Bienvenido a Mexico. Jugamos basquetbol.

This weekend, while many students are enjoying their three-day weekend, the ISU men’s basketball team will be in Monterrey, Mexico.

The Cyclones will play a three-game exhibition tour. The team is taking advantage of an NCAA rule that allows collegiate teams to participate in a summer tour once every four years.

Since the exhibition tour games occur after the 2004-05 school year has begun, Iowa State’s five newcomers are able to practice and compete in the games.

“It gives the young guys a chance to play with the older guys and see how they mesh,” head coach Wayne Morgan said. “It gives us a chance to see where we’re weak at. It gives us a chance to see our strengths.”

With just three returning starters from last year’s NIT semifinal team, senior center Jared Homan said these 10 days of practice are beneficial to building team chemistry.

“We want to find out other players habits, their tendencies, how they play,” Homan said. “These guys haven’t been on campus all summer, so I’m just getting to know them for the first time.”

Homan said the team is looking for the new players to come in and play significant minutes.

“We’ve always had a big core of guys that were returning, which is not so for this group at all,” Homan said.

With a young team, Morgan said the Cyclones may be one of the most inexperienced teams in the Big 12.

“But I think we have the talent and it will give us a better chance to come together,” Morgan said.

Even with so many newcomers, the bench is deeper than it has been in previous seasons, Homan said.

“This is probably the most depth we’ve had in my four years here; it is a very versatile group,” Homan said. “We’ll be able to run this year a lot.”

Morgan said the practice is more important than the competition Iowa State will face.

“We’re looking forward to the competition, but the practice is where we’ll be able to learn some things,” Morgan said. “When we get down there and play, we’ll see some things we got to really work on or maybe some things we can exploit.”

Homan said defense and rebounding are the two areas getting the most focus because in high school or prep school, those aspects aren’t emphasized very much.

“We’re really focusing on that, so that should really benefit us when the season comes and down the road because we got an early start on it,” Homan said.

The Cyclones will play without freshman guard Tasheed Carr, who is still resting a hip injury suffered during a summer basketball league game.

Carr said his hip isn’t 100 percent, but is coming along.

He was injured during a game when he slipped on a wet spot on the floor.

“When it first happened, the only thing going through my mind was that I couldn’t play basketball anymore,” Carr said. “I was scared; I thought it was broken. A lot of things were going through my mind.”

Carr said he was relieved when he was told his hip was just dislocated and he would be able to play in a few months.