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UTEP Cheer, Dance teams invited to Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade

So with all the negativity about UTEP football, and the Athletics Department as a whole, it's nice to have some positive news from time to time. Hopefully they'll raise the needed funds in time to participate.

Hate Towards UTEP - Why?

So going through various message boards, I have to say a lot of people have considerable hate towards UTEP (particularly former WAC conference mates)

Why?

Honestly, while I expect some hate here and there, it surprises me because we've never had the winning to inspire such dislike.

I think its interesting that some fans of the former WAC 16 place some blame on UTEP for the creation of MWC. (something about how we demanded certain concessions/schedules) I don't remember this so am I remembering things incorrectly?

Any ideas on this?

George Mason

GMU hasn’t been to the NCAAs since 2011 and they hired Tony Skinn this past offseason. His first head coaching job. Brought in 10 new players. Currently 12-2 and 1-0 in the A10. Have had 4 home games with under 3,000 in attendance. Have road wins over Toledo and Tulane. Only has 1 non-D1 win.

How is George Mason able to bring in new players and win in year 1 with a first time coach, but we are in year 3 with an experienced coach and suck ass?

NMSU vs UTEP

Wow! Crickets for this first conference rivalry game since 1961 (Borderland Conference); however, understandable. NMSU is in total rebuild mode and NMSU needs to rebuild trust & Golding has lost 3 on the road and got his shorts handed to him against a middle of the pack WAC team.

This is in LC and expect NMSU coming out firing early. Golding will hit back with his entire bench to tire out the Aggies, but UTEP’s lousy shooting will show up again.

UTEP 66
NMSU 67 (OT)
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Golding Buy Out?

I'm not sure Goldings buy out at the end of the year. I figure UTEP would be on the hook for the remainder of his contract. With that said, I think he'll get brought back for at least another year. I wish we could let him go at the end of this year that is not going as well as we all hoped. If he stays and he probably will another year and loses again it'll be 3 straight losing seasons, and I don't think Senter will have a choice. We also didn't think he'd fire Dimel and he did, so maybe Senter is more inclined than we think to try and get a winner at a cost, but doubt it. I for one will say it appears I was wrong about Golding. I preferred him over Tang when hired, but that clearly was wrong. Golding has not sold UTEP basketball in a way to bring quality talent here. It's ridiculously embarrassing to lose to LMU by 20, Abilene Christian and Texas A&M CC (Who's in a down year) and Seattle at home. He's a nice guy, but he has grossly underachieved and I'm out on him as HC until he proves otherwise. Ra Ra, nice guy or whatever he's failed here, miserably!

Free Baylor Hebb

NCAA denied his eligibility this year and UTEP requested a reevaluation. NCAA has not yet replied to UTEP's appeal. What are the odds that the NCAA will grant UTEPs request and allow Hebb to play this season?

Was ranked as a three-star recruit by Rivals.com and the No. 38 shooting guard nationally going into his senior year at Colleyville Heritage HS before eventually signing with Loyola Chicago … spent the last two seasons with Mountain West member Colorado State, playing 12 contests for the 2021-22 NCAA Tournament team before garnering more opportunities in 2022-23 … appeared in 33 contests (14 starts) last season while nailing 46.8 percent (29-62) of his shots for a total of 75 points in 12.7 minutes per contest … added 47 rebounds, 37 assists and 16 steals.

You be the coach, a fun play-along game

OK, play along, you are the Head Coach at UTEP and you must choose which of the following 3 players you would play in critical moments, ready?
Player A, B or C
Here are some stats to help your decision (Don't peek at the end of this post, but I am providing some hints to help you):

Points/Game (Higher is better, right?)
A 5.6 B 3.8 C 0.9

Rebounds/Game (You probably would want more rebounds, just saying)
A 2.1 B 1.6 C 1.1

FG % (I like guys who make their shots, scoring more than opponents is one of the keys to victory)
A 60.0% B 26.7% C 50.0%

3-Point FG% (I also like guys that make 3's)
A 37.5% B 12.5% C 0.0%

Free Throw % (They're free!)
A 84.6% B 83.3% C N/A (hasn't made a trip yet)

Fouls Per 40 Minutes (Lower is better, who wants to send opponents to the line)
A 3.6 B 5.9 C 8.6

Answers:
If you say "A" - you lose - you would never make it as a Division 1 HC - get back to work, you know nothing about basketball!
If you guess "B" - Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner! - You have what it takes to beat Texas in the NCAA Tournament!
If you guess Player "C" - I see a bright future for you, an Assistant Coach job suits you well now but keep going, I like what I see


Answer Key:
A = Elijah Jones
B = Baylor Hebb
C = Garrett Levesque

Terry fails the Barbee Standard

Last season I created a thread about what I called the Barbee Standard. (I can't find the thread; where did it go, Mods?) When Barbee took over, he received some criticism in his first few years, but each season, his team improved over the previous until he took the team to the NCAA Tournament.

I said it would be fair to judge Terry by the Barbee standard: as long as the team improves over the previous season, I wouldn't call for his firing.

Well, last season's team won more games than this season's team. Sure, it's a COVID-shortened season, so maybe that's not the only metric we can go by.

Well, another metric would be performance in the CUSA Tournament, but this season we lost the first game, just like last season. So I don't see any improvement there, either.

We did not improve. I'm officially on the "Fire Terry" bandwagon.

Walden's Football Staff Positions

Besides position coaches and coordinators, looks like Walden is bringing in a large staff:

*Recruiting Operations & Transfer portal coordinator
*General Manager
*Director of Texas Recruiting
*Director of Player Wellness
*Director of Football Operations Chief of Staff
*Director of Creative Content

I didn't know we had a large enough, budget for these positions, but that's nice that we do. Would anyone like to chime in on the duties of these positions?? What is a General Manager in college football? Compared to Football Operations? (I know Nate Poss is gone, who was in charge of team travel and logistics.)
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Pac12/SunBowl/Utep

I believe Utep can make a serious bid for the Pac 12. Utep/Sun Bowl should be working together on this. The Pac 12 can survive because they have the TV contracts and history behind it, they just have to pick the right schools.

No matter what people here think of the Sun Bowl, its a very a important bowl game and Pac can't afford to lose it.

This is where Utep/ Sun Bowl work together. Sun Bowl officials let Pac 12 know bring Utep in and Sun Bowl won't leave .

Now Pac 12 still needs to bring in some schools that will make it respectable. My question what would be some schools the Pac 12 can bring in??

I was thinking

West Division
WAZU
Oregon State
Gonzaga (Basketball only)
Boise State
San Diego State
UNLV
New Mexico
Colorado State
Utep

East Division
UTSA
Memphis
Tulane
Uconn( all sports)
UMass ( all sports)
FAU
Texas State
South Florida
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