San Diego State coach Sean Lewis promoted his team’s New Mexico Bowl matchup against North Texas with this statistical tidbit: SDSU and North Texas have combined for 20 victories, a total surpassed in the postseason only by College Football Playoff games.
Lewis called it “a great matchup of strengths, with our defense (and) their offense.”
North Texas features the nation’s No. 1 scoring offense (44.8 ppg) against the Aztecs’ fifth-ranked scoring defense (12.6 ppg).
This is the first meeting in 50 years between the two schools, dating to SDSU’s 30-12 win at San Diego Stadium. The Aztecs are 6-1 all-time against the Mean Green.
SDSU (9-3) is a 2 1/2-point underdog against North Texas (11-2) for Saturday’s game. Kickoff is 2:45 p.m. PT (ESPN) at New Mexico’s University Stadium.
About the Mean Green
North Texas came within a game of being included in the College Football Playoff as an automatic qualifier, but Tulane got the spot with a 34-21 win over the Mean Green in the American Conference championship game.
North Texas, which won a school-record 11 games, saw a perfect regular season spoiled by a 63-36 loss to South Florida in the sixth game of the year.
The Mean Green scored at least 50 points in seven victories, starting with a 51-0 season-opening win over Lamar. There were 52 points against Temple, 53 against Alabama-Birmingham, 54 against Charlotte, 55 against UTSA and 56 against Rice.
The top scoring effort came in a 59-10 win over Washington State, a week after the Cougars’ 36-13 win over SDSU.
This is the eighth bowl appearance in the past 10 years for North Texas, which has lost all seven games during the stretch.
The Mean Green’s last postseason victory came against UNLV in the Heart of Dallas Bowl in January 2014. North Texas is 3-12 overall in bowl games.
North Texas coach Eric Morris guided the Mean Green through the historic season, but Morris was announced Dec. 8 as the new head coach at Oklahoma State. North Texas introduced Neal Brown the same day as its new head coach. Brown, who was previously head coach at West Virginia and Troy, served this season as a special assistant at Texas.
Brown won’t be coaching in the New Mexico Bowl, however. North Texas named Drew Svoboda as interim head coach for the bowl game. Svoboda served as associate head coach the past three years under Morris.
North Texas quarterback Drew Mestemaker (17) throws during the second half of the American Conference championship NCAA college football game against Tulane in New Orleans, Friday, Dec. 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Matthew Hinton)
The offense
North Texas led the nation in total offense (504.3 ypg) as well as scoring offense (44.8 ppg).
“They’ve got talent everywhere,” Lewis said. “(They have) dudes that stress you out and can change the scoreboard at any moment in time.”
Leading the way is redshirt freshman Drew Mestemaker (292-for-416, 4,129 yards, 31 TD/7 INT), a former walk-on who emerged as one of the country’s top quarterbacks.
“You can tell that the quarterback knows where the answers are, regardless of the problems,” Lewis said. “Teams have tried to throw every single different problem at him, and he’s found the solution to really stress them out. The numbers speak for themselves. He’s got incredible talent.”
Mestemaker, who leads the nation in passing yards, has been rumored in recent weeks to be entering the transfer portal when it opens Jan. 2. A North Texas spokesman said last week that Mestemaker was still expected to play in the bowl game, though potential injury could put at risk Power Four offers that some estimate at $3 million for next season.
The playmakers around Mestemaker include receivers Wyatt Young (63 catches, 1,209 yards, 10 TD), Cameron Dorner (50-845, 6 TD) and Miles Coleman (46-536, 2 TD).
The pass attack is balanced by a robust running game led by Caleb Hawkins (200 carries, 1,236 yards, 23 TD) and boosted by Makenzie McGill II (75-389, 5 TD) and Kiefer Sibley (45-274, 5 TD).
Kicker Kali Nguma has made 12 of 13 field goal attempts with a long of 46 yards.
The defense
The Mean Green ranked 70th in scoring defense (24.9 pg) and 64th in total defense (370.4 ypg).
What bodes well for SDSU running back Lucky Sutton and Co. is that North Texas especially struggled against the run, allowing 207.2 yards a game. That ranked 126th. Only 10 teams in the country allowed more rushing yards.
The defense is led by linebackers Ethan Wesloski and Trey Fields, who rank among the nation’s top 10 in tackles with 104 and 100, respectively.
Opponents need to hang onto the football around safety Will Jones, who has forced a team-high three fumbles and has recovered two of them. The players to be mindful of up front are defensive ends Keviyan Huddleston (5 sacks) and Ethan Day (4 1/2 sacks, 8 qbh).
Did you know?
North Texas was originally known as the Eagles. Inspiration for the Mean Green nickname came from a 1966 game against Texas-El Paso, though there are two origin stories.
One legend has it that Sidney Sue Graham, the wife of the school’s media relations director, was praising sophomore defensive tackle Joe Greene against UTEP when she shouted: “That’s the way, Mean Greene!”
Two North Texas basketball players, Willie Davis and Ira Daniels, were in the student section for the same game and tried to raise spirits by singing: “Mean Green, you look so good to me” in reference to the defensive effort.
“After that we did it every game,” Davis remembered years later. “A lot of people later on started associating it with Joe because his last name was Greene, but it actually started with that simple chant that Saturday night at Fouts Field. And that’s the truth.”
The nickname followed Greene to the NFL, where he was a Hall of Famer for the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Greene is quoted in his Hall of Fame bio, saying, “I just want people to remember me as being a good player and not really mean.”
His image was softened by a Coca-Cola commercial played during Super Bowl XIV that is regarded as one of the best TV commercials in history.