Awards Pile Up for Dampier, Named AP National Player of the Week

Courtesy of New Mexico

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — After winning conference honors, sophomore quarterback Devon Dampier is now getting plenty of national honors to go along with that.  Dampier was named as both a Manning Award Star of the Week and to the Davey O’Brien Award Great 8, and in perhaps one of the biggest honor for any Lobo in recent years for a game-week performance, Dampier was named the Associated Press National Player of the Week.

All of those honors come after a week in which he totaled four touchdowns and 367 yards of total offense, including the game-winning touchdown with 21 seconds left in a 38-35 win over No. 19/18 Washington State on Saturday night.

Dampier was 11-for-25 passing for 174 yards and a touchdown and he rushed a career-high 28 times for 193 yards and three touchdowns as UNM came from 14 down at halftime to win.  Dampier scored on touchdown runs of 7, 33 and 1 yard, the final score coming to cap off an 11-play, 75-yard drive that gave UNM a 38-35 lead with 21 seconds left.

Dampier, who carried the final four times on the drive to cover the final 12 yards, converted a fourth-and-2 on the drive with a 5-yard run.  At the tail end of the drive, Dampier broke the UNM single season record for total offense, a record set originally in 1994 by Stoney Case, who totaled 3,649 yards over 12 games.  Dampier, who is now at 3,657 yards, has at least one game remaining in his season, but potentially two.

Dampier also went over the 1,000-yard mark rushing for the season, as he is sitting at 1,065 yards on the season, and he is the first Lobo quarterback to ever rush for 1,000 yards in a season.  He also is now up to 16 rushing touchdowns, and he is just three away from tying DonTrell Moore’s record of 19 rushing touchdowns, set in 2003.

Fans can vote for Dampier to be the Manning Star of the Week from Monday through 8 a.m Mountain Time Wednesday morning by clicking here: Vote for Devon Dampier.  The O’Brien Award will announce its National Player of the Week tomorrow.

The win over No. 19/18 Washington State pushed UNM to 5-6 on the season and sets up UNM for a potential bowl game. That would happen if the Lobos can defeat the Hawai’i Rainbow Warriors on the island on November 30 in a game that will start at 10 p.m. at night in Albuquerque and the Mountain Time Zone.  The Lobos are off this weekend, its third bye week of the year.

The win was also the second straight for UNM in November as UNM is now 2-1 in the month.  From 2017-2023, the Lobos went just 1-28 in November, the lone win coming on November 18 last year in Fresno, a 25-17 win.