Posted by ESPN.com's Graham Watson

In keeping with New Mexico's Rocky Long...

The 11th-year coach was adamant about making New Mexico's nonconference schedule tougher than usual in an effort to prepare the Lobos for what appears to be a tough Mountain West. The Lobos host Texas A&M and Arizona before traveling to Tulsa and New Mexico State. Long criticized other major conference teams for having soft nonconference schedules to earn bowl eligibility.

"There's teams in the Big 12 and the Southeast Conference and the Big 10 that set their schedule up so that they're 4-0 at the end of preseason and they win two conference games and they get to go to bowl game," Long said. "That ain't right. You ought to at least win half your conference games before you get to go to a bowl game.

"I mean, who did Kansas play last year? I think Missouri got as screwed as you can get screwed. Missouri was a better football team. Much better football team. But you look at who Kansas played in preseason. If they lost one of those games, they ought to ship them out of there... So a Kansas, who's just establishing a program now, they've got to make sure they win all four of their preseason games so they make sure they play teams they can beat. That's a lot better for a coach's security. Everybody [complains] about who you play, but you say, 'I'm 4-0.'

"If we lose all four of these preseason games, they'll be wanting to run me out of town. But for the sake of our program, that's much better for our program."