Joe on utepia | The place for commentary for UTEP athletics

Should Utepia claim Caracter

Should Utepia claim Derrick Caracter as a Miner, or not?

Odds are good that he's in the weight room, or out running, as you read this. In a surprise to many, the former Utepia Miner was actually drafted by an NBA team, the world champion Los Angeles Lakers. That's despite a history of being a head case and a 325-pound balloon on feet. In his one season here he seemed fine.

Now he's been given the chance he's lived for since being a child prodigy. Recall he was in and out of different high schools and played one season in El Paso after getting the boot at Louisville.

Nice person, though, most people said. Just a tad whacked is all.

Psst, Derrick. Don't decide to be a holdout for more money, for goodness sake.

Pro sports teams usually know what they're doing. Caracter was the 58th of 60 players chosen in the annual two-round draft. It's never a cinch for a second-rounder to make the final roster. For Caracter to have a better than 50-50 shot at that, the Lakers are going to have lose some players, for whatever reasons — trade, injury, retirement. World champs don't have scrubs sitting around.

Question to posters: Will you point out that Caracter is our guy, a MINER? Or, is he just a mercenary who played only his junior year here, then left as soon as UTEP lost in the NCAA Tournament?

Hyundai Sun Bowl

Oscar really is a good boy, just like his mother Roberta has been saying for years on Hyundai car ads.

Again the Sun Bowl has been saved by locals. Oscar Leeser, president of Hyundai El Paso, convinced national headquarters to sponsor the annual Sun Bowl Football Game the next four years — the Hyundai Sun Bowl.

Jerry Rubin, CEO of El Paso-based Helen of Troy, sponsored the last six, for about $1 million a year. They were the Vitalis and then Brut Sun Bowls.

Two sponsors before that were via locals at local branches of national bank chains, Norwest and then Wells Fargo.

It all started when the Sun Bowl was the first to have (needed for survival) a corporate sponsor. That was pulled off by local insurance guy Ted Houghton Jr., who convinced Boston-based John Hancock to lend its name, and money, to the Sun Bowl back in 1987.

The four-year deals coincides with the new deal the Sunnies cut with the Pacific-10 and the ACC through 2013. Basically, the Hyundai Sun Bowl will get either the third or fourth best team from those conferences. Kickoff remains at 12:30 p.m. on New Year's Eve, this year a Friday.

El Paso really does have good people who show up when the community needs support.

Here are the Sun Bowl corporate sponsors:

John Hancock Financial Serives, 1987-93
No sponsor 1994-95
Norwest Banks 1996-98
Wells Fargo 1999-2002
Helen of Troy 2003-2009
Oscar's a Good Boy Hyundai 2010-13

Early football talk

This is just to get off the conference-realignment topic. It's so early in the summer (two days in)  to be talking football. In baseball they call it the "Hot Stove League," when talking the sport in the winter. This can be the "Swamp Cooler League."

I'm saying picking the Miners for sucess or failure in 2010 is betting for or against QB Trevor Vittatoe. A much better picture will emerge in August's two-a-days. Recall he had the almost-can't-be-tackled Donald Buckram last year, and it was not a winning season.

I see two for-sure wins: Pine Bluff and New Mexico State. It's too early to tell if there are some really bad teams out there, or if UTEP is in fact one of them.

As usual, it will be UTEP's mental health, more than anything else, that determines how things go later in the season. Mental health has been the team's demise through these four straight losing seasons. The last two games are likely losses at Arkansas and Tulsa.

There's no telling if Vittatoe will be the Vittatoe his first two years predicted he'd be, or if last season's dud as a junior is what's to be.

With Buckram, UTEP goes into the season with a running back picture brighter than in several/many/lifetimes of years?  I'm saying he's better going in than Tyler Ebell, Marcus Thomas and Howard Jackson of the 2000s. And Paul Smith and Toraino Singleton of the 1990s.

Perhaps John Harvey of the 1980s was the best in modern times? His off-the-field problems led to his demise, though.

Got any backs better than Harvey? And don't say Ivory Durio.

2010 UTEP SCHEDULE
Sep. 4 Arkansas-Pine Bluff (N) 
Sep. 10 *at Houston (N)
Sep. 18 New Mexico State(N)
Sep. 25 *Memphis (N)
Oct. 2 at New Mexico (N)
Oct. 9 *Rice (N)
Oct. 16 *at UAB (A)
Oct. 23 *Tulane (N)
Oct. 30 *at Marshall (TBA)
Nov. 6 *SMU (N)
Nov. 13 at Arkansas TBA
Nov. 20 *at Tulsa TBA

Original predictions true

Original predictions have come true. Everything in between was just fun to talk about.

It said here months ago that:

The Pac-10 would take Colorado and Utah.

An the  Big Ten would take Nebraska (and a combo of either/ors: Missouri, Syracuse, Pitt, and maybe Rutgers.

NOTE: Read Friday's (June 18) lead editorial on the Opinion Page and post your comments here.

This is moving so quickly

Now it appears Texas A&M might be considering the SEC. Could Kansas go with them, if that's the direction the Aggies head?

Is it true Kansas State MUST go wherever Kansas goes? State politics, you know? We've heard that about Utah-BYU and some other same-state schools, and that T-Tech and Baylor made it into the Big 12 because of some strong state lawmakers?

