To me this is Sam Houston searching for a rival. We already know who our rivals are and they certainly aren't Sam Houston
Apparently we have a new rival?
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To me this is Sam Houston searching for a rival. We already know who our rivals are and they certainly aren't Sam Houston
Right now, it may be that we are their rival, but they aren't ours. But it's good to see Coach Walden drumming up positive buzz on our program. There hasn't been this kind of excitement since Mike Price first took over the program. Go Miners.
UTEP has no rivals besides NMSU. Anyone else you’re claiming as a rival, is not.
Remember when someone claimed utsa was our biggest rival? Same energy.
It’s more like rubbing salt into the wound than a rivalry. UTEP athletics has performed so poorly we are now in a conference with SHSU. 99.99% of UTEP fans don’t give a shit about SHSU and couldn’t even tell you what city their campus is located in.
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The last school UTEP was “on the verge” of being rivals with, was Nevada. That was just basketball too. No school since then has come close to being that close. That was 20 years ago!
Conference realignment and consistent losing has destroyed any chance of forming rivalries. Lack of consistent out of conference scheduling hasn’t helped either.
Conference realignment and consistent losing has destroyed any chance of forming rivalries. Lack of consistent out of conference scheduling hasn’t helped either.
UAB and UTEP were rivals in basketball a decade or more ago, but that was during Barbee's time as coach. Maybe Floyd's first season. We were rivals with Memphis during that same period. But it's been too many years since UTEP was that good at anything. But maybe Coach Walden can change that. We'll see.
That's true and I would add it was mostly because Barbee recruited the same kids UAB and Memphis did, or those these two school snubbed. Our players wanted to beat and play well against those school.
I don't remember any individual players for UAB. I do remember UTEP has had more overtime, double overtime and even a triple overtime game against UAB than any other team we ever played against. And it's true that Barbee recruited some Memphis high school talent to UTEP. Randy Culpepper is one. I think Jeremy Williams was another. Gabe McCulley, also.
That doesn’t make it a rivalry though. Maybe better games than normal, but not a rivalry.
So what those guys were from Memphis? Memphis didn’t even recruit them.
Unfortunately this is probably what every MWC school said about UTEP when they split and UTEP trying for years to hold onto those old feuds.
Sadly this is what UTEP athletics has become: we once hated BYU, Colorado St, Boise, Nevada, UNM and now we’re stuck trying to make bad blood with Sam Houston St.
At least until they pass us up too.
Stakes. What did UAB and UTEP ever play for? 3rd place in CUSA? Do you really miss UAB being on the schedule? I don’t think UTEP ever played them prior to joining CUSA.
Nevada had good teams and played UTEP for stakes. All things considered, that “rivalry” is somewhat of a stretch too. Still more than anything people try to pass off now, ie Sam Houston or UTSA.
Start a poll, who fans would rather see UTEP play. Nevada wins 3 to 1 easily.
I hated Nevada but only in basketball. The football was meh.
I think UTSA might be a closer vote just because so many alumni like in San Antonio. So I think that may skew opinions a little.
Okay, BUT their basketball team is terrible and our football team was terrible most times we played. The only time we played for “stakes”, they were up 21-0 after the 1st quarter and then it was time for fans to have sex in the back of a pickup truck.
Unless we play them on a semi-regular basis, what rivalry could there ever be?
I still think NM is a rival. Yes, to a lesser extent than it's been but still a rival.
If you are saying that competing for a conference championship against a regularly scheduled opponent is the stakes needed to make it a rivalry game, then it has been decades since the football team has been relevant. Basketball has been hit or miss since Coach Haskins retired. If Billy Gillespie or Doc Sadler had stayed longer, rivalries might have developed. Tony Barbee had us in position to make a rivalry against Memphis, but that only lasted a few seasons. My outlook on a rivalry against Memphis is skewed because I had a supervisor at work who graduated from Memphis and was a diehard fan. I loved it that the Miners beat Memphis twice on their own court. One thing that can make a rivalry is that fans of two teams really don't like each other and rabidly support their own team. New Mexico State is the only school that really qualifies for UTEP. The Miners have been uncompetitive for so long in any sport that rivalry games are hard to come by. But maybe Coach Walden can change that. It would be nice to see.
