years. Jeff Choate went 3-10 in 2024 and 3-9 in 2025 — two seasons at the bottom of the Mountain West for a program that once finished ranked and beat Boise State. The fear in Reno is that the great era is receding into history.
Best players
New Mexico
- Mercury Swaim (LB) · 50 tackles
- Scottre Humphrey (RB) · 540 rushing yards
- Kiefer Sibley (RB) · 485 rushing yards
Nevada
- EJ Smith (LB) · 86 tackles
- Dylan Labarbera (EDGE) · 60 tackles
- Jeremy Naborne (LB) · 58 tackles
What to watch
Leading passer and rusher so far this season. New Mexico: Scottre Humphrey (540 rushing yards); Nevada: Dominic Kelley (588 rushing yards).
The spread has moved 3.0 points toward Nevada since opening (+12.5 → +9.5).
The total has moved down 6.0 points since opening (43.5 → 37.5): books now expect fewer combined points.
The betting line, and the fans
New Mexico fans are feeling it more than most fanbases this week (75th percentile among FBS fanbases), in line with the numbers.
- Model · 33%
- Line · 22%
- Nevada fans · 52nd
- New Mexico fans · 75th
New Mexico favored by 9.5 · Total 37.5
New Mexico by 9.5: where a favorite like this usually runs
Half of games8 in 10 games
New Mexico’s chance through the game, if this goes like the 450 games since 2025 with a favorite of 7.5 to 14.5 points.
Weather at kickoff
Typical at Mackay Stadium: kickoff time makes little difference, scores run 86 to 90
New Mexico at Nevada · Friday, Nov. 6 · 9 pm ET · Mackay Stadium.
Weather score: 0 to 100, higher is better, for the first 3 hours and 20 minutes of the game. Ideal is 100, Comfortable 90 to 99, Mixed 75 to 89, Rough 50 to 74, Harsh under 50.
If it kicked off at
Typical at Mackay Stadium: noon Saturdays score 90, 3:30 pm 86, 7:30 pm 90.
- noon: 90, Comfortable
- 3:30 pm: 86, Mixed
- 7:30 pm: 90, Comfortable
Typical weather score at each kickoff time.
Typical means the average of regular-season Saturdays at this stadium, 2018 to 2025. It is not a forecast for this game.
Home field
Nevada is worth +4.2 points (±4.0) more at home than on the road since 2018 — middle of FBS, 50th percentile.
48% at home, 32% on the road against FBS opponents (21-23 home, 16-34 away).
Our model gives every stadium the same flat 2.3-point home edge (why); the books use about 3. Against the closing line this stadium reads +1.2 at home vs. away over 101 games — inside the ±6.3 noise, so the flat number is the honest one here.
Night kickoff — historically worth about half a point more to the home side against the number, and not much more than that. 4,615 ft of altitude — real, and smaller than the folklore: high venues run a point or two better against the number, noisily. The visitors travel about 787 miles to get here.
Season profile
Week by week
Nevada
- Wk 4Lvs Air Force33-36
- Wk 6Wat UTEP30-13
- Wk 7Lat North Dakota State17-31
- Wk 8Wvs San José State28-13
- Wk 9Lat UCLA0-27
New Mexico
- Wk 4Wat New Mexico State42-18
- Wk 5Wvs UTEP61-7
- Wk 7Wat Hawai'i21-10
- Wk 8Wvs North Dakota State21-16
- Wk 9Wat San José State21-16
Power rating by week
New Mexico is rated 9.3 points ahead as of week 10. Our power rating by week; higher is better.
The market
The spread moved 3 points toward Nevada.
The total fell 6 points.
Spread: +12.5 → +9.5 · Total: 43.5 → 37.5
The books’ cut: 4.3%, the margin built into the odds
Conference standings
Going into this game: place in the conference, then conference record.
- Nevada6th2-2
- New Mexico1st4-0