Joe on utepia | The place for commentary for UTEP athletics

UTEP to Mountain West?

UTEP should put on a "come-from-behind" blitz to become a member of the Mountain West Conference now that TCU is leaving for the Big East. That leaves a nine-school league now.

Roadblocks for UTEP:

1. Houston, and possibly SMU or Tulsa, would also be fits.

2. The Mountain West has wanted an automatic berth in the Sun Bowl. If that's a contingent on UTEP getting in, there may be a roadblock for that, too: CBS TV likely would not want a Mountain West team. The league is based in small population areas. You can't sell national TV ads, at national prices, when clients don't think the audience will be a big one.

3. A minor problem is that UTEP is hosting this year's men's and women's Conference USA basketball tournaments. There'd be some discomfort with a defetor being a host.

NOTES: The Mountain West core: Air Force, Colorado State, New Mexico, San Diego State, UNLV and Wyoming.

Boise State, Fresno State and Nevada are joining.

Utah is leaving for the Pac-10, BYU says it's going independent, at least in football, and now TCU is leaving for the Big East.

So the Mountain West is nine schools.

This may be UTEP's last big chance to catch on with a conference that will remain with the big schools in the NCAA. Other conferences are picking apart C-USA (Louisville and Cincinnati) and the WAC (Fresno, Boise, Nevada).

But if Houston wants in the Mountain West, and Houston has made no bones about looking outside C-USA, then UTEP is an underdog .

That is, unless the nine-school Mountain West chooses not to just add one team for a 10-team league. It could pick up three teams for a 12-school league.

Houston and (SMU, UTEP, Tulsa). And might as well add in Louisiana Tech?

Commander Floyd

It appears UTEP Basketball Coach Tim Floyd has won the veteran Miners over much faster than many coaches could do so.

Turning free-for-all attitudes on offense into patient passing, and passive defense into the team's new identity, dee-fense, is not easy, especially when a new coach takes over a team of guys who have only one year of eligibility remaining.

Beating Michigan in Atlantic City Saturday, and doing it in a low-scoring game, was surprising. Michigan at that. Holy smokes!

But I'm not buying that Conference USA Player of the Year
Randy Culpepper did not start because of the "matchup" situation vs. Michigan. He didn't start because Floyd was showing who's the boss now.

NOTE: Somebody tell me that 35 bowls is not too many. UTEP, at 6-6, should not be going to a bowl.

The stately Hyundai Sun Bowl, with a week left in the regular season, isn't guaranteed of getting a bowl-eligible team from its contract with the Pac-10 Conference. Sunny may have to go find a leftover. But Washington should beat Washington State, finish 6-6, and come here as the Pac-10 No. 4. The Huskies would meet  somebody from the ACC. I'm hoping Miami, but it could be BC or North Carolina.

There are not enough winning teams to go around. And several of the bowls will have matchups the networks would never, ever, consider televising if it was a regular-season game.

Cheers for the Miner players, who met the standards set for bowl eligibility. Now who in El Paso will travel to watch the team play in its bowl game?

Evolving Miners

It's still infancy time in regard to Coach Tim Floyd's re-making of UTEP's basketball program into a clone of by-the-book offense and guard your man. That's the way the bigs in the world of college basketball play.

This is a team that won 26 games under the departed run, gun and ho-whee Coach Tony Barbee. Everybody's back except the two big guys, 6-10 Arnett Moultrie (transfer to Mississippi State) and 6-9 Derek Caracter (to the LA Lakers). That's going to hurt the Miners big on some nights.

At 3-1 after Tuesday's 73-56 long-range bombing of rival New Mexico State, this infant's features are beginning to take shape.

There will be no power and might, and no pizzaz, by the big men, at least not in the immediate future. They might look good against some of the little twerps left on the pre-conference sked. NMSU outrebounded the Miners 40-27 and now UTEP goes under the big-time lights in Atlantic City Friday and Saturday vs. Georgia Tech and then the winner between Michigan and Syracuse.

