New Mexico State’s win over UTEP last Saturday sent the Aggies into their first bye week of the season on a high, giving hope for a potential season turnaround after new the loss of key players and key positions, a challenging schedule and underwhelming play gave way to an 0-4 start.

Now, the Aggies have a full two weeks to prepare for fellow independent Liberty at home, with plenty to still refine.

While is hasn’t been statistically pretty, NM State’s defense has continued its improvement that began at the beginning of last season, keeping the Aggies in games for longer than their early season offensive production warranted. Injuries have plagued defensive coordinator Frank Spaziani’s group throughout the first month, with the likes of Terrill Hanks, Leon McQuaker, Malik Demby and Javahn Fergusson all missing time, but they’ll have a golden opportunity to heal up entering their post-homecoming stretch.

There’s been more ground to be made up on the other side of the ball for New Mexico State after losing their leading passer, rusher and receiver from last year, but since redshirt freshman Josh Adkins was promoted to the starting quarterback role — albeit for just one week — things have started coming together for the Aggie offense.

Running the ball had been a lowlight for NM State’s offense through the opening weeks but against the Miners, Adkins was able to rely on his backs — led by Christian Gibson, the first Aggie to rush for over 100 yards in a game this year — for a potent enough ground game.

Behind a season high 155 rushing yards, Adkins only had to throw the ball 18 times last Saturday, marking the fewest attempts for a New Mexico State quarterback since October of 2014 and going against the makeup of what Doug Martin generally has wanted to do on offense since he arrived in Las Cruces.

“We got to be more wide open on offense… we only threw the ball 18 times tonight and  we can’t score enough points doing that,” Martin said of his offense following the win over UTEP. “We got to get the ball thrown down field more, we got to protect a little bit better, but we’re running the ball much better — the last two weeks in particular. It’s all about our offense growing passing game-wise now.”

The Aggie offense was only responsible for 13 of their 27 points against UTEP, with the rest coming off of a rare combination of defensive and special teams touchdowns, so the need for a more dynamic air attack is evident.

New Mexico State’s offense hasn’t had the luxury of a true number one option the way they did last year after Jaleel Scott’s departure to the NFL, but the ball is being spread out, with six players already registering double-digit catches through five games.

There have been signs here-and-there of that wide open offense Martin talked about over the last couple of weeks, too, the most notable being a clutch late-game bomb from Adkins that hit Johnathan Boone in stride for a 37-yard game to help ice last week’s victory, so the ability from both quarterback and receiver is there.

It’s a huge relief that the running game will be a reliable option for NM State going forward, but as Adkins gets more comfortable, Martin will be able to call for more of those downfield shots that made the Aggies so dangerous last year. Finding that balance will be important, but that’s exactly what this extra week of practice is for.