Overlooked no more, NMSU quarterback Diego Pavia is NMSU's football leader

Aug. 21—LAS CRUCES — Diego Pavia used to wrestle with his eyes closed.

Now, to be clear, he doesn't know if he could pull it off anymore. And it's not as if he was walking out to the mat with a blindfold on, hands out and hoping for the best.

"They might do something crazy to you," Pavia chuckled.

But there was Pavia, set in a neutral position during another practice at Volcano Vista High School. He'd wait to get tied up with his chosen opponent, typically a teammate, maybe a coach. Sometimes that took him up top. Sometimes that took him low. Didn't matter.

He shut his eyes.

"Just so I could get a feel — once he does something, I could react to it," Pavia said, one of those early stabs at marrying instinct and skill vivid in his memory.

At some point, he opened his eyes. It was sometime in 2020. Pavia was a state champion wrestler and one of the best dual-threat prep quarterbacks in New Mexico. He had far-off dreams of playing in the NFL. But no Division I football offers.

A partial scholarship to wrestle at Nebraska was on the table. Pavia was uninterested. "That wasn't where my heart was," he said. "I feel like if I would've wrestled, then I would have fallen out of love with the sport."

Three years have come and gone since that decision. In that time, Pavia has a NJCAA national championship to his name as a starting quarterback, courtesy of New Mexico Military Institute's 31-13 romp over Iowa Western in the 2021 title game. A Quick Lane Bowl MVP in the same role at a different level, via New Mexico State's 24-19 win over Bowling Green in December.

Expectations have followed. This year, NMSU was picked to finish fifth in its first Conference USA preseason poll, boasting a predicted over/under win total of 6.5 by oddsmakers. The Aggies open their season Saturday on ESPN as 7.5-point favorites against UMass.

Which is all to say — everything has changed. Except for Pavia. That old wrestling mindset is still steering the ship.

"I always address the day in a dog mentality," Pavia said. "You gotta win every single day. And nothing's given — just because I'm on a poster," he motions at a poster in an NMSU office bearing his likeness, "doesn't mean we get the free win on Saturdays.

"I still gotta keep my head on straight, still go out there and win and compete."

For the 5-foot-11, 200-pound Pavia, that meant getting faster and seeing the field better this offseason. Going over tendencies with offensive coordinator Tim Beck, the most recent attempt to blend intuition into a position that requires a higher level of choreography. It also meant checking in with teammates constantly — while arriving 15 minutes before them.

Anything and everything to build on last year.

"We weren't very good. No hate, but we beat two FCS teams," Pavia said of NMSU's 7-6 overall record in 2022. "So, when you look at it, we really went 6-5 or something like that. We really didn't establish ourselves and we feel like, this year, it's a different animal — like we got something that no one else has, no one even expects out of us."

Whatever happens, happens. But Pavia will be a key part of it. For some, the signs were there, whether they knew it at the time or not.

Ahren Griego, Pavia's wrestling coach at Volcano Vista, remembers an "aura" of sorts around the kid that would practice by wrestling "the best guys in the room. And when he got tired, he was gonna wrestle the coaches.

"Half the guys are just great and they work hard and they get it done," Griego added. "He did all those things, too, but always with like, a chip on his shoulder and a level of confidence that is almost arrogance. But it's not.

"It's almost like he brainwashes himself to believe he's the best. And I feel like you almost have to do that to reach the level that he's reached."

For others, not so much. Chad Wallin, Pavia's varsity football coach at Volcano Vista, recalled when Kill came up to Albuquerque for a coaches clinic and raved about Pavia's competitiveness.

All Wallin did was shake his head in agreement.

"Everybody (walked) in and they were recruiting him and the first question was his height and this and that," he said. "He plays a lot bigger. He plays like he's 6-foot-3 and competes like he's been recruited all over the country. His attitude is what you build a team around."

Which, in some ways, is what Kill did. In Pavia, he sees his old Southern Illinois quarterback Joel Sambursky, the Salukis' career leader in passing yards (7,894), completions (559) and touchdowns (65)

It doesn't hurt that Sambursky was a wrestler, either.

"He had a chip on his shoulder and he was tougher than (expletive), mentally and physically," Kill said. "And when he got in between the white lines, he refused to lose."

A conference championship. Making it to the NFL in some way, some fashion. For NMSU and Pavia, they're just dreams right now.

"People have high expectations," Pavia said, "but I think we have higher expectations."

On Saturday, they will suddenly, inexplicably be on the table. Pavia will open his eyes. He hopes to open others, too.