Next Level: Chile Bowl Edition; Pac-12 School Visits Rio Rancho

SILVER CITY, NM -- So far this season, 6-foot-5 Eastern New Mexico tight end <strong>Devon Bailey</strong> is a perfect 2-for-2. The former Melrose standout, one of 16 players from the Land of Enchantment on the ENMU roster, has 2 receptions in 2021 and both have resulted in touchdowns. Last Saturday night, he caught a 6-yard touchdown pass early in the second quarter of ENMU’s wild 50-47 come-from-behind Green Chile Bowl victory over Western New Mexico at Ben Altamirano Field in Silver City. Greyhounds head coach Ty Hiatt told Prep Redzone New Mexico that Bailey has proven to be a valuable addition to the ENMU offense as a true freshman. “We’re a young football team, so we knew that if we were going to play Devon and not redshirt him, we wanted him to get in early,” Hiatt said. “He’s 6-5 and runs like a deer. Now we just have to get to the winter and put some weight on him.” Defensively, former Centennial standout <strong>[player_tooltip player_id="26168" first="Karsten" last="Rueckner"]</strong> has emerged as a major contributor to the ENMU defense as a true freshman. Saturday, he was one of the starting 11 and finished with four tackles, third highest on the team. “[player_tooltip player_id="26168" first="Karsten" last="Rueckner"] did some really great things,” Hiatt said. Former Eunice standout <strong>Cameron Santa-Cruz</strong>, a redshirt freshman, tied for the team high in tackles with five. <strong>Kevin McCracken</strong> (Rio Rancho) and <strong>Kendrick Milford</strong> (La Cueva) are two of ENMU’s top defensive linemen. “Cameron is a great safety and a great tackler in space,” Hiatt said. “He made some tremendous plays, both on defense and special teams.” Kelley Lee, Hiatt’s predecessor, made recruiting New Mexico a priority, and Hiatt looks to continue those efforts in the 2022 and 2023 classes, and beyond. “Recruiting in-state is going very well,” Hiatt said. “It helps we’ve won the Chile Bowl for 17 consecutive years. We’re hoping to set up a future date with New Mexico Highlands in the next couple of years. That’s big for us. “We know our roster is never going to be consist entirely of New Mexico only kids because we also recruit Arizona, California and Texas. But we want the best players from here that don’t go to New Mexico or New Mexico State to come to Eastern.” Western New Mexico has 9 players from the state on its 2021 roster, eight of whom are freshmen. First-year head coach Philip Vigil vowed to aggressively recruit the state searching for players talented enough to play at the Div. II level. “We’re going to win and we’re going to win big here,” Vigil said after WMNU’s heartbreaking loss to the Greyhounds. “We’re going to recruit New Mexico. We’re going to get a lot of high school kids out of New Mexico. That’s going to be our base. We’re going to recruit from home out. “New Mexico high school football gets a bad rap sometimes. But there’s good football in New Mexico and there’s good kids in New Mexico. We have to get them here and wear the purple and gold.” <strong>RECRUITING UPDATE</strong>: Rio Rancho RB <strong>[player_tooltip player_id="26227" first="Zach" last="Vigil"]</strong> has been eagerly awaiting his first offer. Several FCS schools, including Weber State and Drake, have expressed interest. However, his first offer might come from a Power 5 school. UCLA Director of Player Personnel Ethan Young attended Rio Rancho’s practice on Monday and spoke with Vigil and OL <strong>[player_tooltip player_id="26229" first="Cayden" last="Romero"]</strong>, who has been offered by New Mexico and camped at Kansas State this summer. “The connection with UCLA came about very recently, just this week,” Vigil told Prep Redzone New Mexico. “I knew he (Young) was coming to our practice on Monday for Cayden and me. The conversation was very open and very mature. We talked about the recruiting process at UCLA as well as other things.” https://twitter.com/ENMUAthletics/status/1447260641937428483 https://twitter.com/ENMUFootball/status/1447054963109027844 https://twitter.com/zacharyvigil21/status/1447780856676900866 https://twitter.com/CaydenRomero/status/1447786864627236865 https://twitter.com/Brandega/status/1446712708364001287