💯
UTRGV in the batters box. The battle of the better taco, 956 vs 915, HEB vs no HEB, no sabo kids vs un poquito kids
By that logic it sounds like SHSU may be the closest thing we have to a rival aside from NMSU. I agree conference realignment has killed many rivalries but maybe it’s time for new ones to emerge. All it takes is one game that ends in controversial fashion or player or a coach insulting rival fans and bad blood can start brewing.
On point that realignment has killed most of the rivalries UTEP had. But we can still develop new ones. The issue now is developing teams that are competitive enough to get fans in the seats. Our fans and the other teams' fans both. It can't be a rivalry if fans on both sides are staying away in droves. CUSA is below average as far as attendance goes. UTEP football has pretty much sucked for the past decade, yet we are still in the top three teams in attendance. This means that even the better CUSA teams aren't drawing the crowds. No rivalries that way. I'm looking forward to seeing what Scottie Walden can do to change the experience for the fans. Go Miners.
The new CUSA I've noticed a few things, SHSU wants to be UTEP's rival (Who the hell else is there lol.) I don't mind it, and the other is that Liberty fans, really don't think too highly of UTEP. They understand ZERO about UTEP, and that's to be expected I suppose... I do, interact regularly with a few Liberty fans, who are pretty cool... Just as a whole, they are CLEARLY the BYU of the conference, and not just due to religion lol.
SHSU could be a rival, but they’re not right now. Not even close. Their fans don’t show up to anything, it’s going to be hard for us to care about each other.
The lob from Stone to Caracter for the win at the Don over UAB, for CUSA regular season title.
Don't miss UAB at all, making us look bad by getting rid of football and then a year later being better than us.
That was more on us making ourselves look bad. My understanding is the UAB is part of the same university system as Alabama and that the Tide didn't want anyone taking even a little gravy off their plate. UAB survived the shakeup because of strong fan support and strong support by the UAB hierarchy.
It’s funny now but we’re gonna cry later when it happens.
You know it, Mack Brown built that football program from the ground up. UTEP/Center would never be able to get his (or his agent's) number 🤣
They haven’t even played a down of football yet, let’s pump the brakes on them surpassing UTEP. If you think El Paso has mostly shitty high school football players, imagine what they have in the RGV.
Mack Brown is just there for a paycheck.
People cried about UAB football going away and now they’re back to getting 10,000 for most games, like before they were shut down.
Not as drastic, be we go through the same with the UT system. We have the 2nd largest endowment in the world, but UT gets 90% of it and the rest of the UT schools get 10%. Kudos to UAB for begging, borrowing, and stealing (not saying they did, just saying doing anything they could to keep their program). We would have cried, complained and accepted our rotten luck.
Brown built the blue print of how UTRGV would start and grow their program, before moving on to coach UNC. Just the fact that they had the money to get Brown involved shows they are serious. We can't even fill out a basketball roster because we don't have enough NIL money.
I don't know about RGV football, but UTRGV are recruiting heavily here in San Antonio. I know of several kids in Football, Soccer, and Basketball that are getting offers from them. I don't know anyone who has taken the offer, but I do know of kids that have taken an A&M San Antonio scholarship in basketball over UTRGV so it seems we are safe for now.
How about our rivalry with Colorado football then? There was a lot of back and forth with them this year? 😂😂
I think Kentucky Basketball is a rival. I don't like them and I hate that they didn't want to play Utep in the anniversary game . Instead Utep had to play Western Kentucky. If Kentucky likes it or not but Kentucky and Texas Western will always be linked together.
I’m not worried about UTRGV football. I’m sure they’ll have a lot of enthusiasm when they start but just because Mack Brown was involved 5 years ago doesn’t guarantee any success. Look at how quickly UT football fell off after he left and he was way more involved with that program. 5 years is an eternity in college football.