Do you believe in miracles? I don't, in Atlantic City, anyway. UTEP will be 3-3 when it goes to New Mexico State Tuesday - and that will be tossup on the betting board.

All was well last night. It was the adage of looking good when your shots fall. The Miners made 12 baskets from 3-point range on 24 attempts. (Polk 5-8). Hitting half one's 3-point attempts is well above average; it isn't going to happen most of the time. NMSU made 3 of 13, a statistic that belongs in a freezer. So that was the scoreboard difference. NMSU's big rebounding advantage couldn't overcome that shooting. You can't rebound if the ball goes swish.

Yes, it's still infancy time and much too early to think the win over those Aggies is cause to whoop it up.

But, yes, UTEP will be well ahead in the win column when Conference USA play starts in early January. Note: UTEP still has a road game at BYU and a home game vs. Texas Tech prior to C-USA play. Do you believe in miracles vs. those two? Well, maybe one. And a win over either would be Floyd's first big imprint on turning the Miners from  run, gun and ho-whee to a team that plays the in-control style of the real big schools in college basketball.

The future?

Forecast a mostly sunny season.

Miners in 'control?'

It may be a tug of war between Miner coach/player wills in tonight's rivalry home game against New Mexico State.

New UTEP coach Tim Floyd is installing his philosophy of smart shooting, among other side dishes that go with smart basketball. He recently said that players who get out of control would sit a spell on the bench before going back into the game.

UTEP players are used to anybody shooting. Floyd's style is there's a 1, 2, and 3 shooter, in that order, and shots are supposed to come off of the offensive pattern unless there's a big gap (for a layup, say).

Tonight there will be excitement running through veins on both teams. Can UTEP remain in Floyd mode, or will willy nilly surface as the pace of the game races?

Recall that UTEP players were in Floyd mode in the season opener against Pacific. They held a double-digit halftime lead. Then, late in the game, with Pacific on a hot streak, willy nilly resurfaced. UTEP lost. Since, they played two little guys (Mercer and Western Carolina).

Now come the formidable Aggies.

Let's see who controls the team tonight, the horseman or the horses?

If it's the horseman, the Miners should pull it out.

 

 

Trevor like Favre, tough but creaky

It's good news for Trevor Vittatoe that he's the starter at QB for UTEP's regular-season finale. Like Price says, you've got to admire how tough he is. Are his ankles like crushed glass by now? He's turning into Brett Favre — too tough to knock out of the lineup. But, like Favre, it's not his old self anymore.

But to beat Tulsa, UTEP will have to pull its biggest upset - pretty close to ever!

Likely UTEP will finish 6-6 and some bowl will get stuck with the Miners. Editorially, we're saying that UTEP may not be able to afford to go to a bowl game should it be invited. Many schools lose money when they go to mid-level bowls.

This will go down as a season where senior leadership was lacking, veteran receivers still dropped balls and HOW IN THE WORLD does a team get so many offensive linemen injured?

It was the easiest early season sked for the Miners - maybe ever: There was a good point made when UTEP was 5-1 and heading to play at 1-5 UAB. Had they played each other's schedule, the records would have been reversed. UTEP is 1-4 since going 5-1.

Unless UTEP does pull the big upset, and finish 7-5, the Miners should quietly pack up the gear for the season. And don't expect Tulsa to let down. Tulsa is going for the C-USA title and the Liberty Bowl. It's about the only status bowl C-USA really has.

Thirty-five bowls are way too many. Seventy of the 120 schools go to a bowl? They're turning college football into what parents have made little kid sports nowadays - everybody gets a trophy.

Trevor like Favre, tough but creaky

It's good news for Trevor Vittatoe that he's the starter at QB for UTEP's regular-season finale. Like Price says, you've got to admire how tough he is. Are his ankles like crushed glass by now? He's turning into Brett Favre — too tough to knock out of the lineup. But, like Favre, it's not his old self anymore.

