Now comes the hard part

That one was easy to pick. It wasn't even surprising UTEP led New Mexico State 31-0 after three quarters.<p>

The next two are also easy - in the opposite sense.  UTEP, 1-2, will be UTEP, 1-4, after losing at national power Texas Saturday and losing at home to new national upstart Houston the following week.<p>

The hard part will be how UTEP acts, in its head, the rest of the season, especially Coach Mike Price. It now looks like the fourth losing season in a row, and worse than 4-6 or 5-7. <p>

The No. 1 thing to watch is hoe Price acts. His disposition. If he changes toward grumpier, it's all over. If he shows he feels pressure, it's over.<p>

Recall, predecessor Gary Nord didn't go down slowly. He went down fast in his final season.<p>
Recall Nord first needed a "four-year," plan, and everyone said OK. Fans realized Charley Bailey had left him a good team in 2000. And Nord went to a bowl. But then there were no players left. OK, four-year plan it is.<p?

Then, after a couple of losers it was his "five-year plan,"and just about everyone said, "welllllll, OK, if you really need fiiiive years. We began to wonder if recruiting was going all right, or not.<p>

Then he said he needed six years, and that's when the tough questions started and the pressure was put on this so-far popular coach by the fans and media. Soon we could see Nord's disposition erode. Soon he was saying there was no way anyone would run HIM out of town. There the day he said he was guaranteed to be back because his assistants had just been offered new contracts. We found out that wasn't the case. We figured Nord was just trying to shut everyone up.<p>

We still liked Gary Nord, as we like Mike Price now, but Nord had had enough. The pressure was getting to him, the constant negatives about another terrible season.<p>

I think a lot of ex Miner coaches felt heat and did things that came back to turn the tide against them. There was the famous promise, "We will not embarrass you," only to see the Miners fall flat back in the terrible 1980s.<p>

Watch Mike Price. I think at 1-4 there will be a lot of heat. He'll point out that losses were to nationally  ranked teams: Kansas, Texas and Houston. The retort to that is, "How come you're not ranked by now?"<p>

Houston is. Other schools the size of UTEP, such as Boise State, Fresno State and Hawaii have had nationally ranked seasons. Little Tulsa is a power compared to UTEP. Tulsa is a little school where most people in town identify with the Oklahoma Sooners, a long car trip away.<p> Houston is in a pro town, not a college town.<p>

If Price starts losing his cool when such hard-hitting questions are asked, then ....<p>

We're going to have to watch Mike Price and see.<p>

My personal belief continues to be: Nobody is going to fire Mike Price from UTEP. He'll either pull through from this, or he'll get angry and huff out of town, or he'll just bite his tongue and say he's had a nice ride and it's time to retire to, as they all say, spend more time with the family.<p>

Watching what Price does AFTER he's 1-4 is the key here.<p>

Comments

[Jefe]

NMSU is w/o doubt one of the worst D1 schools in the land!
You gotta feel bad for Coach Walker as, he inherited NADA from Hal Dumme!

Tough to say how good Utep really is. NMSU made PV A&M look pretty good too.

Well, at least the storms made sure no one watched the debacle.

[Prospero]

The Houston game is huge. If we could win that game here in the Sun Bowl, it would give us a great amount of momentum.

[Maven]

A win is a win, regardless of the level of competition. Besides, did we really want NMSU to be tough this year with the next two games on the scheduled?

Let's hope for at the very least a split in the next two games.

[esteban garcia]

aw, you just can't keep comparing utep to places like tulsa, hawaii, houston, boise st., or such so why don't you just say what we all know? That we have to import african american athletes of second and third tier talent levels to come to a city of hispanics
and to learn to immediately adopt it as their hometown and play well from the start.
No one talks about the culture shock for these kids. And don't compare it to the era of the 1966 basketball team or some of the early bobby dobbs teams because that was much less culture shock compared with today. these kids need time to adjust that other athletes at other schools don't.

[Aggiefan]

Congrats to the Miners on a well played game. Good luck the rest of the way in CUSA.

