sacks
10 Jadrian Taylor UTEP
53 Praise Amaewhule UTEP
Tackles for a loss
8 Praise Amaewhule UTEP
First down def
21 UTEP
32 Fla. Atlantic
3rd down conversion % def
13 UTEP
21 Fla. Atlantic
4th down conversion % Def
24 UTEP
Passes intercepted
29 Fla. Atlantic
46 UTEP
Pass Yds Allowd
21 Fla. Atlantic
39 UTEP
Rush Def
10 UTEP
101 Fla. Atlantic
TOP
11 UTEP
108 Fla. Atlantic
This all comes down to prior competition. Nobody believes we have beat anyone and they figure our 6-1 record is inflated. They may be right, but every time I kind of thought that this season the Miners dominated the other team.
The Miners have been judged to lose and lose pretty big to UNM, and kept them way under what the oddsmakers predicted. The Minrs are averaging holding opponents 12 points below predicted scores. LA Tech was held 30 points under their predicted score of 33.
I have been burned by orange faith before and I have held my enthusiasm until I felt it was no fluke, and the Southern Miss and especially the LA Tech games made it clear to me that this team is legit. I still don't think they are ready to play for the National Championship, but until someone from CUSA shows me they are head and shoulders above the rest, they are just another CUSA team and we damned sure have no business being afraid of any of them. I still like the Miners to win and hold FAU to under 20 points. Our defense is real. They believe in themselves and have formed a brotherhood, a team, that is determined to not let their brothers down. There is something special happening with the defense. It is the coolest thing in the world when you get a group of men to pull together that way. They feed off of pushing each other to be super and living up to the pushing feeds the frenzy. FAU may be a decent team and I think that they are, but the are running into a buzz saw. A hungry living, crazy buzz saw. The first series, if we have the ball, I don't have huge expectations, but if we are on defense they are going to be shocked. We get the ball back and now begin the grind again, this time with more success. And so it goes, shocking defense and the Chinese water torture of offense.