But to beat Tulsa, UTEP will have to pull its biggest upset - pretty close to ever!

Likely UTEP will finish 6-6 and some bowl will get stuck with the Miners. Editorially, we're saying that UTEP may not be able to afford to go to a bowl game should it be invited. Many schools lose money when they go to mid-level bowls.

This will go down as a season where senior leadership was lacking, veteran receivers still dropped balls and HOW IN THE WORLD does a team get so many offensive linemen injured?

It was the easiest early season sked for the Miners - maybe ever: There was a good point made when UTEP was 5-1 and heading to play at 1-5 UAB. Had they played each other's schedule, the records would have been reversed. UTEP is 1-4 since going 5-1.

Unless UTEP does pull the big upset, and finish 7-5, the Miners should quietly pack up the gear for the season. And don't expect Tulsa to let down. Tulsa is going for the C-USA title and the Liberty Bowl. It's about the only status bowl C-USA really has.

Thirty-five bowls are way too many. Seventy of the 120 schools go to a bowl? They're turning college football into what parents have made little kid sports nowadays - everybody gets a trophy.

UTEP basketball: Why only 2,152 fans?

How can this be?

UTEP sold out its first basketball game Friday with 12,222 fans in a loss to Pacific. It was "Paint the Town Orange" week. A lot of hoopla.

In Game 2 of the season, on Sunday, the announced crowd was 2,152 in an easy win over Mercer, a little school from Georgia.

Question: Was 2,152 the smallest crowd for a regular-season game in the history of the Don Haskins Center, built in 1976?

And all the fanfare about Tim Floyd returning as coach? All the support? All the new-found love of Miner basketball?

Yes, it was an afternoon game, on a Sunday, and only two days after the season opener. But, c'mon!

Also:

For some years now, the Haskins Center has not held 12,222 for basketball. Handicap seating took away some spots. The 2004-05 UTEP media guide lists capacity at 12,000. I've always heard it's not quite 12K. Why call it 12,222, then?

There were empty seats at the sellout. It's common for schools and sports franchises to count season-ticket holders who don't attend a game. After all, they did buy a ticket.

So why not count all the "sold" tickets for Sunday's game? Surly UTEP sold more than 2,152 season tickets. The team won 26 games last year, was 15-1 in Conference USA, and made it to the NCAA Tournament. Now favorite son Floyd is back.

What gives in Utepia?

It's not automatic for T. Floyd

It was not Tim Floyd as advertised in UTEP's basketball season opener. He's got some practice-session yelling to do before the senior-dominated Miners return to Haskinsesque.

Pacific 66, UTEP 61. Only the low score was reminiscent of how Don Haskins coached and his No. 1 disciple, Floyd, has carried in other college stints the last quarter of a century.

It was a bottom line of UTEP having no poise in the clutch, no smart shoooting. And this game was lost with three minutes to play.

At 59-50, Pacific hit its 11th 3 pointer of the night. Then Pacific dunked on an offensive rebound. Then Pacific scored on a layup.Uh-oh. Never mind the departed Haskins. Floyd turned over on the bench.

UTEP? Randy Culpepper was out of control with a fancy attempt at a layup at clutch time. And then Christian Polk threw up a scud. No smart shots.

This is not surprising. Floyd has work to do in bringing smart basketball back to Utepia. I'm guessing Culpepper, the Conference USA reining player of the year, is in the doghouse on this one, especially after going 0-6 in the second half, but still shooting - and not stopping his man on defense.

I'm guessing Floyd will have some Haskinesque in Culpepper by the conference season. In the meantime, there's some yelling to do on the practice court before this becomes Tim Floyd's UTEP Miners.

 

Fans will love Floyd's style

I'm all for the Tim Floyd style of coaching college basketball athletes. Discipline trumps how many 3-pointers you can swish in  row (when you're on a hot streak).

I'm eager to take note of how Conference USA Player of the Year Randy Culpepper will react to having a governor on his offensive accelerator. Culpepper has been living with the green light to shoot from anywhere at any time.