Anyway, if it's  A&M and Kansas to the SEC, then move Tulane or La Tech into the new UTEP conference as listed in the previous post about 10 minutes ago.

UTEP new conference

Everything is conjecture as schools are moving, as of Friday, to new conferences. But conjecture equals fun.

If the Big 12 is decimated, I'm agreeing with some of you that this could be a new conference for UTEP:

From decimated Big 12: Kansas, Kansas State, Baylor and Iowa.

From Conference USA: UTEP, Houston, SMU and Tulsa.

That's only an eight-school conference, but since it would not be among the big conferences anymore (new Pac-10, new Big Ten, ACC and SEC), it doesn't matter if it has two football divisions for a conference championship game. I probably wouldn't get much $$$ TV play.

As of this post: Colorado has gone to the Pac-10, Nebraska is strongly believed to be accepted into the Big Ten and Boise State is going to the Mountain West.

There is not any talk of UTEP going to the Mountain West. Wish there was. Hope UTEP, in Bob Stull's always-quiet ways, has something going there.

One hole in the above new conference: Kansas is way too good in basketball. If the Big 12 folds, Kansas gets ripped. Could the SEC find a place for Kansas? Kansas could be a top BB school in the SEC and could compete in football as well as such members as Kentucky and Vanderbilt.

Texas has to leave Big 12

The Big 12 has lost Colorado to the Pac-10. It's all but official it's lost Nebraska to the Big Ten. Even if those are the only moves, Texas cannot affort to stay in a 10-school conference. And, no, there's nobody out there to add to replace Nebraska. Don't say TCU.

Conference are trying to get to 16 members, or at least 12, in order to have two football-playing  divisions, thus a national TV ($$$$) conference championship game.

Look for speculation to be correct: Texas, Texas A&M, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and Texas Tech join Colorado in a 16-school Pac-10.

And look for Missouri to join Nebraska in the Big Ten. That gives the "Ten" 13 teams. Look for Pitt, Syracuse ... and some other eastern school if Notre Dame remains independent.

Colorado going West and Nebraska going Midwest are starts to a big dominoes fall in massive conference realignments.

Wrecking Big 12

If a pretty good conference, the Big 12, is descended upon by two raiders, that bodes terrible for the college sports world.

The Big 12 will die as a conference, big no more.

If the Big Ten were to convince Big 12 members Nebraska and Missouri to bolt (more money and higher prestige), and the Pacific-10 can get two or three more, fandom will be seeing the death of the Big 12 and the start of the feared "Super Conference" composed of just the real big football-playing schools. Iowa State wouldn't make it, nor would Baylor. Texas Tech? Kansas State? Oklahoma State? Does anybody care about University of Kansas football?

These are moves that would be to set up 16-team conferences (alliances) with eight-school divisions for conference playoff purposes (an extra $$$ football game on national TV as part of a national championship playoff).

The Big Ten, Pac-10, SEC and ACC would soon form their own alliance, perhaps even leaving the NCAA? That would be 64 teams right there.

Yes, maybe UTEP could get in with the Big 12 leftovers, or with the Mountain West. But those would all be second-tier alliances even farther away from big TV as they are now.

The Pac-10 would need six additions: Utah, Colorado  and some of the high-academic Big 12s. Academics is a reason Texas might choose the Pac-10 over the less academically prestigeous Big 12. Remember, college presidents make the conference-affiliation decisions, not football coaches. With a need of six more teams, that might mean BYU has a shot at the Pac-10.

If this is happening it's the first move in the big schools breaking away from the lessers who annoy them with their cries for equal BCS consideration  and TV money.

Hope the Big 12 can hold onto its own so others can hold onto "big-school" status.

Tim Floyd: What to expect?

Since USC has already placed restrictions on its basketball program, and since the NCAA has not charged UTEP Basketball Coach Tim Floyd with wrongdoing at USC — what the?

USC AD Mike Garrett  went to confession on his program and said booster Rodney Guillory was involved in some illegal, under-the-table doings in the recruitment of O.J. Mayo in 2007. And the NCAA is investigating if then-coach Floyd gave Guillory $1,000 to steer Mayo to the Trojans.

Note, too, that the NCAA has questions about USC football regarding some red-carpet treatment for running back Reggie Bush.

Some media outlets figured the NCAA would announce its findings regarding Floyd today (Friday). Now it's reported the NCAA will speak up at a later date.

What's up? Floyd adamantly denies cheating. When he was hired here in March, UTEP said its search found no misdealings by Floyd at USC. But as Miner fans recall from the 1990s, the NCAA can do what it darn well pleases when it gets into its inquisition robes.

The fact that USC has already imposed penalties on itself — and that Garrett has been no friend of Floyd's through all this — fans here have to wonder if the mess will somehow reach El Paso, and could it affect the UTEP program?

This investigation has gone on for many months. USC claims it has done something wrong. But does the NCAA have anything on Floyd?

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According to the Internet, here are the sanctions by USC on its men's basketball program, self-imposed in January 2010:

... Call for a one-year ban on postseason play following the current regular season, including the Pac-10 Conference tournament; a loss of one scholarship for this season and the 2010-2011 season; a loss of one coach permitted to engage in off-campus recruiting during the summer of 2010; and the loss of 20 recruiting days (from 130 to 110) for the 2010-2011 academic year.