[Hopeful Thinker]

Joe,
We still have Tulane, SMU and Marshall as wins according to your predictions, right? UAB and Rice look really NMSU-like right about now (Rice is in ESPN bottom 10). If we can get those two wins it would put us at six wins. The Houston game is going to be a HUGE game. If the fans show up along with the team... We have a fighting chance, more so if they(Houston)are gassed and beat up from the Tech game.

[just a thought]

Hopeful,

MP lost at Tulane with a more talented UTEP team, Marshall always has good athletes (sometimes great in Pennington and Randy Moss) and SMU is an away game in November. I wouldn't count our chickens. Just saying...

[SM]

Great game for the Miners. I was in town to watch, but left after the rain delay (my 8 month old son told me the Aggies were in for a whipping, so I listened to him and we all left). Yes, the Aggies are real bad and are in search of an identity that will not be found this year. But the Miners look strong and should be able to move the ball in C-USA.

For the Aggies, this is a season-long root canal. I am excited for basketball season, but then again, our two best frontcourt players are out until the second semester (McKines and Gilenwater). Arg!!!! One thing us Aggies have learned in the last few years is patience.

[John Franco]

Getting that UT game at the Sun Bowl last year sure doesn't look that great anymore. Sure it sold out and helped get more season tickets sold last year, but now UTEP has to play #2 UT at home in the fourth game of the season. Whatever momentum UTEP built against NMSU high school, will be destroyed. Unfortunately, the team will probably get pretty banged up in the injury department, so we can expect another bad loss against Houston. There are no for sure wins for the rest of this season. Let's hope Stull can get his buddy Price to go away quietly.

[Lowercase Ray]

John,
getting to play the #2 in the nation is never a bad thing. There is no pressure on you, as you're not expected to win and if you can play a respectable game in most peoples eyes you've done well. Any time you can get a home and away from schools like Texas, TT and Kansas, you jump at the chance. Normally those schools will require that you play twice in their stadium for them to play once at your place. That's the way it is when they're are holding all the aces. Constant playing against the big guys will inflate the number of losses you have to endure, but it is going to push UTEP to play better football. I remember Rice getting slaughtered by Texas and TT only to turn around and have the best year that they've had in CUSA last year. I keep hearing how UTEP should be at a level with Boise St, or a Utah. Well that is how those schools have gotten to that level; they've shown by playing and now actually beating some of those school, that they are at a higher level then your regular mid-level schools. One last thing to think about, by having eligible recruits (and parents of) see UTEP playing some of the best schools on tv, they draw positive consideration from that. After all, if they can't play for the best teams, the next best thing is to play for a team who will play against the best teams.

You do make a good point in that the coaches should stress to the players to stay away from possible injury situations. The real fight for UTEP will begin in conference play. The best scenario would be for the team to be playing effective and to start off healthy going into it. Tulsa has been taken down a level because of the injuries they've sustained. Do you want to beat Tulsa? Then stay healthier then they do!

[John Franco]

I agree with you Lowercase that playing a team like UT in Austin gives UTEP exposure to recruits, but with the direction the MIners are going, it is in a negative way. I predict the score of this game to be 55-3, with UTEP on the losing end obviously. If this deal would have been made when UTEP was going to bowl games, I could see your logic. Instead it will make it even harder to recruit those second tier players who hardly want to play for a team that is nothing but a doormat from C-USA.

[CLEOFITZWITZ]

Name the last time UTEP has been the CUSA doormat.

[Lowercase Ray]

I'm thinking closer to a 20 pt loss. It may be that I'm too optomistic, but I believe that this team has gotten the worst behind them now. Well unless they start getting injuries as they did last year. It's still early in the season so I'm trying to keep the faith going.

[just a thought]

I agree with LRay and CLEO (surprise). I predicted a 7-5 season and that is definitely still plausible.

Get a split between Tulsa and Houston and win the rest of the games that you're supposed to. Losing to 5 bowl teams is still okay in my book.

[marcus dormant]

time to change coach, Mike price think utep belong to him and is family, it stinks