Now Floyd makes it clear that leading scorers are not his star players. Rebounders and good defense make him smile.

I can't make my point using last year's statistics because the Miners finished 26-7 after going 15-1 in the conference. There was some major talent, albeit not disciplined talent, on that team (Caracter and Moultrie, who are gone now). But recall that the Miners were 25-7 when they entered the first round of the NCAA Tournament, only to lose 77-59 to a talented-but-disciplined Butler team.

Earlier run-and-shoot teams of previous coach Tony Barbee didn't fare well because their mistakes trumped their leaping ability and their twirling-like-an-ice skater slam dunks every once in a while.

I'm thinking more of earlier teams that had talent, but the guys, including Culpepper,  could not be counted on to play smart in close games. Stepping out of bounds, turnovers ...  oops, the two free throws didn't fall. Nor did the next two.

When UTEP dominated the WAC in the 1980s, it was because good players played disciplined, team-style play. You can't get guys with all the trimmings to sign at UTEP, a far away school, but you can get a pretty good meal out of defense and discipline and enough offensive skill to put the team over the top. In those days of successes Don Haskins coached and Floyd recruited. Don't forget Rus Bradburd did some good recruiting too.

This is an oft-told story about that time, probably at the end of the '70s.

UTEP had a few poor seasons under Haskins, who was said to be washed up. There was no NCAA Tournament for Haskins in nine years. Floyd, his recruiter, supposedly told His Coachency that he can't convince good talent to come to El Paso if all Haskins was going to do is have them play defense.

Recall an old quip used on a lot of defensive-minded coaches, who liked to play with slow, calculating offenses: "Don Haskins was the only person who could hold Nate Archibald under 20 points." Of course Archibald played in the early 70s, but by the late '70s the Miners were still deliberate and the guys wanted to be able to run on offense, not pass and set screens.

Haskins adjusted and really did dominate the 1980s with good players who were given some offensive rope - as long as they still played solid defense.

That held true until the NCAA stepped in  - twice. A telling blow was after Haskins' last big winner, the 1992 Sweet 16 team, but probation took some scholarships.

Floyd has announced that running scoring totals of players will not be posted on the scoreboard this season. His point is a good one. Often players get engrossed in how close they are to double-digit scoring - maybe even to that magic 20-point figure - that their mind is not on the small points of the game that lead to wins. Being in the right  place at all times is one specific.

Floyd is open when he says he's a Haskins-type coach, albeit with a few of his own wrinkles. After all, he's a Haskins student, just as Haskins was a Mr. Iba student at Oklahoma A&M (now Okla. St.). That means defense is No. 1. And both defensive coaches are in the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame, the big one.

I think Floyd's proven ability to recruit talent, and his defensive mindset, is what's needed to build a solid program at a school like UTEP. A good team that's good virtually every year can be had here. So can a great team every two or three years.

Fans are going to like watching Floyd's disciplined Miners once he gets his way of doing things in place. Plus it will be fun watching Floyd put that new Miner way of life in place.

There'll be no, "But Coach I had the open (35-foot) shot."

No, the players fans will enjoy most will be the ones like Fred Reynolds, Kent Lockhart,  Juden Smith, Tim Hardaway ... hey, aren't you Antonio Davis and Greg Foster? ... who were defense and team play first and point-making stars somewhere down their athletic pedigrees.

Basketball opens

Short take on UTEP's season-opening basketball opponent, University of Pacific (Stockton, Calif. — it's a brainiac school).

The Tigers return their No. 1 and No. 3 scorers from a 23-12 team. Sam Williard scored 11.7 points and got 8.4 rebounds. Terrell Smith scored 8.7 points a game.

But nobody else. The rest of the team is a bunch of transfers and two freshmen.

This week it's everybody-wear-orange - UTEP's primary color - to show loyalty to new coach Tim Floyd.

Note: Pacific's colors are Orange and Black.